How Many Singers Do You Need?


© Cindy Lee Haddock
Articles in this Topic    Discussions in this Topic

HOW MANY SINGERS DO YOU NEED?

This is another of those situations where the songwriter needs to treat each situation as a unique one. Here are a few items you might consider to help you determine just how many voices you want on each song.

THE LONE WOLF

This is the situation in a lot of rock groups, and many alternative and folk ones as well. There is one singer, and they do all the vocal duties. If you are cutting a demo, often the singer will just overdub themselves with themselves on each number, or use some device like an octave pedal so they can pull this off live as well to create some thicker sounds and harmonies in places like the chorus or where they might like to emphasize some music point. Most of the time, though, it is a simple melody line with no extra frills. If you have a really good singer or really good lyrics that the vocalist can pull off with plenty of feeling, this might be all you need.

THE DUET

Sometimes it is great just having one more person to create some simple harmonies or a call-and-response echo sort of touch to your song. This also is often enough to let you squeak by many reps who insist on a more "polished" sound, and that often translates as having some harmonies somewhere in the song. Having a second voice, too, can add what might be lacking in instrumentation, giving you that wild high top note or a bass drone that is lacking if you don't have a keyboardist or second guitar or violin to add thickening to your sound.

THE WOLF PACK

Sometimes, too many singers can just get in the way of each other, but tell that to a church choir or barbershop quartet. If everyone sings a separate part well, multiple voices can really add a listenable quality to your songs that simply is missing with the more bare-bones approach. Many people love to sing along with all the fun tiny background parts in more textured songs-take Queen's 'Bohemian Rhapsody' for example. The first performing band outside of school I played in did a lot of Eagles numbers, and we all were in both band and choir in school, so we had plenty of folks to cover all those vocal parts to get that same wonderful layered sound that band is known for. As long as everyone does their part and knows to not stomp on the lead singer's vocals, this can give your music a really professional sound without a rep wanting to bring in a lot of fancy production in the studio-you've already done the work for him, and it's your sound, not some producer's, and you will be able to pull it off live without extra help.

Go To Page: 1 2


Post this Article to facebook Add this Article to del.icio.us! Digg this Article furl this Article Add this Article to Reddit Add this Article to Technorati Add this Article to Newsvine Add this Article to Windows Live Add this Article to Yahoo Add this Article to StumbleUpon Add this Article to BlinkLists Add this Article to Spurl Add this Article to Google Add this Article to Ask Add this Article to Squidoo