General Music Chat

....their work stops. I mean you can write lyrics, or records instruments if you have that talent but.. For crying out loud a runny nose cold is stopping me from laying vocals! I have 5 songs to lay the vocals on and man am I frustrated. I got my last 2 songs/vids in under the gun on friday night. I woke up saturday morning with raw sinuses. No fun. Had to get a substitute to lead the singing at church sunday too.

Thats a truism that is. Tony, the young man who is working on doing some back up for us had a six week snot fest. He could hardly talk much less sing.
I have found Zycam and B complex vitamins decrease the duration of the snots. I also drink a LOT, of green tea when ill. A habit I've carried over from the psyco kung fu workout days of my youth.
May God speed you healing.

Funny thing is when I get sick I sound better for the blues (as long as I'm not too sick). Maybe if you get sick change the tunes to genres that might sound better with gritty vocals. Otherwise singing when you're really sick is no fun. I did a gig one night years ago and I was so sick I was coughing up blood. The trooper that I am I finished the gig but couldn't work for a week after that. Hope you get well soon.

My doctor told me that if you sing when you have an upper respitory infection and do that over time it can cause nodules to grow on your vocal chords and your instrument is basically ruined, I started singing around 1980 because we were having problems finding a singer I learned how and have been doing double duty since. Your voice is a very fragile instrument that you must take care of and not take it for granted. Have you ever noticed how when you get certain types of colds your speaking voice seems to drop an octive (maybe a bit exajerated there) those are the wrong times to force a show, but how do you balance being a lead singer and not have to cancel gigs twice a year. I don't know about you guys but gigs are hard to come by and if you cancel they may not have you back and you have lost a gig, so as a result I don't cancel gigs (now since I've said it I'll probably have to this year lol) being a person that loves vocal harmonies I have made it a habit to have multiple singers in the band that way if someone gets sick the others can pick up the slack. I have found that an erb (no not that one lol) called elm bark works great for me it lubricates the vocal chords. contrary to popular belief drinking stuff on stage doesn't lubricate your vocal chords the fluids have to go thru your system and lubricate that way. Water is best and at the health food stores not the popular chains but usually the mom and pop types carry the elm bark tea and elm bark losenges I have found that these make a bigger difference than just about anything and stay away from drinking alchohol (dangit) the night before a gig or recording session it will dehydrate you and your vocal chords.

I've done so many bad things for my voice - 40 yrs of smoking, dairy, singing while sick. One time I developed what I think were nodules - I had that disturbing doubling effect on certain notes, I had to take a month off when I did that. I'm no more careful these days than I ever was, though.

Embarassed myself one time by coughing up a loogie on the mic during a performance. It just hung there for the entire song. EW was that gross!

When I find myself having prob's, I do drink a lot of warm stuff on stage & off. A little salt water gargle helps, too. One thing you might try that I've mentioned before, Paul, is this;

cut an onion in half, "lengthwise" i.e. not against the grain to give it circles

boil it in water until it's ready to fall apart

toss the onion, add honey & a touch of lemon juice

drink it up

It ain't as bad as it sounds, & it really does help!

Thanks Philby, I still feel like crap today. No singing for me. Going to cancel band practice tonight.

I was sick for 3 weeks and for the first time I lost my voice..

You should have heard the bitching.. (I mean we could have croaked through it like and all frog quartet)

Yeah I had the same crap for 3-4 weeks, lost my voice, bad cough. Of course we had a show right in the middle of it. Feeling great now! Feel better soon Paul.

My 8 month old is about 2 weeks into it now. She still has it. My 2year old sounds like she's over it. My wife still has it 2 weeks in. I want it to be gone in one week.... OR ELSE! or else..... uh....... I don't know.
thanks Jim

Changing of the season.. yep.
Well, try not to sing or shout for 2 days or so. It'll go away.

My singer just got a sore throat . . . aw crap . . .
.
Lotta people around here sick, in CT . . .
.
It was funny - Sunday afternoon we were were performing - did 3 - 4 songs, and everything is great.
Then, we launch into one of our hardest songs - really hard to sing, and extremely difficult to play. It's a really busy finger-picking song - kinda folkish - sounding; very pretty song.
But the song has between 2 - 3 chord changes every second. That's not a typo; - probably 200 chord changes a minute.
Let me tell you, when you're performing a song like that - you don't want any distractions . . .
1/4 of the way into the song - my nose itches. Then it starts running . . . there's no way I can wipe it - I'd miss a dozen chords . . .
And so I'm sniffing really hard, every 2 -3 seconds . . . big, huge drops . . . man, that was the most uncomfortable song I every performed . . . really, distracting, but I made it to the end just fine.
Yeah? so?
Here's the kicker - the audience heard me sniffing (there's some quiet spots in the song). And I was sniffing really, really loud, to stop my own personal Niagra Falls.
The place erupts with applause and hoots an hollars - the response blew us away . . . they loved it . . .
I'm wondering if they thought I was just super-'moved' by the lyrics, and it made me cry?
hehe . . . I'll have to remember that, for next time.

They prolly thought that with all those chord changes you had to be on coke, RM! LOL

(j/k, of course!)

Yeah, I thought of the coke - thing, too.
But - nope no drugs; unless you want to count about 6 cups of coffee . .

.
But - there is no chance that the audience thought it was part of 'the act.'
People see the way I am when I come out, and how I talk to them and all.
I am real.
There is no act.
On stage - I am the same way as off-stage.
And, you know what?
The audience likes that there is no act . . .
. . . they like it a lot . . .
.
Sometimes when playing a song, I get caught up in the emotions of the song, and people see it happening . . .
Some of my newer stuff is pretty involved, both with the actual physical playing, and the emotions coming out of the chordal flow . . .
God, with what I'm playing, I don't have enough brain cells left over to act any way . . . I'm lucky I can keep up with the song, sometimes . . .

And - I wouldn't have it any other way . . .

The place erupts with applause and hoots an hollars - the response blew us away . . . they loved it . . .
I'm wondering if they thought I was just super-'moved' by the lyrics, and it made me cry?
hehe . . . I'll have to remember that, for next time.

LOL !!!!! Sometimes you never know what it will take to get the audience screaming!!! You just never know.