Buc McMaster Posted April 24, 2017 Share Posted April 24, 2017 Again, again, again, again and again..........to the point of complete familiarity. The guitar has got to be nearly rote, like breathing, a do-it-in-your-sleep thing. Only then is a songster freed vocally to be convincingly emotional with the delivery. I play the songs on my set list endlessly, over and over again, sometimes plugged in and at the mic, sometimes unamplified facing the office door. It's repetitions that make a song solid for live performance. This is a tune I fiddled with a few months ago and then set aside. This morning I remembered it, and thinking it's firstly a great song and secondly that it's not a tune one would expect to hear done in a Texas honky tonk acoustically, I ran through it four or five times and turned on the camera. A good example, I think, of a song that needs more repetitions to be done well. This take is okay but there are a few vocal stinkers. And after sufficient repetitions it will be a staple of the set list.........I love the song! Walk On By - David/Bacharach Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
E-minor7 Posted April 24, 2017 Share Posted April 24, 2017 We obviously hear'n'see a member of the 10.000 Hour Club here. Always a pleasure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MissouriPicker Posted April 24, 2017 Share Posted April 24, 2017 As easy-to-listen-to as Dionne Warwick's version from the 60's. In addition, for me, I find it much easier to focus on the lyrics in an acoustic version than something with a lot of orchestration. Nicely done............And "repetition" truly is the secret. It's got to become second nature and you're almost doing it without even thinking about it. You're just doing it. [thumbup] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EuroAussie Posted April 24, 2017 Share Posted April 24, 2017 Indeed. Rines and repeat is key, especially with a delicate song like this which very easily can get away if the tone, timing, pitch and guitar tone is not spot on, which is clearly not your issue here. I find I feel fully comfortable with a new song after Ive performed it around 30 times. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BluesKing777 Posted April 24, 2017 Share Posted April 24, 2017 Again, again, again, again and again..........to the point of complete familiarity. The guitar has got to be nearly rote, like breathing, a do-it-in-your-sleep thing. Only then is a songster freed vocally to be convincingly emotional with the delivery. I play the songs on my set list endlessly, over and over again, sometimes plugged in and at the mic, sometimes unamplified facing the office door. It's repetitions that make a song solid for live performance. This is a tune I fiddled with a few months ago and then set aside. This morning I remembered it, and thinking it's firstly a great song and secondly that it's not a tune one would expect to hear done in a Texas honky tonk acoustically, I ran through it four or five times and turned on the camera. A good example, I think, of a song that needs more repetitions to be done well. This take is okay but there are a few vocal stinkers. And after sufficient repetitions it will be a staple of the set list.........I love the song! Walk On By - David/Bacharach No sound on the computer I am on, so I will listen to the track later, Buc. I can add a few things about 'again, again and again'. Then do it again and again. Though, the longer you have been doing it, the quicker the songs come together, but there is something about practicing the 'right' parts and getting it correct SLOWLY before getting it up to speed, but I am impatient and forget that one often! Now I have reminded myself, back to the drawing board. Sometimes it can be good to give up on a tune for a while and come back a day, week, year later..... BluesKing777. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave F Posted April 24, 2017 Share Posted April 24, 2017 Has your astrologist suggest you drop the 'e' from McMaster? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
j45nick Posted April 24, 2017 Share Posted April 24, 2017 Excellent, Buc! The Bacharach/David duo produced some of the greatest popular songs of the last 70 years, and this is one of them. Bacharach has a great, jazzy approach to his compositions that lends itself really, really well to guitar solos, even for those of us who can't sing much anymore. You've still got the singing chops, as well. Really nice performance. And regarding repetition, it's definitely the key to success. I often get the basics of a song down (chords, rhythm, pace)and refine the picking patterns over time by slowed-down experimentation until you develop the feel and note patterns you are after. This is especially important with the hybrid picking I am primarily using now, at least when I can still grip a flat pick. It's fun, and rewarding when it works. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Buc McMaster Posted April 25, 2017 Author Share Posted April 25, 2017 Has your astrologist suggest you drop the 'e' from McMaster? Huh? Nick I sure don't have any guitar soloing chops but with beaucoup repetitions I can get close to a presentable rhythm guitar part and vocal. With this one only a handful in I reckon it'll be one of those "geez did that guy just play that song?!?" numbers at the local dive. Certainly one out of left field, huh. Still don't have the right phrasing yet and got to clean up those bad notes but I think it's a keeper, for shock value if nothing else! And Mark, I don't count 'em but most of what's on the list I'd guess are well over 100 run throughs........if they don't catch wind by then they go on the scrap heap. If there's a particular sticky part I'll repeat just that part a dozen or more times before going back to the beginning to do the whole thing again......and again......and again....... And I always practice at full vocal volume, otherwise it's just lip service to the effort, so to speak. Have to know that it works, and that I can actually do it, at stage volume to know if it works at all. Repetition is the only way to get that relaxed confidence with a song that really sets you free as a songster. Thanks for listening, folks! It is sincerely appreciated! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
QuestionMark Posted April 25, 2017 Share Posted April 25, 2017 Again, again, again, again and again..........to the point of complete familiarity. The guitar has got to be nearly rote, like breathing, a do-it-in-your-sleep thing. Only then is a songster freed vocally to be convincingly emotional with the delivery. I play the songs on my set list endlessly, over and over again, sometimes plugged in and at the mic, sometimes unamplified facing the office door. It's repetitions that make a song solid for live performance. This is a tune I fiddled with a few months ago and then set aside. This morning I remembered it, and thinking it's firstly a great song and secondly that it's not a tune one would expect to hear done in a Texas honky tonk acoustically, I ran through it four or five times and turned on the camera. A good example, I think, of a song that needs more repetitions to be done well. This take is okay but there are a few vocal stinkers. And after sufficient repetitions it will be a staple of the set list.........I love the song! Walk On By - David/Bacharach Spot on...my experience shows the same. It all comes down to practice, practice, practice! QM aka Jazzman Jeff Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave F Posted April 25, 2017 Share Posted April 25, 2017 Huh? When Dion Warwick's career stalled, her astrologist advised to add a small e to the end of her last name. After she did, a string a bad luck hit her. She then removed it. More useless information http://www.encyclopedia.com/people/literature-and-arts/music-popular-and-jazz-biographies/dionne-warwick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BluesKing777 Posted April 25, 2017 Share Posted April 25, 2017 What about a crack at "Raindrops", Buc? The original has all kinds of stuff, but the basic chords and vocal are great if put in to key of C instead of key of Z or whatever they did it. It is pretty short though: http://www.chordie.com/chord.pere/www.guitaretab.com/b/b-j-thomas/138128.html BluesKing777. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Buc McMaster Posted April 25, 2017 Author Share Posted April 25, 2017 Ha! Thanks for the 'splaination, Dave! Never had a career I figured needed such consultation, certainly not a musical one! BK: that's one song I have personally sworn to never take up........the melody never held any appeal for me. Honestly, it always grated on my ears. Dunno why. Pretty good tune lyrically though. Just not for me. But thanks for the suggestion! But as an aside to that, 20 or so years ago BJ Thomas' road manager came to the music store I managed and said he mistook me for BJ from across the room. Sheesh. Never really saw the resemblance myself...........still don't. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BluesKing777 Posted April 25, 2017 Share Posted April 25, 2017 Ha! Thanks for the 'splaination, Dave! Never had a career I figured needed such consultation, certainly not a musical one! BK: that's one song I have personally sworn to never take up........the melody never held any appeal for me. Honestly, it always grated on my ears. Dunno why. Pretty good tune lyrically though. Just not for me. But thanks for the suggestion! But as an aside to that, 20 or so years ago BJ Thomas' road manager came to the music store I managed and said he mistook me for BJ from across the room. Sheesh. Never really saw the resemblance myself...........still don't. Ha! What about if you were riding your bicycle while playing and singing the tune with your uke and Kathie baby on your handlebars? Phew. Not sure if this the BJ version? BluesKing777. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MissouriPicker Posted April 25, 2017 Share Posted April 25, 2017 I think that was the BJ version of the song......Anyway, even if it wasn't----on the seventh day God created Katherine Ross, and that's all that really matters in that clip. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lars68 Posted April 25, 2017 Share Posted April 25, 2017 I listen and learn, both from the version posted and the advice given. Lars Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kidblast Posted April 25, 2017 Share Posted April 25, 2017 Agree with ya Buc, when you're performing, you have to play your material like you own it and you can't own it with out working it out before hand. The timing / breathing knowing where your notes (all vocally), all critical to making it sound right. And I have to make them work for me, as I don't have a good cover voice. Some guys can come really close to sounding like the artist they are covering, I can with some but not with all. my voice is my voice.. playing the guitar isn't the problem, I can't handle just about anything played on 6 strings, it's the singing for me that I feel I need to work. Also, I find that every note sung is important, from the first note in the verse to the last, eg: carry the song from start to finish. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blindboygrunt Posted April 25, 2017 Share Posted April 25, 2017 Yeah , the last thing you want to be doing is thinking about what you're doing 100 is about right , and beyond that is better Some come quicker than others due to them maybe being similar to songs already learned Any money from a gig isn't paying for you standing there at the gig singing , it's for the endless hours of practice !! Not my type of song that buc but I do like it at a gig when someone plays something that isn't in your average 100 greatest acoustic songbook ... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kidblast Posted April 25, 2017 Share Posted April 25, 2017 Any money from a gig isn't paying for you standing there at the gig singing , it's for the endless hours of practice !! yep,, so on average we make like 25cents a day! :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blindboygrunt Posted April 25, 2017 Share Posted April 25, 2017 Any money from a gig isn't paying for you standing there at the gig singing , it's for the endless hours of practice !! yep,, so on average we make like 25cents a day! :) If you're lucky Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kelly campbell Posted April 25, 2017 Share Posted April 25, 2017 Great job on a great song Buc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fortyearspickn Posted April 25, 2017 Share Posted April 25, 2017 Buc, I agree, of course. I remember a while back you were adding "Somewhere, Over The Rainbow" to your set list. That opened my eyes to the importance of having variety in what you play. I'd always enjoyed most every kind of music (yes, less so the over-produced 100 Piece Orchestras drowning out the vocalist singing a song that has no apparent melody, and certainly less so "cRAP"). but was somewhat narrow in what I wanted to play. In part, because what I actually COULD play was sort of simple ballad stuff. I had added "Rainbow" to my list a year or so earlier, but I thought it was just an aberration on my part. I found, only by repetition, was I able to actually get to the point o ENJOYING hearing myself sing it. One of my first 'Ah Hah' moments. Plus, of course, for someone who could not memorize four of the simplest lines of poetry in English Lit, I found repetition made memorization easy with song lyrics as your 'matching' them to a note. So, once again, thanks for your valuable advice - telling me stuff I sort of suspected, but needed to have validated and certified by a professional. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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