Free Your Voice with Expressive Music Art

Today we take a look at using Music to inspire physical Art.  And, postulate how this process can be used to Free Your Voice! There are many ways to combine art with music, so don’t think this prescription is the only way – make up your own way! Step 1: Gather your art materials: in this case a sketch pad and drawing pencils Step 2: Put on (play) desired music (in this case – classical piano) Step 3: Let your artistic expression flow! Here’s the example my daughter created: (to support art by Katie Pierce click here) Click the image
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Cross Training with Piano

With many types of training it’s often helpful to take days off from the primary area of training and to focus on training in other related areas – eg, cross training. For singing, areas of cross training might include playing the following instruments Piano Guitar Flute Overall, the Piano is probably the most versatile and is widely used for teaching and understanding music theory.  The keys are laid out so that you can quickly identify notes (something not always as obvious on a guitar or flute for example).  This makes playing scales, building chords, and understanding harmonies a snap. If
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10 Slide Spitting Singing Jokes

Humor is always important when studying and develop a skill. The joy needs to shine through and my favorite voice instructor used to begin each lesson with a good joke (and sometimes several during the lesson – thanks Dr. H!) How about a few FUN Singer Jokes to get us rolling into the Holidays?! Please chime in and share some of your favorites!  And, a drum roll with all the fixin’s 🙂 #10 Q: What is the missing link between the bass and the ape? A: The baritone. #9 Q: Dad, why do the singers rock left and right while
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“I DON’T WANNA PRACTICE!!!” – The CURE!

Think… Inspired Singing! – Don’t Ever Force It! “How to practice” is often not well addressed for students in private lessons, video, or books.  If you’re lucky your private teacher may offer a few hints… Here are a few things you will hear from a teacher that are helpful starting points… “Don’t practice mistakes”… for example, “Practicing at full tempo with errors, only reinforces the errors… because then you’re practicing to perform the errors… slow it down until you can play it perfectly at a slower tempo, then gradually increase…” While this is sound advice and a great starting tips,
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Incredibly Inspiring Intervals for Singers!

On first glance the idea of Interval work for Singers sounds about as exciting as working out at the gym (not to dis those who get excited about working out – it’s a great thing!). But, let’s face it, all of our music is made up of intervals and we need to be solid in making those leaps.  What’s challenging is finding a good way to practice without being bored to tears – something that keeps us going! SOLUTION Find a practice pattern that is FUN!!! In this article, we borrow one of my favorite exercises of all times (from Foundations
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[MUST KNOW SECRETS] Singing On Pitch in the Holidays

It’s nearing that time of year again and it’s never too early to begin to prepare for Holiday Singing. Here are some best kept tips and secrets to help you make it through this holiday season in good voice. Start making set lists or favorite song list.  If you’re a casual singer, then you probably have the experience of being in a group where everyone is trying to come up with songs.  Now, many groups will go around the circle and let each person chose a song for everyone to sing – that’s ideal if you can get it going.  But, often
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FALL In Love with Your Voice – Day 4

On this 2nd Day of FALL, we’ll continue our search for excellence. There’s also a special offer to get Lifetime Access to the Foundations of Singing when you purchase PitchPerfector at the special FALL SALE rate of just $47. BUY PitchPerfector NOW!   Leave a comment below on your thoughts about this article… and… BUY PitchPerfector NOW! (includes Lifetime Access to Foundations of Singing)
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FALL In Love with Your Voice – Day 3

On this 2nd Day of FALL, we’ll continue our search for excellence. There’s also a special offer to get Lifetime Access to the Foundations of Singing when you purchase PitchPerfector at the special FALL SALE rate of just $47. BUY PitchPerfector NOW!   Leave a comment below on your thoughts about this article… and… BUY PitchPerfector NOW! (includes Lifetime Access to Foundations of Singing)
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FALL In Love with Your Voice – Day 2

On this 2nd Day of FALL, we’ll continue our search for excellence. Yesterday, we learned that there are doubts or obstacles to Falling in Love with our voices. We introduced a 2 pronged approach Solid improvement techniques to help us sing better and have more confidence Improving our self talk. To improve your overall singing musicianship, I highly recommend that you return to the Foundations of Singing course and repeat the entire program again. You’ll be amazed at how much more you’ll gain the 2nd or 3rd time through the program.  There’s also a special offer to get Lifetime Access to
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FALL In Love with Your Voice – Revealed…

On this 1st Day of FALL, let’s do something extraordinary, something remarkable! Do you want to know the most important secret to singing? You might have guessed by the subject line of this article.  Yes, Falling in Love with your own voice is arguably the best thing you can do to improve your singing.  You’ll find more confidence, you’ll create a sense of magnetism that others will want for themselves. Imagine what it’s like watching a couple who are in love with each other?  It feels good, and provides a sense of joy and pleasure to all those around. Convinced?
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You’re SINGING OFF PITCH her teacher Scolded… She SMILED ;)

Some voice teachers and be quite forceful and intimidating and it’s a wonder how they ever get positive results from their students. Recently, a prominent voice coach scolded her student for Singing Off Pitch! The student responded by SMILING and continued singing. In this case, the student’s response was exactly what was needed. Smiling is an old school technique for improving flat pitch that still works for correcting small pitch errors. The benefits are two fold: The SMILE can actually slightly tightens the vocal chords, thereby increasing pitch The implied “brighter” mood of the singer is also known to slightly
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GUIDE: Step by Step, Perfect your Vocal Pitch

First let’s get a few basics out of the way.  To sing on pitch, you will need basic singing skills which usually require regular vocal exercises founded on sound vocal pedagogy.  You need to develop the ability to sing without strain!  Next, breath support is critical for maintaining pitch and there are many resources and practices for this. Note that breath support for singing is not the same as breath support for exercise. Basic Singing Foundations Ability to sing without strain Breath Support It’s not critical that you have mastered all of the foundations before beginning work on your pitch…
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GUIDE: Everything You Need to Know about Vocal Pitch

The First thing you need to know, is that Everyone Sings Off Pitch virtually All the Time… It’s really just a matter of how far off pitch and duration of the pitch discrepancy.  Just as with a clock, while there are points on the clock face that the hands pass, they are always slightly before, or after the “time” that you are comparing too.  So, when you sing a note, you’re always somewhat below or above the target pitch.  This is true, even with electronically produced sound! Cents – For purposes of discussing pitch, each note (western equal tuning) is 100
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Chat Support

Chat Support For PitchPerfector Customers Pre-Sales Questions – Chat For singers looking to improve their pitch, that have pre-sales questions, you contact us through our Support link and get respond by email. NEW – You can now Chat Live at OnPitchSinging.com to ask questions directly from the Inventor of PitchPerfector, or other trained agent. After Purchase/Customer Support Chat When purchasing PitchPerfector you get an account on our sister site, SingingResults.com where you can download PitchPerfector, collaborate with other customers, and get live chat Support. Example Uses for Chat Support: Help with Downloading PitchPerfector Technical question on how to use a feature of PitchPerfector
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Lesson 5: Advanced Transition Techniques Anyone Can Do

Lesson 5 Intro – Transition between songs Greetings all and Happy Holidays! Hope you get your fill of Turkey or Tofurkey – whatever you desire!  This intro will be removed later, but for now in case you run across this – enjoy our holiday spirit! Last week I saw a concert of professional musicians – they were excellent musicians! BUT, there kept missing the mark on one important area. They were not connected to the audience. Now some of the clues for this are when you hear things like “we love you Portland”. Okay, that’s not “bad” and not a
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How to Find the Starting Note in a Song: Part 4

In Part 1 we looked at “getting over embarrassment” as even the best singers hit a wrong note from time to time; and outlined steps to support hitting the correct note. In Part 2 we expanded the discussion to include more tips and examples of how to use musical instruments/accompaniment to help find the starting note. In Part 3 we dissected the basic elements of chord structure and introduced the confounding issues of overtones using different instruments, and impact of chord inversions. In Part 4 we’ll explore starting notes that are not the root of the chord, but the 3rd or 5th of the
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How to Find the Starting Note in a Song: Part 3

In Part 1 we looked at “getting over embarrassment” as even the best singers hit a wrong note from time to time; and outlined steps to support hitting the correct note. In Part 2 we expanded the discussion to include more tips and examples of how to use musical instruments/accompaniment to help find the starting note. If you just discovered this conversation thread, you may want to go back to these previous discussions. Note: we’re talking about leading and teaching a song to a group, but all of these principles can apply to most other settings. In Part 3 we dissect
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How to Find the Starting Note in a Song: Part 2

This questions might seem trivial at first for some singers. However, it does apply to all skill levels. Consider a “Classical” aria where the piano, or orchestra, plays an introduction that goes on for what seems like minutes and the vocalist seems to pick the starting note out of thin air as it doesn’t apparently fit with anything recent in the accompaniment (think Brahms). In such situations the singer might be listening for a strong note 8 or 16 measures earlier and from that point jumping a known interval to find the right entrance. Wow! It’s not easy sometimes! Fortunately,
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How to Find the Starting Note in a Song: Part 1

Ever wonder how to find the starting note in a song? I travel quite a bit and work with a lot of singers who lead/teach others in singing. This might be a choir, sing-a-long, or other group gathering. For someone new to the role of leading a group, one of the most common questions/problems is “how to find the starting note”. Of course this is a challenge for singers in all situations. At times it’s quick, easy, and comes naturally. At other times, depending on experience, and the complexity of the song, and your history of singing (eg, what you are
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Top 10 Tips for Singing in the Holidays

As a Thank You for reading this season tips, take advantage of special Holiday Savings and get an EXTRA $10 OFF the already low Holiday Price. 100% Money Back Guarantee!   Many people are singing in the holidays more than any other time of year. Here are tips that will enhance your Singing Results this Holiday Season.   The count down starts today… Dec 15, 2013.   Tips #10 – Make A List Just Like Santa… and, Practice!   So many times at gatherings people start to sing and get through a couple of songs and then can’t figure out
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Holiday Feasting KILLS Singer’s Voice

  Singing after the Holiday   You might not normally think that the great feasts of Thanksgiving and other holidays would have anything to do with Singing, except that you might be singing more often. Have you thought about the impact of that delicious food on the Quality of your Singing Voice? Gaining weight – the first thing most of us notice is an extra 5 pounds or so of weight, mostly concentrated in the belly area.  This extra weight limits your breath support because your lungs can not fully expand.  The impact on singing is shorter phrases, less support
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Can Vocal Software Cure Everyone Who Sings Off Pitch?

Everyone sings off pitch though people have varying degrees of admission to this problem.  Some professional singers who have been earning their bread and butter by singing on stage for years assume they need not deal with such a basic issue as intonation.  There are those who are simply happy to sing in a community choir, know they can carry a tune at least decently, and do not think to carefully about pitch.  There are those who simply do not sing because they know they cannot match pitch.  But the truth is that all of these singers and also singers
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ONLINE SINGING SOFTWARE A GREAT TOOL FOR YOUNG SERIOUS SINGERS

One of the most common problems plaguing young singers is intonation; that is, the singing off pitch.  Voice teachers often remain from comments on pitch because they, like you, would rather spend valuable lesson time working on technique and repertoire; they may also assume that pitch is such a fundamental issue that with time it will take care of itself.  Friends who hear your pitch problems want to be polite, and knowing that they are not experts anyway they will not say anything.  Besides this, it has been proven that singers themselves–even well-schooled professional performers–cannot always tell whether or not
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VOCAL PITCH SOFTWARE: PULLING CLOSET SINGERS OUT OF THE CLOSET

Many people do not want to sing in public because they are too shy or believe they lack talent.  But, as the adage goes, “if you can talk, you can sing!”  Singing is a natural instinct in humans.  Just listen to children: they are constantly humming while they work or play, sometimes mumbling words to their favorite song, sometimes just playing with their voices.  This instinct becomes stifled when people learn that they “cannot sing”–probably after an embarrassing episode brought on by singing a wrong note in elementary school choir. [include file=”buynow.php”] The biggest issue confronting people who think they
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VOICE PITCH SOFTWARE A POPULAR NEW TOOL

A new tool is becoming popular for singers everywhere: voice pitch software. Vocal pitch software programs, like the well-respected PitchPerfect, are available online.  Online singing software is easy to download, inexpensive, and very easy to use.  And, singing pitch software requires only about ten minutes a day to improve your intonation.  So what exactly is it?  With the PitchPerfect voice pitch software, the vocal pitch software will play a single pitch or a simple scale which the user sings back into a microphone (either the one built into their computer, or a simple external mic like the one on a
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DO YOU SING ON PITCH? FIND OUT WITH SINGING PITCH SOFTWARE

Do you sing on pitch?  Yes, I am asking you: the professional opera singer, the church or community chorister, the karaoke star, the shower recitalists, the mother who sings a lullaby to her child at night–everyone!  Are you sure you sing on pitch?  How do you really know?  The truth is that your voice, resonating around inside your skull, sounds different to you than it does to those around you and therefore you cannot really know whether or not you sing on pitch unless you have an objective external measuring device like singing pitch software.  Don’t believe it?  Experiments with
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VOICE SOFTWARE RECOMMENDED FOR THE AMATEUR SINGER

Many people are afraid to sing in front of others, whether singing hymns at church, “Happy Birthday” at a family gathering, or the national anthem at the ballpark–let alone up on stage in front of audience as either a soloist or even as a choir member.  There are a number of possible reasons for this: shyness, not liking the sound of your own voice, but the most common is a fear of singing the right note.  No one wants to be that person who sings out loud and clear, joyfully rejoicing, but unfortunately–much to the dismay of those around him–unable
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HOW TO FIX SINGING ON/OFF PITCH BY LEARNING TO SIGHT-READ

Instrumentalists like to make fun of singers for their lack of musicianship: they often have trouble counting, have trouble finding the correct voice pitch, cannot tell when they are singing on/off pitch, learn their parts on the fly by ear, and many do not even know how to read music!  Nor do they spend nearly as many hours working in the practice room as their fellow instrumentalists.  Singers wish to refute these insults as unfounded stereotypes, but unfortunately the accusations are indeed based on fact.  So, singers must take responsibility if they wish instrumentalists to take them seriously as musicians!
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CAN SINGING SOFTWARE CURE PROBLEMS YOU DIDN’T KNOW YOU HAD?

Most vocalists who sing frequently, whether at home or on stage, in the professional or amateur sphere, will happily tell you, “fortunately, I’ve never had pitch issues.”  However, they are wrong: everybody sings off pitch.  You may wonder how this can be; after all, a singer must hear himself, and whether or not one is off pith must be fairly obvious, right?  Wrong.  The degree of offense of an incorrect pitch depends on how far the singer is from the desired pitch, and for how long they remain off pitch.  So the problem may be very slight and not very
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HOW TO MAINTAIN VOCAL PITCH WHILE SINGING HARMONY

Most singers have no trouble singing on pitch when they are singing solo.  Maintaining accurate vocal pitch may become more difficult when accompaniment is added, but generally accompaniment supports the solo and with a little practice singing on pitch with accompaniment is not too difficult.  However, singing on pitch can becomes much harder when singing a harmonic line, or singing in an ensemble with several part harmony.  Some may believe that they simply do not have an ear to be able to maintain singing pitch in such a setting, but by practicing properly you can become an expert, and you
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HOW TO DEAL WITH PITCH ISSUES–EVEN IF YOU DON’T THINK YOU HAVE ANY: PITCH SOFTWARE

Many are the accomplished singers who blithely report “fortunately I have never had pitch issues.”  Well, guess what: everybody has pitch issues!  Yes, everybody.  Doesn’t matter if they sing on stage at the Met for a living, or merely hum an occasional aria in the shower when no one else is home.  The truth is, even very good singers cannot tell when they are singing off pitch.  This has been proven in experiments where, for example, professional vocalists (MS and PhD performance majors) are asked to sing a phrase and immediately after state whether or not they sang on pitch. 
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SINGING PITCH PROBLEM AREAS

Many singers who have been singing all their lives are surprised and frustrated to learn that they have trouble singing on/off pitch.  For some one who has been immersed in a lifetime of song, it seems that accurate voice pitch should come naturally.  But to those of you out there who have unhappily discovered vocal pitch difficulties, fear not!  First of all, you are not alone.  Second of all, singing pitch problems are relatively easy to fix.  Here are several factors to look out when you are diagnosing or evaluating a singing pitch issue.   1.  How closely do you
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HOW TO IMPROVE VOICE PITCH

How much attention do you give to your singing pitch when you practice?  Most voice students assume they have the basic skill of singing on pitch since they can easily maintain a tune.  However, most young singers are singing off pitch more frequently than they realize.  When rehearsing repertoire it easy to accidentally fall just short of or slightly overshoot a voice pitch unknowingly.  Sometimes a student will hit a vocal pitch incorrectly, but fix it quickly.  If the singer is only singing off pitch infrequently and not for too long, than the problem is not too offensive for the
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