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Anybody else do it? I'm terrible at it! Something more to practice...
Anyway, this thread is for singing your lines as you play them. post away!
Here's some Fried Bananas...
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02-27-2018 07:31 PM
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I only sing them in my head. My singing is so terrible I don't like to listen to it.
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I find that I play much better when I sing my lines as I play them. I don't quite nail every single note, but I often find that I'm more melodic when I sing. Beyond that, and even more significant, is that when I sing, my lines are invariably different rhythmically. It gets me out of rhythmic ruts. Brain to fingers seems to result in one set of rhythms. Brain to voice to fingers expands it.
Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
That said, I find myself not singing far too often. Not sure why. It feels like my attention is so focused on something else that I don't feel the freedom to sing. So, for example, if I have to read the changes, I won't sing. If I know the changes, but I'm intent on listening to something novel another player in the band is doing, I won't sing. But, if the comping is just right and sufficiently predictable, and I'm relaxed, then I can sing.
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I can barely sing up to C5 so more than the guitar's top octave is out of my range. I sing in my head, which has no pitch range or speed limits (I'm also not a foot patter or mental verbal counter).
I wonder if there is a connection... the way I see it, both phrase pitching and timing are coming from some part of the mind. Some people like to express one or both of those sources physically and externally (singing and/or foot patting) so that they have an external guide, but others like to use the direct internal source without looping it through the outside world (me).
How many people that sing or foot pat do both, and how many that don't do one or the other don't do either?
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Mr B, one thing is you are singing fast difficult lines. I'm thinking of course it's hard.
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I usually pat my foot, although not always, I think. I don't actually think about it. I sing only in my mind, and I'm sure about that. If my foot isn't moving, then something else is. I can't swing without something moving.
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I don't usually sing while I play but recorded myself a while back. The problem is you hear my voice
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I agree that it could change things rhythmically, but my musical ideas still come from my vocabulary so it doesn't change the notes I play. I can't play like Jeff, my lines are easier to sing.
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Have you tried singing what you finger while muting the guitar strings with your right hand?
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Yea singing is cool... I hate it at gigs.... and I guess it helps becoming aware of all the BS you should already hear and know... but MrB your post made my day... thanks
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Well thank you, Reg, I hope in a "that was fun" as opposed to a "that was hilarious what is this guy thinking" kind of way Originally Posted by Reg
Yeah, for me, I'd never do it at a gig. I didn't even like making this recording of it too much
Christian, that sounds like a worthwhile exercise. I think I might try it as a test of sorts, hear and finger a phrase silently, then play it and see if I was "right."
Sometimes, I wonder what's really going on when I "sing" my lines...Is my brain ahead of my hands, really? Or do I know my "licks" good enough that I can see 'em and sing 'em almost simultaneously. There's a bit of both going on, I suppose...
Maybe more importantly is thinking about rhythm and space, as you know, a horn player eventually has to breathe...so if I'm singing, eventually I have to breathe too...
Just more stuff to think about.
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it is a very good exercise to sing with transcribed solos-unisono.
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Thought I'd bump this one more time to see if anybody else was interested...I dunno, I thought it was worthwhile. Maybe I should have titled it "buying new guitars to sing lines while playing."
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i haven’t started singing my lines while I play, but was able to get really good deals on organic honey and tea which is supposed to help with my tone
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You should have called it ‘Benson Technique’, that would have got the attention. Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
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I’m doing a variation- recording myself singing to changes in iReal then transcribing my licks. Definitely makes me play with better phrasing. Don’t expect me to post any examples though!
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dang my bit fell flat; i’ll workshop it
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I've tried to do this periodically, and I've recently been trying again. Some might enjoy this video from Steve Giordano. He says something I'd not heard elsewhere: try to sing in the same octave you're playing in, where you can. I think if I did this a lot I could really start to think of the different octaves as distinct areas/flavors. (I tend to grab whatever's closest, mostly, or to play too much on the top two or three strings.)
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Yea Jeff... was in very good way, Here's this guitarist, usually with all kinds of distractions going on etc... anyway wailing away and singing his likes and usually pretty live... You always just put it out there... I love it.
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Herb Ellis did that all the time, and encouraged everyone who listened to him to do the same thing. He said it's what made lines musical---what you sing comes from you. It may not be great singing, but our voices--the rhythms, the feel, the duration of notes, etc---tend to be distinctive.
You can't hear his voice in this clip but you can see that he's doing it. He said Joe Pass did it too. Kessel did it. (You can hear that in some of Barney's instructional videos.)
What helped me the most in doing this is working with some of Carol Kaye's material and playing the "chordal scale" up and down in all keys. (Up GM7, down A-, up B-, down CM7, and so on.) Or working with triads. I guess those are the easiest things to hear, so they may be the easiest things to sing??? Gotta start somewhere.....
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Well thank you. I like living on the edge Originally Posted by Reg
Mark, I think the way Herb does it is how I like it best...I don't really want to "hear it." That's fine for practice, I suppose...But I'm not trying to do a Benson or Pizzarelli thing, I just ain't got the voice! But even if it just makes me take a breath and think a little more about phrasing, I see it as worthwhile practice.
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When I practice sight reading I try to sing the notes first just before I play them (at least during part of the practice). I find that it trains my voice to link with what I play on the guitar. You also get sight singing practice out of it. Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
I don't like to hear people singing their lines in recordings though. Singing that way often comes across as a bit grunty and not very musical .
That's why I can't listen to some Oscar Peterson live recordings especially on the headphones
Which is a massive loss.
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Howard Roberts said that singing along with your solos prevents noodling. And if you're noodling you're probably playing something that isn't very musical. That was in one of his Guitar Player columns long ago.
It's something I need to start doing so thanks from bringing it up.
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Learning solos and tunes by ear and playing sung lines is the same thing. All the music comes from 'out there' so there's no difference between what Lester plays and what you play, say. There's only music.
Sometimes it's easier to start with what someone else has played on a recording. Then the spirit can possess you a little bit, and you hear new lines.
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Not guitar, but Keith Jarrett famously uses his voice as part of his improv performance process, and he's considered one of the best pure improvisers in the history of jazz.
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This is really important to understand, in overall, general and every other sense. Sooner the better. Originally Posted by christianm77
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