Sing, sing a song

I’ve decided to learn to sing. The rest of the house are delighted.

I previously thought I could hold a fair enough tune. I’ve played SingStar. That’s as close enough to winning Britain’s Got Talent as you can get, right? Recently, though, I’ve found myself obsessing over Postmodern Jukebox – an amazing musical collective, organized by Scott Bradlee, who take modern songs such as Meghan Traynor, Jay-Z or the White Stripes and perform them in a retro style. The orchestral version of High and Dry is something to be beheld, and you haven’t lived until you’ve listened to a jazz version of Dancing Queen.

So anyway, having listened to a bunch of properly good singers I thought to myself ‘I can get good. Why not? I’ve got the time.’

The first thing I did was to download an app. There are tons of these around – you sing into them and they tell you whether you’re on pitch which, let’s face it, is a fairly key component of being a good singer.

There’s only one problem with singing into an app, trying to hit random notes while a little yellow line bounces up and down around a target box. Everyone else can hear you. I decided to avoid the problem by hiding in the downstairs toilet with the washing machine and the cat litter. It’s all glamour being a singer you know.

I then selected my first exercise. This was a delightful exercise where it tries to determine your vocal range by getting you to read a phrase in your normal speaking voice. Cleverly, since you will naturally speak within your comfortable range, this should find the midpoint and then ask you to sweep your voice up and down to find the limits.

I spoke. It highlighted my midpoint. I tried to sweep down. Immediately, I sounded like a duck having a coronary. It turns out my midpoint is also my bottom. My high point was not much better. Strained and somewhat squeaky. So there I was, hiding next to the toilet rolls, alternating between Donald Duck and Minnie Mouse, hoping that this would turn me into Pavarotti by lunch time.

The next step was to try an actual song. The track it suggested was Love me Tender. This seemed promising. Everyone can do an Elvis impression. Surely that means the songs are easy. Besides, Elvis was a great guy, but he came from a simpler time when singers sang songs rather than attempting trills and vocal flourishes. It’s disappointing how frequently the winner on American Idol is determined by how many different notes can be within a single syllable. That’s not vocal dexterity, that’s just indecisive.

I hit play to attempt the verse.

On the plus side, I got a pretty good score for both tone and tempo. On the downside, this probably meant the app needed its ears testing. For a start, to make it easier, they had decided to slow down the song to a dirge-like pace. The funereal aspect did not add to my vocal style. Secondly, if I was hitting the right pitch its was only if you took an average. My limited range turned out to be vast if you included to micro-second peaks and troughs as I tried to sustain each note. It looked a seismograph.

Still, it was only my first attempt. I have plenty of time to work on this, and at least no one had heard me.

I headed upstairs.

“Did you enjoy your singing?” said Sue.

Later that evening, I quietly deleted the app.