Dear [[{First name}]],

Welcome to the November Musicademy Newsletter. We know from feedback that you particularly enjoy the Ask The Expert feature so we’ve included more questions this month – do send us your questions for future issues.

In this edition:

Ask the Expert
Improving my vocals confidence

Daniel Tuck form Yorkshire in the UK says:

“My singing is reasonable, though I am trying to improve, I think that a lack of confidence holds me back a lot. Do you have any tips on improving confidence?”

Musicademy vocals tutor Gayle Bamberger replies “You have obviously worked out that confidence is really crucial in effective vocals performance. When we are under confident we tend not to breathe as well as we should and also not to really nail the notes that strongly, so it all comes out a bit mushy. Obviously we’ve taken a fairly in-depth approach to helping worship vocalists through our vocals DVDs, so of course we would recommend going through them or alternatively getting some private lessons to help you on your specific issues, but here are some brief tips:

  1. Learn to breathe properly so that your breath is constantly and consistently supporting your singing voice. Take some time to do breathing exercises before you perform – this will not only improve your breath support but aid in relaxing you also.
  2. Get your posture right so that your legs, hips, back and abs are supporting you.
  3. Open your mouth wider, particularly on the high notes, and project your voice as much as possible. Use diaphragm pushes for more support.
  4. Warm up properly so your voice is in top form. Do stretches as well to relieve any tension your body may be carrying.
  5. Practise using vocal warm up exercises (again available from our website). If you want to be good at a sport you need to practice it and your voice will significantly improve if you’ve put it through its paces regularly in terms of vocalisation exercises. Regular use of these exercises will also help you improve your tone, range and power and prevent long term damage.
  6. Keep hydrated – drink plenty of water before and during singing. Avoid milk and dairy foods which will clog up your throat, and try to avoid caffeine and alcohol as well which tend to dry up the vocal chords.
  7. Practice singing in front of other people – in our live courses we get people to take it in turns to sing a verse of a song. Its terrifying to begin with but you gradually learn to control your nerves, remember to breathe properly again and try differently the next time. Get some honest feedback on what others think you can do to improve as well. It’s also worth “practising confidence” when you are alone – try to break through the fear barrier by singing louder and being more daring and creative with vocal inflections without the added pressure of an audience. Test yourself in the privacy of your own home and believe in yourself! This will eventually follow you on stage…
  8. If you are the worship leader but don’t feel too confident vocally (and so many guitarists or keyboard players find themselves in this position regularly) then ask a good confident singer to back you up holding the melody line rather than doing a lot of harmonies.
  9. Again if you are leading worship and struggle to communicate where you are going next with those lovely ad libs that great singers seem to pull off with ease, then just speak the first few words of the next line before its sung – like that we all know that we’re repeating the chorus or going back to the first verse and you’re not left singing it by yourself while the congregation catch up.

Its also worth considering the ‘fight or flight’ mentality. Rather than fleeing from the challenge of singing, face it with positive thinking, risk taking and jumping at every opportunity to grow and develop gifting. People are mostly singing because they choose to – not because they are forced to!! You need to remind yourself to enjoy sharing your voice with people, rather than let nerves rob you of an enjoyable experience.

Ask the Expert
Getting your songs out there

David Hall from Melbourne, Australia writes

“I am a singer / songwriter. Are there any web sites that would provide exposure for songs that I have recorded?”

Apart from the obvious MySpace we’ve come across two worship focussed sites recently that should help you and there are rumours of a couple more currently in development.

The first is Song Discovery run by Worship Leader magazine. It works like MySpace and our own Andy Chamberlain has a profile there – not that he’s uploaded any songs yet – far too busy making guitar teaching DVDs!

Secondly, we’ve recently come across a UK based site RESOUNDworship This web site features brand new songs, with free-to-download mp3s, lead sheets and chord charts. Each song started life in a local church context, and has been honed in peer critique to ensure strong biblical lyrics, usable themes and engaging, singable music.
Tim Hughes is apparently a fan - he says

"RESOUNDworship is a highly engaging and fresh new website packed full of new songs to resource and equip the church in worship. Sign-up and enjoy!" 

Some of our tutors who are also worship leaders are already using this site and recommending it - one of our students is also a contributor. We like the ethos behind the project which is run by a group of British based songwriters who are seeking to resource the church with heartfelt, crafted, accessible worship songs. They are also open to new contributors so this may well be worth looking into.

Record label Word are about to launch a community site which we understand will showcase new songs – we’ll include details of that in a future newsletter.

Ask the Expert
Keyboard warm-ups and fills

Luis Gabino Alvarado from Costa Rica had two keyboard related questions:

“It has been difficult for me to find exercises for warming up my fingers or exercises for flexibility and speed, could you give us some exercises for making more speed, and before playing a song?”

This really does go back to good old scales and arpeggios. Not only will they help you warm up but they are such essential building blocks for contemporary playing styles. I would also suggest that you start in a key, say C, and from the bottom of the keyboard play every chord voicing for each note in the scale – CEG, EGC, GCE and so on right up the keyboard. Now use the next chord in the scale which is Dm. Again go up and down the keyboard. If you can do it without looking at your hands you are again learning useful skills whilst warming up. You could also try simple chord sequences within a key. If you don’t know how to work out which chords are in a particularly key there’s an article in our members section on theory which covers this nicely.

“I have often heard these really nice "scales" that musicians do after the voice stops singing, during the "solo", in a verse or in a chorus. They sound very nice, and I wonder, what are the most common scales I could use in a specific tone.”

I think what you are referring to here are “fills” rather than scales, although they are of course normally based on the key that the song is in so will generally use the scale notes. We teach this on our Intermediate Keyboard DVD volume 2 and it incorporates using auxiliary notes, passing notes and broken chords. There is an article on it in the members section but you probably do need to watch the DVD to really get to grips with it.

Ask the Expert
Recommendations for acoustic guitar amps

The Revd Mark Worthington from Gateshead in the UK emailed saying

“I am wondering if you have any recommendations or guidance concerning guitar amps for worship. I understand there are all sorts of complexities with regard to bands, mixing desks, monitors, etc and tones of amps are as varied as there are amps. In a small church balancing the guitar with the keyboard seems to require a little amplification. So far, we have used a small 15 amp practice amp but it has no real tone or reverb features (always to be used in moderation - I know!).”

Andy replies - for an acoustic amp I use an Ashdown Radiator 1 which I bought for around £200 and I think is great. It has two channels, DI out, both XLR and jack inputs plus reverb. I’ve used it for all sorts of situations and I’m really happy with it. Its small light and portable so will work well if you find yourself needing it for say, a school assembly. Ashdown also do a bigger version for around £400 with more features which is worth checking out too.

If you can find a second hand Trace Acoustic amp on Ebay then they are great and good value as well. You could also check out amps by AER, SWR and Marshall. They do have different tones so worth trying them before you buy to see what you like.

New online Keyboard Song Learner lessons

We’ve filmed and uploaded two more online lessons for keyboard players. These are:

What a Friend I've Found
This is a relatively simple lesson in C and is suitable for newish players. You will learn:

  • Simple chords to play along with the melody line adding in additional melodic parts in the chorus
  • How to use a sustain pedal effectively
  • Techniques for playing smoothly

Holy is the Lord
Ideal for more advanced beginners or people at intermediate level, this lesson will enable you to play Chris Tomlin's song either relatively simply or with more complex syncopated rhythms. This lesson will teach you:

  • How to add melodic interest using chord notes
  • Rhythmic changes
  • How to create contemporary sounds by sustaining right hand notes while changing the bassline
  • How to push the beat
  • About making a difference in sound between the verse and chorus sections by either changing register or improvising using the right hand

Go to our webstore to download the lessons. Look for the Online Video – Worship Keys tab.

New online rock & pop guitar lessons

We’ve just uploaded eight more online guitar lessons to our webstore. As you may know, Musicademy runs a music college in the UK and we’ve taken all our rock & pop guitar lessons and made them available as online downloads.

The latest set are from stage eight which we would normally use to teach guitarists who have been playing about three years. This is where guitar playing really starts to get exciting as we take you through some exact guitar parts of well known rock & pop songs.
Stage 8

  1. Whats My Age Again? – Blink 182
    Increase the speed and accuracy of your right hand picking technique with this song.
  2. Pentatonic Warm up exercises and speed exercises
    Learn to play fast using hammer on and pull off techniques with the pentatonic shapes learnt in stage 6 of the course. 
  3. American Idiot - Green Day
    Increase the speed of you power chord changes and knowledge of octave soloing as we show you all the parts to this song.
  4. Beautiful Day – U2
    Understand how to use delay and parts of chords as you learn one of U2’s definitive classics.
  5. How You Remind Me -Nickelback
    A great introduction to playing chords using Drop D tuning as you learn Nickelback’s massive hit.
  6. I Believe in a Thing Called Love – The Darkness
    Now learn solos 1 and 2 of this modern classic as we break down each riff, step by step. See other lessons for learning the other parts in this song.
  7. Every Breath You Take - The Police
    Add9 chords are a wonderful addition to any acoustic and rhythm players repertoire. As we teach you this song you will learn the shape that will allow you to play add9 chords anywhere.   
  8. Purple Haze - Jimi Hendrix               
    Combine lead and rhythm guitar as we show you how to play the Intro and rhythm parts note for note.          

Save money by downloading all seven lessons. When you get to the checkout simply insert the coupon code FULL STAGE 8 to receive one of your lessons for free.

Competition result

Dwight Parker from Virginia won last month's downoad competition. Remember that submitting an Ask The Expert question also gives you the chance of winning the five downloads.

Win Five Free Song Learner Downloads

We really like to know what you think of our newsletter and the Musicademy products so please take a couple of minutes to answer these questions and e-mail them to us. One respondent will win five free song learner downloads and we’ll let you know what they think of them in the next issue.

  1. What did you think of this newsletter?
  2. Which articles did you particularly enjoy?
  3. Any questions for our “Ask the Expert” feature?
  4. Any suggestions for content that you would like to read in the future?
  5. Any suggestions for websites we could recommend people?
  6. Have you bought a Musicademy product or downloaded a lesson and what did you think of it?

Please e-mail your responses to enter the draw!

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