Musical rant.
May. 2nd, 2004 01:15 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kyrasantae
I have witnessed the drastic difference between the sound of a studio recording and a live recording -- a tape of the choir singing at the music festival shows just how much we suck: our sound is without direction, without form. It sounds clunky and forced, somewhat bored, with no expression.
On the studio recording we did today (and will tomorrow), even with minimal mixing, we sound much rounder and confident. Such is the nature and the wonder of technology, it's most probable that it's not because we're singing any better.
But we cannot possibly sound like we have form and expression until we learn to appreciate and understand the music. We concentrate so much on technical nitpicking that the music itself becomes tedious and unmeaningful, and thus we sound bored and forced. We are so intimidated and fearful of getting details messed up or not doing a good job of coming in together, for seemingly only God knows why, we cannot be free to feel the music. Because if we are taught to feel the music and make it personal to us, all of those technical details will suddenly have meaning to us. And when we have learned to love the music then we will be more motivated to sing well and keep the technical details in mind rather than to be nitpicked on them all the time.
Yes, that would mean the director must not be afraid of it not being technically sound at first, but once the music can be felt and becomes a part of us, fixing those details will be so much easier.
My former piano teacher has years more experience than you, Mr. Graham! You'd do well to listen to his advice! Unless you're happy enough with winning second places by default at Kiwanis and lots of those ugly blue 'participant' certificates from there. Ever wonder why we never seem to learn and you're so frustrated over our attention span? The above may just be why!
On the studio recording we did today (and will tomorrow), even with minimal mixing, we sound much rounder and confident. Such is the nature and the wonder of technology, it's most probable that it's not because we're singing any better.
But we cannot possibly sound like we have form and expression until we learn to appreciate and understand the music. We concentrate so much on technical nitpicking that the music itself becomes tedious and unmeaningful, and thus we sound bored and forced. We are so intimidated and fearful of getting details messed up or not doing a good job of coming in together, for seemingly only God knows why, we cannot be free to feel the music. Because if we are taught to feel the music and make it personal to us, all of those technical details will suddenly have meaning to us. And when we have learned to love the music then we will be more motivated to sing well and keep the technical details in mind rather than to be nitpicked on them all the time.
Yes, that would mean the director must not be afraid of it not being technically sound at first, but once the music can be felt and becomes a part of us, fixing those details will be so much easier.
My former piano teacher has years more experience than you, Mr. Graham! You'd do well to listen to his advice! Unless you're happy enough with winning second places by default at Kiwanis and lots of those ugly blue 'participant' certificates from there. Ever wonder why we never seem to learn and you're so frustrated over our attention span? The above may just be why!
