Karaoke Forums

[shadow=gold]Ok, this may sound crazy, but this year I am auditioning for American Idol... (no, I'm not one of the crazy "horribly bad" people that think they can sing!) I've been told I have a beautiful voice and my friends, family , and total strangers have told me to audtion, so I want to give it a try, since it is my dream and my passion.

I just need advice on how to control breathing, when thr right time to breathe is, and how can I improve t hings like higher range, voice runs, not sound nasal, things like that. Any help and advice at all would be greatly appreciated!![/shadow]

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[blur]I gave you my heart..please handle with care*~Misti~*[/blur]

In addition to other advice you will receive I highly recommend recording your voice while singing and playing it back repeatedly.

Situps help with strengthening breath support. Practice doing everything softly for a while too, it will help with learning control.

Keep your throat open, just like the way you do it to get to notes in your mezzo voce. Keeping the throat open cuts down on the nasal sound. Breath at every pause. Some contemporary music doesn't allow for much breathing.

Get objective opinions of your voice and don't be afraid of what they will say, but do take it seriously enough that you will work on the points they mention. Friends and relatives can be too supportive at this time so get opinions from people who will be honest. You can PM certain people on this website to ask for a subjective critique, it might hurt and it might not. Be prepared for that.

and sub it to SS

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I can neither confirm nor deny ever having or knowing anything about nothing.... mrscott

I would do that , but the problem is I've never recorded my voice on the computer, I dont have a tape recorder at the moment, but all I need is a recording program.

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[blur]I gave you my heart..please handle with care*~Misti~*[/blur]

Good point Jian. Misti, do you have any songs already submitted to Singer's Showcase?

I can't tell because the SS site won't load for me today.


How soon do you plan on auditioning?

No, I dont have any yet, I need to fina  agood recording program, I have a mic, sound card and everything else....

I am audition August 21st in Birmingham.

By the way do you know any good programs? And how to record? I've never done it..

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[blur]I gave you my heart..please handle with care*~Misti~*[/blur]

There is a software that is free for recording and manipulating audio files. It is called Audacity.

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/


Install it and see where it takes you. If it gives you problems, let us know.

My last subs, my only subs so far went pretty easily. I played the karaoke song on my computer using windows media player and recorded it at the same time with my recording software. If you can do this it will only take a few practices to get it to sound pretty good. Pretty good is a place where people can listen and give you help with your voice.

The kind of mic you are using might throw people off a little too. What brand of mic are you using?

Uh, call me crazy, but if you are serious about this audition and a possible music career, go get some voice lessons to help with all of the concerns you have above. You could get a decent vocal coach almost anywhere in the country for about $35-40 a week for a 1 hour session and they'll leave you each week with valuable excercises to work on throughout the week.

There are about 9 weeks between now and your audition, so you are looking at about a $300-400 investment in your future.

If you can't afford that (even if you don't have the $$$, that is equivalent to working one day a week at a part time job at like Target or Walmart or the like), I would contend that you just aren't that serious about it and may want to find other aspirations!!

GET A VOICE TEACHER!!! DO THIS RIGHT OR DON'T DO IT AT ALL!!!

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C Mc
KJ, FL

To be perfectly honest... to get through at any idol audition.. you have to be LUCKY..... not even neccesarily that GOod.... you have to audition to get past several stages, before you even SEE the celebrity judges.... and depending on what mood that particular producer etc is in.. you might not get through, regardless of what you sound like.


I have heard MANY people I thought were amazing, get shut out at the first stage.


Vocal lessons may work... but, luck is better:)


Another important thing, is song choice... i heard some great voices, on songs that did NOT suit them, OR their sound..... And, the first stage, you go in with a group of audtioners into a room, and you sing in front of them. I saw ONE room, have 4 of the 5 girls singing alicia keys "fallin'"..... Looked a little ridiculous, was probably boring for the judge, and in the end, the whole room got cut right there.

Sorry that I didn't think of this myself. When I was trying to take voice lessons, I couldn't get my schedule to work around my lessons. My vocal coach expected a lot more work than I could provide. Since I was working and in highschool, earning a living had to take priority in my case. At least my sister was able to graduate thanks to me paying rent to live with my mom. I was serious, I practiced anytime I could. I had no social life, had no time.


SERIOUSNESS ISN'T THE ONLY THING THAT STANDS IN THE WAY OF TAKING LESSONS!!

True, but it does show dedication to your art.  Just like bands that ALL live in a studio apartment & eat Top Raumen nightly that live & breath music every waking minute are more likely to succeed than bands that all have regular jobs &/or families that can't live & breath music every hour.  If you are seriously dedicated to trying to make a 'dream come true' at making a living at an art, you need to make the sacrifices whenever & wherever they need to be made.
I agree, with the vocal lessons & get to taking them NOW.

But other factors are involved in the AI selections too, do you have a potential Idol look, potential for stage performance, memory for lyrics, etc...

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LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

forget it.

i give up.

I gave up my future so that my family could eat and live indoors.

I just suck. I'm an idiot. I walked 3 miles to school and 3 miles back, I walked another 2 miles to work. I'm just don't count in the grand scheme of things.


I should have made those sacrifices. Screw my family.

Actually I'm glad I never bothered, we all know Manic-Depressive people never become musicians.

Sorry for this, I got carried away. It seems that maybe I enjoy drama a little too much. Maybe I should have taken acting and persued that instead.

Well if that's how you feel, that's too bad, but I believe you were thinking of a more stable career with having to support your family & a music career WASN'T a priority but a rather nice hobby that you enjoyed to do & wanted to improve on it.  But for someone that wants to make a career out of it & don't have the financial responsibilities of a mortgage, family, etc...can make those sacrifices to try get into the music business.

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LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

Are my eye's really getting bad, or are other's having a difficult time reading "junebug's" contrasting font color and shadow color combo as well ?

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Northeast United States runner up for the "Singing Hall of Shame".

No Lonman, I was talking about family such as my mom and my sister. I was 15 year old. I did live and breath music, more so than my grandparents who were music teachers.

I was in highschool 25 hours a week, working 50 hours a week. Plus the amount of homework that had to be done and never did because of work.

I actually sang all through my shift at work, practicing my breathing and range and...

anyway.

I'm sorry about taking away from the point of your thread Misti.

Couldn't read a word I had to highlight the entire message as if I were going to copy/cut/paste.

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LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

Ok, so you were still looking at the future for a stable career & obviously didn't see a music career as a possibility in your decision - not a bad thing.

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LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

Btw.... I find "voice runs" really irritating, and find that they are overdone, annoying, and completely hide a potentially beautiful voice.


But, that is just me.. i know they are very popular in todays "music", but my gawd, i find them irritating. When I was at the auditions... EVERYONE was wailing like that, and I found it terribly grating.... waiting in line, and listening made me wish for ear plugs... how IS THAT considered singing?! ("woo hoo, i can sing scales in a terribly irritating way!":)


Have you ever posted anything online for us to hear? I would be interested.


And, Don't forget... All of those TERRIBLE people you see on the funny audition shows, had family that told THEM that they should audition, because they had beautiful voices;)

Sorry Lonman, I don't see how you got that from what I was saying. What career?