1. Most tweets go unread.

Just because you tweet, don’t expect your followers to see it. Few view their feed comprehensively. They check in and check out. Catching only bits and pieces. Even forgetting your fake and dormant followers, which are voluminous, far fewer than fifty percent of your followers see one of your tweets. Actually, I’d be stunned if 10-15% of your active followers see one of your tweets.

.................. MUCH MORE here.  Check him out:

http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.php/archives/2012/12/03/everybody-knows-3/

These are quick and dirty, maybe I'll expand and clean them up a bit later.  But just wanted to get them out.

First, credit where credit's due - Here are two links to learn more about him, and contact him if you want him to do some work:

http://ronansrecordingshow.com/ and http://www.venetowest.com/rcm/

OK, here goes.   He did note that these things don't apply to avant garde jazz or chill ambient music, and that there are no absolute rules in music.  That said, read on.

The first FIVE seconds of a song are hugely important - that is, if you are trying to engage people in a mass way, or trying to get the attention of an A&R person or a music supervisor.  Song intros that are just twice through the chord progression will not get your song heard by anyone.

Create interest in these first 5 seconds.  Could be a cool riff, a weird sound, a great groove, an interesting synth, an engagine melody, a wall of guitars, highly distorted drums... think outside the box, and listen to hit songs to find examples.

We cannot engage in multiple things at once.  Whether it's two people talking to us at once or two melodic elements at the same time, we can't engage in multiple things at once.  When it sounds like a song is complicated with many elements, listen more carefully:  only one or maybe two things are actually being FOCUSED ON at once.  Example:  OK Computer by Radiohead.  It is thought of as complex, but it is really actually simple.  Another example:  Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.  Lots of instruments, but whenever one is added, another one disappears to allow it space.

If you change the sound stage, people think a song is more complex than it really it.

Throwing the kitchen sink at a song NEVER works.  More is not more.  More is less.

Use bold elements.  Then take them away, and add others.  And so on.

After a certain point, things usually start going downhill fast, the more elements you add.  Example: if you have drums/bass/guitar/voice and then you add keys, well, yes you are adding keys but you have to remember you are also taking away from the drums, bass, guitar, and voice.  New elements or instruments almost always compromise the existing ones both sonically and with respect to the listener's ability to hear what's going on.

(Multiple layers of a single element count as a single element, i.e 50 layers of background harmonies singing a single chord count as one element.)

The most hugely successful songs are SIMPLE.

Figure out what you want the listener to focus on, and create space around that.  Remove competition.  Feature one thing at a time.

Sustained sounds rob your mix of punch.

Sustain is the enemy of impact.  Sustain and punch are OPPOSITES.  If you want punch in your mix, look for things that are sustaining, and change them to be less sustaining.  

This includes the piano sustain pedal, a snare that rings, an arena-size kick drum, guitar notes that sustain rather than mute, reverb and delay on vocals (or on anything), etc.

This is not to say that sustain is bad or should never be used.  Phil Spector's Wall of Sound was intentionally just voice and tambourine over a massive indistinct wall of sound (comprised of a ton of musicians in a single room, like three pianists, 5 bassists, etc, some people not even mic'd directly).  If that's what you're going for, fine.  But anything that rings for a long time after the transient results in a) less punch and b) muddier sonic information.  

Drums are frequently some of the biggest offenders.  A snare's ringout is almost never in the key of the song (ever think of that? I didn't).  Toms vibrate sympathetically even when not hit. Ride & crash cymbals are common problems, and compression usually makes it worse because compression brings transient and sustain levels closer to each other, thus reducing the effect of the transient and increasing the effect of the sustain.

Big hit records (except for 1982-1990) have a lot less reverb and delay than we think.  A lot of them lately have little to NO reverb.  Pink and Katy Perry: completely dry vocals.  Rihanna is an exception.

NEVER add reverb on the master channel.  Unless you're doing spacey ambient experimental music.

Exception on delay:  Delay which is in time, i.e. delay as part of the groove (as in dance/EDM), is more a part of the performance, than a factor adding sustain. 

Keep it simple.

Keeping things simple makes you look like a badass (as a mixer or producer).

One of a great mixer's most powerful tools is the MUTE button!

If anything in your mix sounds awesome soloed, it will not sound awesome surrounded by a huge, dense mix.

Record in mono. The enemy of big wide stereo mixes, is stereo instruments.

The widest stereo result comes from recording everything in mono and then using those mono recordings to define the far edges of the mix.  Individual stereo tracks cannot be pushed as far to the edge of the mix; they all live in a muddy middle of the mix.  (And then there is no place to put the vocals, which should be in the middle.)

If given stereo tracks, see whether it's possible to either collapse them to mono or actually use only half of the stereo field.  The individual track will sound worse, but the mix will sound better.

There are some exceptions to this, such as a piece made only of live piano and vocals, where you may want a stereo piano sound which helps define the room space.

The louder your vocal has to be, the wimpier your track sounds.

We tend to calibrate volume to the vocal.  Therefore, if the vocal has to be pushed way loud in the mix in order to be heard, the listener will turn the track down, because the vocal is too loud. This also turns everything else in the track down, and makes it sound wimpy.  It is better to carve out space for the vocal (and keep it dry) so that it can be at a low volume relative to the track, and still be heard. This allows the guitars, drums, and everything else to seem much louder.

Often, in mastering, a stripped down ballad on a CD will end up sounding way louder than all the rock songs on an album, because of this (above).

When mixing your stuff and comparing to commercial releases, compare at the same volume.

It doesn't help to compare your un-mastered mix to a mastered commercial release.  It will always seem quieter, and you won't be able to troubleshoot as easily.  Compare your track at the same perceptual volume as the commercial track, and then listen for specific differences.

Low-frequency sounds:

Bass, synth bass, anything with lots of low end should always be recorded mono and placed straight up the middle in the mix.

Cut low frequencies as high as possible, until it starts sounding bad, then back down again.  (I think he said he cuts up to as high as 80Hz, until it really starts taking away from the track.)

To remind you - or if you just signed up for this newsletter recently - the question was:

What's your REAL reason for singing?

This is an important question to answer for yourself if you're putting a lot of resources (time, money) into lessons, recording, coaching, school, rehearsals, and everything else that goes into pursuing music at a high level.

I asked this question because some of the goals I've heard from people, in my opinion, don't represent what they really want.  And when you set a goal that doesn't represent what you REALLY want, it's pretty disappointing when you achieve it.

For example, I know someone who believed - subconsciously - that the day he played a show in front of 15,000 people, he would finally be happy.  And after he did play that 15,000 person show?  He walked off the stage thinking...  Huh.  I feel exactly the same.  Nothing's changed.  Now what?  Why have I dedicated my life to this?

His real desires were deeper.  They were personal issues, things unrelated to music.

This is why I'm asking.  I've been asking myself for a few years now what it is I REALLY want out of music.  And the answer keeps evolving, but I have a pretty good handle on it now. 

But there are so, so many singers out there who think that if they just get featured on iTunes; if they just make it to the finals of The Voice or X Factor or American Idol or America's Got Talent; if they just sell 100,000 albums (and, you should know, almost NO ONE does that any more); if they just get one of their songs played on the radio... That if one of these things happens, that other, totally unrelated things will magically happen.  That they'll be happy.  That their boyfriend will come back.  That their family will love and respect them.  That they'll be popular.  That they'll be rich and not have to work hard any more.

Nope, nope, nope.

Be prepared for a long hard road.  Be prepared to do it because it's what you WANT to do.  As they say, it's the journey, not the destination.  Yes, you have to have a destination in mind, but you're going to spend your life on the journey so it better be worthwhile.

Here's why I do music.

The shallow answer:  Because you gotta do something all day.  And I'd rather write and sing and play and practice and teach and perform, than write software or work in a store or go to a professional office or any of the other ways you can make a living.  Because working in music offers me constant variety and lots of control over my life.  Because I like what my days, my weeks, my life look like in this career.  Because I like the people I hang around with in music.  

The deeper answer:  Because music is my search for immortality.  It's the way I'll leave something of myself behind.  (I don't and won't have kids, BTW.)  It's the way I hope to connect with a larger group of people than just my family and friends, and give the world something meaningful.  It's the arena in which I now choose to pursue excellence - the way I choose to strive to push my limits and be my best.

Now, if you still think your dream is to be a full-time rockstar, please read this:

The Mythology of the Full-Time Musician

Hello Friends,

My name is Christian Sanders. I am the newest addition to the team at Performance High. I would consider myself an opera singer, and I love to incorporate classical techniques used by opera singers to help inform popular music, jazz, and musical theatre singers. I think every singer, no matter what music they want to sing, should have some sort of classical training to make sure that they are singing in a healthy way that will allow them to sing for a long time. With that in mind, let’s talk a little bit about breathing.

Breathing is a tricky thing. It’s so difficult to talk about with people because everyone has their own way that they think about breathing, and each teacher has a certain vocabulary that they use to try to get their students to breathe properly. Instead of going into some vague jargon about sensation or feeling, I like to introduce students to proper breathing in this way.

First, grab a book from your house somewhere. Next, lie on your back on the floor with your stomach facing the ceiling. Put the book right on top of your belly button. Now, exhale all the air you have (to inhale properly you must learn how to exhale properly). When you inhale, the only thing that should move is the book on your stomach, and it should move toward the ceiling. Try not to move your shoulders or any part of your upper chest. It might feel a bit strange, but focus on how it feels to release all of your abdominal muscles in order to make the book move toward the ceiling. This is how it should feel each time you take a breath when you are standing up! 

Proper breathing is definitely something I continue to struggle with. It’s so tempting to suck in my stomach when I inhale that I have to consciously stop and decide to release my stomach muscles in order to get a good breath before I sing. Good luck! 

Check out this amazing video of Amy Walker doing 21 accents in two minutes.  

When her Seattle accent came up, I thought, wait, that one's not an accent, that's just "normal" speaking!  But of course that's just because her Seattle accent is the closest one to my own.  To you, the Seattle accent may actually sound like an accent.

...

I'm not writing about diction or enunciation today.  I'm actually writing about finding your vision.  

Your accent is a metaphor for your vision of your live show.

In the same way that it's not easy to describe or identify your own accent, it's not easy to describe your musical vision.  It's too close, it's too familiar.  You can't even see or hear it.  But you probably do have a vision, just as you have an accent.  If you can't find it, you can finally start to see it when you compare it to other visions (or accents).

So get on YouTube and start watching live videos.  Go to some concerts - of artists both in your genre and outside your genre.  Pay attention to all of the elements.  Start to see what you take for granted.  And make notes, tons of notes - both on what belongs in your show and what definitely does not.

Here are some things to notice:  How many musicians are on stage? What is the lineup? How many of them sing? What are they wearing? What are their ages? Are there lights or media? Video? Decorations on stage? A backdrop? Are people sitting and listening politely, or are they rowdy, dancing, partying? What is the atmosphere in the room, how does everyone feel? How big is the audience? What does the audience look like? How big is the stage? Is it indoors or outdoors? What genre of music are you playing? Is it largely improvisational or is it mostly fixed in structure? Is it instrumentally or vocally focused?  Is anyone wearing costumes?  Are you in ripped clothing, a cocktail dress, a Bjork or Gaga getup? What is the energy level? Do you have dancers on stage? Do you have backup singers? Are you playing an instrument? Do you have guest musicians who step in?  Is it a community-oriented performance where the audience participates musically or otherwise, or is it a classical or jazz performance in a theatre with tiered seats? What type of venue is it - an arena, a restaurant, an outdoor festival, a wedding, a coffee shop, a house concert, a backyard, a flatbed trailer?

This is only the beginning.  These questions help you just start to work with the basics.  But once you have your basic vision down, you have a framework to think within and make decisions within.  You have a place to start with, to add your own unique elements you haven't seen anywhere else.  

Creativity thrives within a framework, so even if you don't have a complete vision yet, start its framework!

In my lessons, we are working on the epic closing song for my debut set with AdrienneO this Thursday night.  The vocal style that best matches the emotion of the song is a more epic, classical approach than anything I have ever sung before.  I have no problem reaching any of the notes in this (very rangy!) song, but hitting them with the right tone and release is illuminating a big difference between classical and popular singing:  air flow vs. air pressure.

As a popular-music singer, I tend to sing with a good deal of air pressure to provide the air support for my voice.  Think about the compression and apparent tension you hear in popular-music voices, from Aretha Franklin to Kelly Clarkson to Bruno Mars to Enrique Iglesias.  To put it simply, there's a lot of air pressure there.  It may sound like tension, but I think of it more as compression.  The air is literally pressurized between the diaphragm and the vocal cords.  This results in a more belty, brighter, and "tighter" feel and tone.

Compare this sound to classical singers; for example, Lea Salonga singing I Dreamed a Dream.  There is a freedom and release in classical singing that you don't hear as often as popular styles.  There are lots of reasons for this, of course, but the main one I am focusing on today is air flow.

I have no problem hitting a high F with pressurized air.  But it sounds like too much of a belting voice for this epic song.  I have to let off the pressure and compression, and add air flow instead.  Then the note pops on it own. 

...

If you tend to sing with a lot of air pressure and want to sing with more air flow, here are some ideas for how to get there:

- Do high-range vocal exercises with light, hooty sounds that are completely oriented in the head, not mixed in to the chest much - if at all.  (You need to have a clear released head voice in the first place to have something to work with.)  Fortunately, the majority of at-home singing programs have plenty of these kinds of exercises.

- Try "sitting" against a wall, knees bent, back against the wall, and singing there.  (This works well with some people, and not so well with some guys who have really muscular backs or shoulders.)

- Try sitting on a chair, legs resting up on a high chair or stool.  This works really well for me, because it makes it very hard to over-exert my abs.

The main idea is that instead of highly compressed air making its way out through your vocal cords like air squeaking out of an overblown balloon, you want to provide a consistent, gentle flow of air.  When you do this, it's easier to get a beautiful, released vibrato and clearer resonance, because a lot of other muscles in your throat and mouth can relax as well.

You DO want some nasal resonance.  Your sinuses are some of your vocal resonators.  But you DON'T want to sound like you're singing through your nose.

Here's a very quick tip to tell if you're singing through your nose:  

Hold your nose closed with your fingers, and then sing.

If you sound mostly the same (except for consonants D, N, and M), then you are fine.

If you sound radically different, then you are singing through your nose rather than using nasal resonance.  Figure out how to sing more through your mouth so that you don't sound so weird.  It has never required more explanation than that, for my students who have tried it.

Very simple tip this week, but also very effective!

Mistakes are part of live performance.  They're going to happen, because we are human.  They may not happen at every show, but they're going to happen sooner or later.

Ill put my ego aside for a moment and confess to just a few of the recent mistakes I've made:

• Singing the same lyrics for verse 1 and verse 2
• Forgetting to double the first chorus like we practiced in rehearsal
• Hitting some wrong notes on the keyboard
• Playing the wrong rhythm on bass for a couple bars
• Letting a bad word slip out in a venue that prohibits cussing (it was part of the lyrics!)
• Moving to another place on stage during the prechorus, and then realizing I shouldn't have moved during the prechorus, because I wanted to move on the chorus
• Putting the mic on the stand (or taking it off) only to realize I needed to have it off (or on) immediately afterward
• Saying stupid things between songs

If you have watched my Zen of the Stage DVDs, you'll know that although I'm a fan of high achievement and constant improvement, I'm not a fan of perfection.  Perfection creates too much pressure.  It's an unattainable goal.  Many variables change from night to night.  There are internal variables such as how much sleep we got and what kind of mood we're in, and external variables such as the venue setup, the set list, and gear, to name just a few.

Mistakes happen.  What really matters is how you handle them.

...

There are two main ways to handle mistakes:  Ignore them, and OWN them.  The one thing you don't want to do is try to fix them.

The kind of mistake will determine whether to ignore it or OWN it.  Here are some examples.

Singing the same lyrics for verse 1 and verse 2:  Most of the time no one's going to notice, unless it's a song everyone sings along to, like Sweet Child of Mine (which was, unfortunately, the song I made this mistake on).  In any case, however, the only thing to do is truck on with authority.  OWN those incorrect lyrics!  You can't stop singing.  You can't make a face.  You can't half-*ss mumble the rest of the verse.  It's much more important to sing the same lyrics again with authority and confidence than to point out with your body language that you made a mistake.

Forgetting to double the chorus (or any other song-arrangement mistake):  If you happen to make this kind of mistake, it's your job as the lead singer to drag the band along with you.  Keep singing solid and confidently.  Make it obvious with body language that you are not backing down, you are forging ahead with your mistake.  Your strong and confident authority in a moment like this is the difference between a bump in the road and a train wreck.

Hitting wrong notes, playing the wrong rhythm, letting a bad word slip:  Nothing to do but keep a straight face and pretend it didn't happen.  ...Unless you're playing jazz and you can repeat the creative mistake a couple more times to make it sound intentional, which means owning your mistake.

Stage-blocking mistakes:  Whatever you end up doing, own it.  It matters less that you stick to whatever plan you had for the song, than that you OWN what you DO end up doing.  I call it "juice"  - that extra zing that a really confident, intentional movement has.  There is a world of difference betweeen a lazy movement and a movement that you OWN- a movement with "juice."

Saying stupid things between songs:  What really matters is that you have the right attitude, not that you say the right things.  In the words of my guitarist friend:  "You could yell nonsense at the crowd with the right attitude, and they would love it."  OWN whatever it is you say, stupid or not.  Your communication is made up much more of HOW you say things, not WHAT you say.

...

Good luck at your next gig!  Hopefully these thoughts will take a bit of the load off the shoulders of the perfectionists out there.

I'm going to share some of what's going on inside the band, since EDM (electronic dance music) and electronic music in general (electro-pop, electro-rock, etc) are commercially rising genres right now.  Perhaps you are using some electronic elements in your act or are curious about how to do so.  Hopefully you can learn something from my experiences.  I'm still wading through them, and certainly don't have all the answers yet, but this may give you some things to think about if you are using - or considering using - electronic elements in your show.

Synchronization

We are a trio, but we sound way bigger.  Part of that is because we use loops triggered from Ableton Live.  Now, when playing a gig you don't want to be hunched over a laptop using a mouse, trying to move a little cursor on-screen to make sounds start and stop.  So, you use an interface with easier controls.  We are currently using a Novation Launchpad.  (The Ableton APC40 interface is better, but has been unavailable for over six months.)  There are many such interfaces available.

Ableton can be set to trigger sounds on the "1" beat, even if you hit the trigger button early.  This is good because then you don't have to worry about being so precise, and it frees you up to do other things like play keys or guitar, which Justin does in my band.  Ableton also stretches or compresses loops to ensure they are in time with the tempo.  This is called warping.

Ableton's tempo awareness means that if you have live drums, there needs to be some kind of coordination between the drummer and Ableton.  As far as I understand, there are two options:  either your drummer plays to a click generated by Ableton, or your drummer sends tempo data to Ableton.  Basically, one has to be the master and one has to be the slave so that they're in sync.

We chose the latter - the live drummer in control - because we want to be able to slightly push and pull the tempo for emotion, rather than be fixed to a 100% mechanical tempo.  We have a product that analyzes the tempo from his playing, and sends that information via MIDI to Ableton.  He uses an electronic kit in this project, but if you have acoustic drums there are also products where you can attach sensors to the drums to do the same thing.

Here are some of the issues we've run into:

- Sometimes loops don't get triggered at the beginning of the song because Ableton is not in a "ready" state.  We had to hook up a "start/stop" MIDI event that the drummer can send in order to set Ableton to a "ready" state.  We also have to work out a system of communication between Tad the drummer and Justin the Ableton DJ, so that Tad knows when a "start" or "stop" command is necessary.

- We can't use drumstick clicks as our countoff, because those send no MIDI events and thus no tempo information to Ableton.  We have to use hi-hat hits to count off the song so that Ableton receives tempo data.

- Once in a while, in the middle of a song, Ableton starts triggering loops one beat OFF of the 1.  Very, very bad.  We suspect either possible RAM or CPU limitations on an old laptop, or issues with how the loops were exported from Logic, because Ableton should never, EVER lose a beat.  We're still working on this one.

- Sometimes, loops exported from Logic play at the wrong tempo in Ableton, or play with way too much warping, making them sound bad.  We suspect issues with tempo information embedded in the loops.  Still debugging this one too.

Musicality

Although using loops enables us to bring in a lot more sounds than three people could generate live, we have to make sure that what we play is still musical - and feels live.  We aren't DJs and don't plan to be.  We don't want to just press play and then play along to a recorded song!  So, using Ableton has affected our musicality in a few ways:

- Justin has to think ahead and trigger sounds slightly before it is time to actually play them.  This is a switch from feeling where a song is going, to thinking about where a song is going to go.  And unlike playing guitar or keys, if he fails to trigger a sound, there's no catching up a second or two later.  This has meant that Tad on drums and I on bass need to be very clear about when we are changing sections, so that Justin can know well enough in advance to stop or start loops.

- Some of my vocal harmonies are triggered.  This means that the harmonies are in control, not me.  I have to make sure to sing when I'm supposed to sing, or else it's just plain weird.  Live backup singers could be more responsive to variations in my performance.  Yes, I could consider using something like the TC-Helicon VoiceLive for my harmonies, but not all my harmonies have parallel movement or use the same lyrics as the lead voice, so that wouldn't work.

- We have to give consideration to which sounds are played live and which are triggered.  We are doing a live show, after all.  So we use loops mainly just for padding and ambient sounds, not for out-front riffs, and certainly not for solos.  But this isn't something you even have to think about when everything is played live.

...

Once we get everything working well, it should continue to work well (fingers crossed).  If you want to see it in action, we're playing at Herman's Hideaway in Denver, CO on Thursday, July 19, 7:30-8:15pm along with the Brent Joyce Band and Straight Nerdy Like a Cool Kid.

We decided between one mix and the next that we would modulate up a whole step near the end.  That meant I needed to re-record the vocals at the end of the track.  I forgot to do it until a half hour before I had to leave for the meeting in which we were going to mix in these new vocals.  So I banged out three vocal tracks (lead and two harmonies) in 30 minutes and that was that.  No warmup, only one or two takes per track, done.  The vocals aren't perfect, but perfection shouldn't usually be what you're after anyway.  Emotion should.