Way Down East in a village by the sea/Stand an old red farmhouse that watches o'er the lea...
I've been making lots of updates to my website lately--I added a lot of pictures, I'm going to be adding some more video soon, and also recording some vocal tracks to upload. Also, yesterday it occurred to me that I already have some vocal tracks on my iPod, of various live concerts I've done. I listened to a bunch last night--obviously I'm not going to use any from high school (God forbid! nobody wants to hear my thready little voice singing "Turtle Dove" or "Bridge Over Troubled Waters") but there are a couple from college I could use, plus the Mozart Litany for which I was the soprano soloist. (My theory is that Mozart was having an affair with some hot soprano when he composed that work, because she has an AMAZING amount of solo material. Two full soli complete with cadenzas, plus several quartets.) I'm-a use "Hostia Sancta" and "Panus Vivus," edited, of course. On the other hand, "Agnus Dei" starts off with a rather nice sustained note...I definitely have to edit them because I don't want the faster runs in the clip. I do them fine but not great, and I don't want any vocal clip on my website not to show me off. Runs have always been my biggest liability as a classical performer. In "Glitter and Be Gay" I can do the chorus "A ha ha ha ha ha" section fine (and I attack the perfect fourth and the major sixth intervals rather well indeed, if I do say so myself ;) , but I slip a bit on the ascending runs at the end of the chorus (that leads into "Pearls and ruby rings/How can wordly things take the place of honor lost?")
Audacity has some great little editing features, a whole ton of ways to improve the sound quality. This is good because the recording of my junior recital is not the greatest--I'll have to pump up the sound and reduce a LOT of hiss. The mike was not as close as it should've been for that one. But I'm going to use "Down East," a beautiful little American art song by Charles Ives. It shows off my voice nicely (very sustained melody line) and it demonstrates my musicianship--it starts off with an extremely chromatic, just-barely-minor section, then transitions into a sweet lilting melody and even samples "Nearer My God, to Thee." Beautiful little pieces--I love the Ives. I may or may not include the Schubert lieder I performed--I haven't listened to them lately but as I recall, "Die Yonge Nunne" is good but I go a teeny bit sharp in "Gretchen am Spinnrade" (in the "und ach--sein kuss!" part). Well, if you're going to go sharp, I suppose when Faust kisses you, that would be the logical place :D
Audacity has some great little editing features, a whole ton of ways to improve the sound quality. This is good because the recording of my junior recital is not the greatest--I'll have to pump up the sound and reduce a LOT of hiss. The mike was not as close as it should've been for that one. But I'm going to use "Down East," a beautiful little American art song by Charles Ives. It shows off my voice nicely (very sustained melody line) and it demonstrates my musicianship--it starts off with an extremely chromatic, just-barely-minor section, then transitions into a sweet lilting melody and even samples "Nearer My God, to Thee." Beautiful little pieces--I love the Ives. I may or may not include the Schubert lieder I performed--I haven't listened to them lately but as I recall, "Die Yonge Nunne" is good but I go a teeny bit sharp in "Gretchen am Spinnrade" (in the "und ach--sein kuss!" part). Well, if you're going to go sharp, I suppose when Faust kisses you, that would be the logical place :D