Innovative Music

Learn To Sing

Learn To Sing

Maybe you are one of the those people who recently saw Susan Boyle singing on the television show “Britain’s Got Talent”, and not only have become a true fan of good singing, but also want to be a good singer.  If this is true of you, you may find it unbelievable to accept that you too may become a good singer, even though, you may think that you have no singing ability at all.  Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that you will sing as well as Susan Boyle, voice does play a part in this singing thing, after all.  Susan’s angelic voice packaged with her frumpy look is what stunned people throughout this planet of ours in recent weeks.  If you haven’t heard her yet, just do a search on youtube.

There are singing techniques that every good singer implores, whether done consciously or not, and learning these techniques will be the first step for you to become a better singer.  I will attempt to guide you on what you should and shouldn’t do at the beginning stages of becoming a better singer.

There are three general rules while on your quest to learn to sing.  Generally, you should know how to breath, you should have control of your voice, and lastly, you should practice on a daily basis.  These three rules will make you a better singer, whether or not you have a great voice.

Step 1.  Breathing through your diaphragm.

Most people, believe it or not don’t know how to breathe properly when singing, and this is the number one cause of why people aren’t better singers.

Put your hand over your stomach area, or just below your ribcage, then sing.  Your stomach area, not your chest, should be moving in and out.  If it isn’t, you aren’t breathing properly, and this is affecting the notes that come out of your mouth.

So what can you do to change this?  There is only one answer to this, and that is practice.  You will be surprised how quickly you will learn this new breathing, and how much more control you will have when singing.

Step 2. Don’t over do it.

When I say don’t over do it, I mean don’t shout, or over sing.  When you force your voice in this matter, you are forcing two tiny pieces of skin, known as the vocal chords.  These vocal chords are sensitive and will become damaged if all you are doing is shouting your notes rather than singing them.  Remember that singing is about having control over your vocal chords.  Singing is not a shouting contest.

Step 3.  Practice.

Although, this step may seem obvious to most wannabe singers; it is this step that they most fail at.

You should practice singing everyday using the  above mentioned techniques.  You as the practicing singer, should be conscience of these techniques at all times.  With time, you will come to notice that you will no longer be conscious of your breathing, but rather, that your correct breathing will come to you naturally.

If you follow this recipe of breathing through your diaphragm, not over straining your vocal chords and practicing your singing on a daily basis, you will almost be quaranteed that your singing ability will improve.

Marketing Music

If you are reading this, than you are most likely an independent musician who’s trying to break into the music business, but need a few pointers on marketing music, your music.

Let me begin by telling you that marketing music isn’t the easiest thing to do.  If you aren’t completely dedicated to this venture, you shouldn’t even begin.

Being an ‘Indy Musician’  who’s trying to put your music out there for the world to hear, is always a lot of work.  You must not give up, you must never waver from your goal.  That is the first key of  making your dream of  fortune and fame in the music business come to fruition.  Remember that there are millions of musicians out there, good musicians that are keying in on those same goals.  Unfortunately, there are very few open spots for those musicians in what has become an industry over flowing with artists who want to earn a good living from doing what they most love to do.

You must learn the in’s and out’s of marketing music.  That means research; a lot of research.  It also means countless hours behind a computer, music instrument, microphone, music studio along with hitting that proverbial pavement.  You must be relentless in your search for a chance to show “them”  that you are better than those other millions out there.

You can start off by opening up a MySpace music account, and put your best songs on your account.  Then go crazy and start adding people as friends.  You will find that most people on MySpace are very willing to add Indy musicians as friends, even though they have never heard of them before.

Don’t stop with MySpace, there are many social networks out there that allow you to get your music heard.  You should be seeking as much publicity “good publicity” as you can for your music.  It only takes one right person to hear your music and change your life.

Make sure that you have a good name for yourself or your band, and brand it over the web.  Call local newspapers and try to get some music reviews.  Play live at local bars, coffee shops, festivals.. anywhere that you can.  Summer festivals are especially great if you can get yourself on the menu, so to speak, because  local television usually covers those festivals, meaning that you might get some free television time.  That means more people than those who attended the festival will hear you.

Next step is to make a CD.  Making a CD was very expensive and tedious not too many years ago, but that has all changed with the internet and computers.  Ultimately, you will want to get your CD professionally done, but there is nothing stopping you from starting with your own creation.

Once you have a physical CD of your music, you should seek out ways to distribute your music.  This could mean downloads of your music or selling them in a store.  Make sure that you aren’t charging ridiculous amounts of money for them, otherwise no one will be interested.  You should, however, try to re-cooperate your expenses for production of that CD.

The more CD’s you sell, the better your Soundscan sales stats will be, and this is always welcomed by the music industry.

As you can see by the information above, marketing music isn’t an easy thing to do.  It takes much work, much dedication and a lot of heart.

If you can stomach all the rejections that you will receive, and not get down on yourself.  You may be successful.

Lastly,  Never become negative in your thinking about your music career or the way you are marketing music.  You should always believe that you will be playing the big stage somewhere out there.  If you are easily depressed with rejection, DON’T BOTHER!

Good Luck, and Have FUN.. Looking forward to hearing you on the big stage one day!

Subliminal Messages In Your Music

Subliminal Messages In Your Music

Subliminal messages are messages that are faintly, or unknowingly broadcast to listeners, in order to influence their behavior.  An example of this is watching a television commercial and having the company broadcast a subliminal message for you to go out and buy their product.  It is broadcast to you, but you can’t consciously hear the message, but before you know it, you feel hungry for a certain fast food.  These messages have been used many many times in music over the years.  The Beatles did this a lot.

If you are a musician who would like to add subliminal messages to your music,  you may be quite surprised to find out that adding subliminal messages to any music piece is not as hard as it seems.

Before you start your process of adding subliminal messages to your music, you should ask yourself a few simple questions.  First of all, you should ask yourself why you want to do this.  Is it for yourself, your fan base or just for kicks.  Deciding on your reason will guide you to which software you want to use.

Subliminal messages in music have had a bad rap over the years.  Usually these messages had a satanic, or evil undertones to them.

Apart from the evil undertones to subliminal messages in music which were a turnoff for media, the music also had to be played backwards in order for the listener to hear the message.  The message is obviously obsolete for the person who never played the music backwards.

With today’s technology, recording subliminal messages  is much easier than it was 30 years ago.

You may be asking yourself.. okay, then how is this done?

First, you need to get yourself good recording equipment, or multi-track software . You need the multi- track music equipment to listen to different compartments of your music.. this includes instruments, vocals and your subliminal message.

Once you have your message and the recording equipment you need, you can go ahead and record your message into your music.  Make sure the message isn’t too loud.  The last thing you want is to have your subliminal message override or accompany the vocals or instruments of your music piece.  Incorporate the subliminal message into your music, and voila.. you now have a message being broadcast to your fans, or yourself.

Have Fun!