The night before I'd laid down the lead vocal lines for "Tiempo para el amor". Of all of the songs we'd written for the suite, this one has been the most reticent to reveal its character and potential (to me at least). Always in the back of my mind, I was thinking that I could make it better... stronger... and often I felt a tinge of guilt, if you could call it that, for not having spent enough with it to do it justice.
So in return for a sizeable chunk of the Christmas break, Tiempo got a stronger melodic line. And even though I didn't feel ready, I decided to damn the torpedoes and go for a take. I was right... I wasn't ready and that's where disappointment creeps in. The optimist in me expected to deliver a song I hardly knew, to recording standard, in one evening. Surely I was good enough for that?
What comes back from the recording process is always unforgiving. For me, it's often brutal and all too rarely for my liking is it beautiful. In the cold post-recording light, I had to admit that there was still a lot of work to be done. But as a world champion latin dancer said to me once, "honest feedback is like medicine, it tastes bad but it makes you better".
And now I've got a better idea of what I want, and what I need to do to get it:
- I need to practice singing it in a higher key, so that there'll be enough headspace for me to sing onto the note from above;
- the tone I'd like is a lightly supported head-voice;
- the lyrics should be expressed with gentle subtlety but with solidity; and
- there should be a greater sense of air around the vocals.
That there was no lack of trying, and that there is a clear path to doing better, I think that's good enough reason for a fleeting flirt with contentment.
Loo Yen
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