"Real Love" An Evaluation

“Real Love” An Evaluation

In his book, “The World in Six Songs: How the Musical Brain Created Human Nature” (2008), Daniel Levitin identifies six fundamental song functions or types (friendship, joy, comfort, religion, knowledge, and love) and goes on to show how each in its own way has enabled the social bonding necessary for human culture and society to evolve. I have chosen to compose a folk-pop inspired ballad, which falls into the “function” of a love song. My musical inspirations were Taylor Swift, Ed Sheeran, Demi Lovato and James Morrisson. I chose to write my song about an argument I had late one night with my boyfriend. Writing about personal experience is daunting as you’re putting yourself out there for your audience and talking about how you feel. “I've only thought about it as a way to help me get through love and loss and sadness and loneliness and growing up.” Swift, T (Vanity Fair. 2013). John Lennon once said “Songwriting is about getting the demon out of me.” (Flavorwire, 2012.) This is something I agree with, having wrote my song in the spur of the moment, all my emotions were raw and I think that passion shows in my song. 

I wrote my piece on an acoustic guitar, an instrument associated with my genre. When establishing a chord progression it was clear I have a very limited knowledge of guitar chords and so my initial melody was very simplistic featuring only Em, Am, D, C and G - which I can play myself. Because of this I asked someone else to play my melody and he suggested developing the chords into a slightly more complex melody. Changing the C chord into a Cadd9 chord. As it’s a ballad it’s written in ¾ timing, like a waltz, far more swoony and romantic with a natural momentum to it. Reminiscent of Aerosmith’s ‘I Don’t Wanna Miss A Thing’. The song benefits from the slower pace and the lyrics are clearer. It also differs from the stereotypical 4/4 pop song timing. Using simple chords, with slight variations, altered lyrics and a key change for my final chorus, kept the melody of the song simplistic and allowed for the lyrics to take precedence. I also experimented with using a capo, so that I could sing slightly higher which was more comfortable for me.

I made the song into a duet, meaning the song would feature my own vocals but also a male counterpart, both singing solo vocals on the song as well as harmonies. I think the blending of two voices connotes love which was a compositional aim of mine that I think shows in the music. I initially decided the male part would start the song and sing the first chorus. I would then take the second verse and chorus before we both sang the bridge and final chorus. This was mainly because the start of the song, which was lower, is better suited to a male vocal. However, upon hearing it back I realised that the song would work as a call and response style, which would also add to the sense of an argument. I wanted to communicate love and affection between two people, therefore upon reaching the lyric, “(promise) you’ll love me as long as I need you, that you’ll be forever true” I decided to bring the male and female vocal together in harmony as "To sing a duet together means sharing with someone both the pleasure and the responsibility of making music for an audience which is there to feel enjoyment through music." - Andrea Bocelli (J, Abbott, 2012). The idea of eternal love and being able to see past our differences was something that I wanted to get across through my lyrics and I feel that this technique was an effective way to communicate such emotion through music and tha because the use of harmony was used selectively it therefore had a much more impact. Both vocal parts were clear in diction as we both sang in vibrato, this meant the male and female vocals fitted well together and blended nicely.

Recording the song using Cubase made my recording sound much more professional. For the vocals I used a Shure SM-57 microphone which is a dynamic microphone with a cardiod polar pattern which "is used extensively in amplified music and has been used by every U.S. president since its introduction in 1965" (TECnology Hall of Fame: 2004). "It became the lectern microphone of the White House Communications Agency in 1965, the year of its introduction and remains so." Charles J. Kouri, Rose L. Shure, Hayward Blake, John Lee (2001). Bon Iver recorded the whole of his ‘For Emma, Forever Ago’ album on an SM-57. It’s a good microphone because it has a large frequency range, from bass up to vocals. The vocals were equalised before I compressed them and finally ran them through a reverb effects channel. “As a general rule, equalisation should be employed only after all efforts have been made to obtain the best sound at source. What's more, there's a huge subjective difference in sound between a budget equaliser and a top-quality studio equalise” (White, P. 1997) As my equipment is budget, equalising removes any unwanted frequencies, bringing clarity and tone to both the instruments and vocals. Compressing ensures the audio doesn't peak and create digital distortion. 

To improve the song, I would have spent more time recording the vocals. My voice wasn’t at its strongest at the time of recording and I know that I could have sounded better. I also would have taken the time to ensure that both vocal parts were singing in time with one another, as we recorded separately we each put our own spin on the song. We also took breaths at different times meaning our phrasing on the harmonised lines differed slightly. I would add a second guitar, played by myself. Even if I only played the bar chords or even a bass part I would like to be able to play my own compositions. I would record the melody on a piano and compare the two as I think a piano is more suited to a ballad, which was an initial compositional aim whereas the guitar makes my piece folk-pop. I would have also liked to experiment with piano chords as I like the sombre feel a piano can bring to a ballad and it would have given the piece a classical element to it. 



Bibliography; 

Levitin, D (2008) The World In Six Songs. USA: Dutton Penguin. p.7 

Swift, T. (2013). “Taylor Swift’s Telltale Heart”. Vanity Fair. 

Hawking, T. (2012). 25 Great Songwriters on the Art of Songwriting. Available: http://flavorwire.com/306045/25-great-songwriters-on-the-art-of-songwriting. Last accessed 16/01/14 

Abbott, J. (2012). Andrea Bocelli talks love and music. Available: http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2012-02-10/entertainment/os-andrea-bocelli-orlando-20120210_1_pop-music-andrea-bocelli-voices. Last accessed 20/05/15.

TECnology Hall of Fame. (2004) Available: www.tecawards.org/hof/04techof.html. Last accessed 25/05/15

Charles J. Kouri, Rose L. Shure, Hayward Blake, John Lee (2001). Shure: sound people, products, and values 1. Shure Inc. p. xiii. ISBN 0-9710738-0-5.

White, P. (1997). EQ Exploration. Available: http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/1997_articles/feb97/allabouteq.html. Last accessed 02/06/2015.