"The Elephant Diet" Day # 112 Rainbow colors

Today I'm working on more vocals for the songs Portraits of White and Sing a Song of Joy.

I thought perhaps you might enjoy seeing a picture of what it looks like on the computer screen.  I'm now up to 106 total takes. Some of those are just short phrases in the song.  I couldn't fit them all into one photo, but at least you get the idea!  Very colorful.

Using an iMac, Brauner mic and the software Digital Performer.

"The Elephant Diet" Day # 111 Stacks of Vocals

I spent the morning in my studio correcting some things my producer suggested I change after hearing the vocals I did for him the other day.  When the band recorded one of my songs, they played it with a different rhythm than I originally had in my demo.  Because of that, I changed the way I sang it, but my producer wanted me to keep singing the song the way I did before.  I sent the corrected version back to him this morning.  Waiting to hear if he likes this better.

I also re-did some vocals on another song because there were a few spots that weren't quite right.  It's the Enya style song and if one or two of my s's or t's aren't together, it shows up pretty quick.  I don't know exactly how Enya does her 'stacked' vocals, but from what I read, they just keep working with a song until they get what they want and they might not know until after they've tried a few things which works best.  Apparently one of her songs has 90 vocal tracks.

I started with 32 tracks and decided since I have the studio, equipment and time (though that's so limited these days) I could experiment with as many takes as I want.  So I doubled it and sang the whole song 64 times.  You really have to tune into yourself when you do this.  If you vary your tone too much or use vibrato from one take to the next, it gets real sticky and you can't keep singing more and more takes without trouble.

The first time I heard a recording of Enya, I stopped what I was doing and went searching for who this amazing artist was.  I am so excited to have finally written a song in this genre.  I'm learning a lot as I work on this particular song.  I can't wait to hear what TN does with it!

"The Elephant Diet" Day # 110 Alterations

I sent a file of vocals to my producer early this morning for his approval or rejection.  I'm thankful to work with someone who can make up his mind pretty quick!  Hopefully I'll hear back soon.

I also dropped off one of my dresses to be altered by a friend who sews.  I'm hoping she can add sleeves to the sleeveless dress I bought for the photo shoot in 3 1/2 weeks.  It's very beautiful and I can't wait to wear it, but a dress without sleeves for Christmas didn't make sense.  Plus, I feel really uncomfortable without sleeves on.  Guess I need to keep up my workouts at the gym.  But until then, we are adding sleeves....as long as she can find material to match the dress.  I know, that's risky.  Trusting that we can make it work.

I had lunch with my Mother and then took her to the doctor.  The Home has decided to raise her level of care from 3 to 4.  We hope this will help prevent her from falling so much and will give her more quality of life.  She continually wishes she could die and go to heaven.  It's part of every conversation I have with her now.  If she would die, that would be a really big alteration to my life.  For now, I'm glad it's just a dress we are adjusting.

"The Elephant Diet" Day # 109 Home from Nashville

WORD Entertainment Group
The site of the conference

We had a great time at the "Get Busy" Conference in Nashville, TN arranged by my producer, Eric Copeland.

There were over 20 artists there, plus about a dozen who attended 'on-line'.  Eric told us that he is currently working on producing 20 projects right now.  I thought I was busy!   One of those 20 is my Christmas CD.

Artists from all over the U.S. gathered to learn more about booking and social media.   We ended the day by having dinner together at "The Row".  

Today I worked on vocals for another one of the songs.  It's supposed to be a holiday today, but Tom is busy in the shop and I have tons to do too, so we will have to take another day as a holiday sometime soon.