appassionato

look, there's Orion shining on the horizon

I've been working on learning tobikata wo wasureta chiisana tori for the past month or so. I was running into a lot of roadblocks -- namely odd jazz-type chords that aren't easy to pick out, given that my hearing isn't as good as it should be. 'Cause if I was writing this song myself, the chords would probably be something like:

B         Bbm Ebm Abm     B7       E
  sora wo ka  ke  ru  hikouki mado kara
B/D#      E/C#             F#
miorosu kumo    wa yuki no you

But instead, they are something like:

B         Bbm Eb Abm      F#m7   F#m7/B     E(add8)  
  sora wo ka  ke ru  hiko uki  mado       kara       
  B/D#    E/C#             Ebmaj7/F#
miorosu kumo    wa yuki no you

tobikata wo wasureta chiisana tori (MISIA cover - short)

It has now taken me, off and on, one month to figure this out.

Last Friday, out of desperation, I tried chord analysis software -- that thing was buggier than Vista. It crashed every time I tried to load it and threw (mostly ignorable) error messages galore -- I later discovered it doesn't like mp3s very much, which was not helpful because the demo project file specifically included mp3 files to show off the analysis. I managed to circumvent this by removing the source mp3s, but either I don't know how to read hexagons and spectra, or that thing doesn't do a very good job. I gave it clean C major and D major chords, and while the official analysis box spat out the correct chord, the hexagons, which are supposed to tell you things about what's likely to be the bass note, and what notes are being played in the chord, are completely and utterly off, which made it useless for figuring out that F#m7 and F#m7/B that's been throwing me for weeks and weeks.

Out of even further desperation, I dragged ciaran_h into it, and he said he was pretty sure it was A major. I could not for the life of me see how straight A major worked, but after playing around A/B sounded right. Then it didn't sound completely right, until I finally put an F# below, making it F#m7/B instead of A major. I think. Who knows if it's actually A(add6)/B, or if they're the same thing anyway? Then there was the issue of there being two chords, which sounded nearly alike, and I couldn't figure out how they were different. After putting the chords on repeat for a while, I nailed it down to just plain F#m7 and then F#m7/B for the second chord. The next few chords weren't nearly as difficult, but they now put me at the problem of the last chord in the first verse. I ended up having to put it on repeat for at least three hours non-stop before it occured to me to put the song in C major and then play with the chord. After more non-stop chord repitition, I finally mostly figured out something that sounds more like it should -- Ebmaj7/F#. Jeez. Not even the guy who played keys for MISIA's Hoshizora no LIVE got all these chords exactly right, and I don't blame him one bit for it.

I wish my dreams will soon unfold

Next to You (melody. cover - short)

I'm such a sheep, but I don't care. (Jess and TamTu have already done covers of this song; Jess's introduced me to the song and made me want to sing it, TamTu's made me go, "Okay, if I'm going to procrastinate I might as well have something to show for it.")

I've never much liked melody.'s music. melody.'s music is mostly R&B and dance flavored, genres I traditionally can't stand or understand. My music tastes, on the other hand, run into the more gentle, lullaby-sounding, heart-stopping power-ballad piano-heavy songs -- songs like Kodoku no Kakera and Only Hope. Then there are the bouncy piano-pop songs like On & On and sora wa itsumo naite iru that I adore. These are the songs I seek to sing and learn from. So I never bothered much with melody., even though I had about two of her singles on my harddrive.

On the flip side, I do like some regular pop, mainly songs executed precisely like BoA's Love and Honesty and Nanairo no Ashita ~Brand New Beat~.

Next to You is one of the rare songs that fit this criteria. And so, of course, I sang it, once again ignoring the fact that the chorus is way out of my range. I am particularly proud of the last line of the prechorus, "omoi wa tomerare nai", because it did stretch me, but I don't think it sounds as bad as it could have.

I wasn't born for the rose and the pearl

I'm Not That Girl (Wicked cover - short)

Earlier tonight, as I was working through some of the things I'd been thinking about, I remembered that I had promised to send Lyssa the Wicked soundtrack because she had never heard the awesomeness that is Defying Gravity. I was bored at the time, and desperately needed something different to listen to, so I pulled up the Wicked soundtrack and was struck by my memory of this song.

I've always loved it ever since I heard it, even though it was so sad. Then again, I've always been a sucker for soppy love ballads. The resignation, the knowledge that it wasn't her and never would be (I wasn't born for the rose and the pearl), the acceptance that this was just how things went for her. This was just who she was -- not that girl.

I can't remember if I ever did mix a version of this song. I do remember searching long and hard for the karaoke version, one that didn't sound horrible, one that sounded as close to as on the soundtrack as possible. I also remember many nights spent in Cool Edit Pro recording this song, over and over and over again, this version as well as the higher, more operatic reprise version sung by Glinda, but if I ever mixed and saved, I don't remember it -- and I certainly never let anyone other than a few hear it.

(I always think to myself, if I ever by some strange chance end up becoming even modestly famous, there is going to be the one individual crazy enough to go back and start going through everything s/he can find -- I know, because I am often that individual -- and s/he is probably going to find a windfall of embarassingly craptasticular, poorly recorded/sung mp3s, especially the ones from the times I was trying to be a belt singer. I don't even want to think about what friends here and there have accumulated on their harddrives since 2000, and can you imagine if someone hears Drive me to Mercury? Cute song, but oh, the embarassment!)

It took me many, many, many takes to convey this in exactly the way I wanted to. I had only intended to do this last verse, but I'm feeling more like I want to do the whole thing... eventually. But we all know how I am with recording songs.

something bigger, something brighter, something greater than what I can see

If there was one thing I could say to you right now, it would be "Please don't leave me now. I need to finish whatever this is that's in my head right now." I won't even argue with you or ask you where you've been for the last year. Stay. Please stay.

something bigger, something brighter
something greater than what I can see
something braver, something stronger
something so much more than just me

I once thought that my love could save the whole world change lives for the better

I once thought that I could be strong enough

I once thought that I could be strong enough
to stand on my own feet, walk this road alone
I silently scorned the thought of You breaking in
bridging the gap between what was and is
I thought that I knew enough to begin
if only I knew then what I know now

I don't think I've written anything this dark in a very long time. Or ever. Actually I take that back; this is probably even darker, especially given the situation it was written in --

I'm not the one to blame
but maybe it's my fault the same
for though I did no wrong
I stayed silent

but the instrumentation for it is far gentler. I was talking to Nikki as I was arranging and I mentioned thinking that it was kind of... almost violent, at least when it's faster. I never meant it to be as dark and violent as it sounds... actually I'm not sure exactly what I was going for when I originally started writing. I was messing around in F major yesterday, today it was Bb minor after playing with Bethany Dillon's Beautiful, and I was just messing around with patterns when I came up with this. And remembering what Angela Aki said -- "I play around and then find the melody and as I’m singing the melody a word would fall from the sky, and that’s the key to the song, and that’s how I write almost all my songs." -- as I was playing, I came up with the whole 'strong enough' theme, since I've been struggling with that lately.

Unfortunately, I don't think this means my bout of writers' block is over (if I can even call it that; I'm almost starting to think it's just incompetency). All I have are scribbled bits of music here and there, and I'm starting to wonder if I'm ever going to finish anything this year... or ever.

trust in me no matter what you think of me

Skyline (YUI cover)

Yesterday was the deadline for the YUI-Lover forum collaboration; in a moment of insanity, I'd signed up to sing Skyline. I don't like participating in forum collaborations much because of the pressure and the deadlines, and most of the time, in my experience, the effort turns out to be for naught because the project usually falls apart because people don't submit their songs. The voice acting world is bad enough with failed/abandoned projects; I've totally had those experiences, even with my own singing groups (Sailordreams, and what did I call the inner-senshi singing group again? oh, Moonkiss.) and with other groups or projects. Though it's not quite so true anymore, many forum projects end up doomed because people don't know what they're doing. But somehow, I decided I really wanted to sing Skyline; I even came up with a piano arrangement that I loved. I ended up finding an amazing guitarist who arranged Skyline for me, did a percussion track, and sent it off to me for me to put vocals on. I finally finished it last night; I'm not entirely satisfied but the deadline was coming up and I just stopped really caring so much, mainly because of everything that's been going on.

In another moment of insanity, I was persuaded to record Trust in Me -- at 1am. I'd always loved that song, from the moment I heard it -- I can't remember if I first heard it at the end of the first episode of Chojin VA 1 or if Maria or Mike sent it to me. All I remember is only having the TV size version, adoring it despite it being a song totally unalike something I would like (it's a very distorted guitar-heavy J-rock-type song) and begging Maria for the full version. I liked it so much that when I heard the original song it the music had been taken from, I thought Maria's lyrics and singing superior than Tomiko Van's... to this day I don't really like her voice. I was going to record it, too, since I adored it so -- Maria'd made the instrumental by stripping the vocals and I found that I was able to do the same -- but somehow I never ended up doing it, or at least if I did, I never finished it. Last night, I found the instrumental off a music video, and somehow ended up recording it in the middle of the night, despite my voice feeling very hoarse. It sounded a lot better last night than it did all day today, so I'm probably going to end up redoing it sometime.

I want Your symphony singing in all that I am

I don't know what took me so long to finally watch A Walk to Remember. It was suggested to me a long, long time ago, probably when I was in my freshman year of college; one of the first English pop songs that I loved (possibly even the first) was Only Hope (maybe it doesn't count entirely as a pop song, since it was written by Switchfoot, but, this version was sung by Mandy Moore). I was, of course, extremely amused when Jamie tells Landon, "Okay, but you have to promise me you won't fall in love with me." But it is a beautiful, beautiful movie, and as always, I bawled my eyes out at various points in the movie. And then I watched it again. And then I decided that despite having failed to sing this song on multiple occasions when Chell first sent it to me, I was going to try again.

Only Hope (Mandy Moore cover)

The song, to begin with, isn't really all that much out of my range, which is my usual problem when recording songs --picking a lovely song that either requires belt (which Ican't do) or a song that has high notes I can't really reach all that well. The part that gave me the most trouble was the climax, where there are these really high notes that are to be sung in head voice.  And so there are probably a few random unfinished clips of this song floating around, and I'd pretty much shelved any ambition I had to sing this song. I even forgot about this song until yesterday, when I was trying to clear disk space -- I'd been sending Adam a few of the interesting ones that came up (Idina Menzel's version of Lean on Me, Clay Aiken's Build me up, Buttercup). The words to this song are so beautiful, so magical; a reminder of what it means to sleep in contentment, in peace, knowing that God is taking care of everything, of submitting, surrendering, acknowledging that just maybe, I don't know everything.

sing to me the song of the stars
of Your galaxy dancing and laughing and laughing again
when it feels like my dreams are so far
sing to me of the plans that You have for me over again

so I lay my head back down
and I lift my hands and pray to be only Yours
I pray to be only Yours
I know now You're my only hope

oh, the days when I drew lines around my faith

Please Come (Nichole Nordeman cover)

I remember the first time I heard this song. It was dark; it was the first day Crosswalk worshiped at its new location, and Andi began to sing this song -- a song we adopted as our 'theme song', the song that was meant to guide us to learn to love well.

It gave me chills. Not only because Andi has this incredibly unique and pure and sweet voice, a voice that makes me jealous, but because of the words, the meaning behind it, and how true they were.

oh the days when I drew lines around my faith
to keep you out, to keep me in, to keep it safe
and oh, the sense of my own self-entitlement
to say who's wrong, who won't belong, or cannot stay

'cause somebody, somewhere decided we'd be better off divided
and somehow despite the damage done
He says, "Come."

there is room enough for all of us
"Please come",
and the arms are open wide enough
"Please come",
and the parts are never greater than the sum
this is the heart of the one who stands before an open door and bids us, "Come"

oh the times when I have failed to recognize
how many chairs are gathered there around the feast
to break the bread and break these boundaries that have kept us from our only common ground
the invitation to sit down if we will come

there is room enough for all of us
"Please come",
and the arms are open wide enough
"Please come",
and the parts are never greater than the sum
this is the heart of the one who stands before an open door and bids us, "Come"

come, from the best of humanity
come, from the depths of depravity
come now and see how we need every different bead on this same string

come, there is room enough for all of us
"Please come",
and the arms are open wide enough
"Please come",
and the parts are never greater than the sum
this is the heart of the one who stands before an open door and bids us, "Come"

This song became something of an anthem for me, a song that meant to me why I believe the things I do, why I trust and love the way I do, why I never push my own thoughts and ideas and beliefs on others. It just hit me the other day, when Andi sang it yet again at Crosswalk's third anniversary, that it had been three years since I first heard the song, since I first discovered Nichole Nordeman. That was the discovery that changed everything for me, including how I saw the world and the world around me, people, and perhaps even more in healing me -- it taught me that I did not need to be able to belt to be a good singer. And mercifully, Nichole's songs were more than instrumental in carrying me through some of the most difficult times in my life. They provided me with beautiful ways to say the words I couldn't formulate on my own. Nichole was how I discovered Bethany and went back to Ginny, and Please Come was probably one of the first songs I picked out mostly by just hearing.

I've wanted to sing this song for so long, because of all this and more, but I have never gotten around to it for whatever reason. Maybe in earlier years, partially because I wanted to create something that sounded as wonderful and ethereal and beautiful as Nichole's version and of course, came short each time I tried. I think it wasn't until after Angela that I discovered the true meaning of 'cover song' and began to focus on making things kind of uniquely mine.

I finally sat down to do it today. It's definitely not the best recording in the world; the timing is really difficult for this song, and Nichole's songs are never easy sing-along songs. They are songs you sing along to in your heart. But. I think I'm reasonably satisfied with it -- for now.

it's alright that I can't go back to the days when I was young

This morning, I took dad's old guitar out of the closet in which it has been sitting, unused, since he bought his electric guitar. It was horribly out of tune, so I tuned it, but not before discovering that a guitar doesn't tune much like a person who only plays piano would think it would. So I was sitting there wondering why I couldn't tune the sixth string out of it's leaning-towards-F-sound when I discovered I'd been tuning the 4th string instead. Oops.

I suppose it was something I've been meaning to do (again) for a very long time -- pick up the guitar. I want the flexibility of being able to cart my instrument around and perform. You end up developing a very close relationship with the instrument you work with most; but Ariel is by no means easily portable, at 44 pounds without heavy, durable case (another 20-30 pounds?) and stand. And even I cannot coax the kinds of tone out of Ariel as I can with my Yamaha upright -- which is most definitely not portable. An electric instrument cannot do the same kinds of things an acoustic instrument can (and vice versa). A guitar, on the other hand, is far more portable than a piano, and from what I've observed it's far easier to just play along and play chords than to accompany on the piano. Furthermore it also seems to be easier to write songs on guitar than doing so on the piano, where I've found myself wrapped up in writing to a pattern or chord progression and obsessing about how it's arranged rather than just writing, because I've never been able to arrange afterwards. And so I've wanted to pick up the guitar for at least the last four years.

I am, however, scared to death of callousing -- I'm terrified of losing touch sensitivity in my fingers. I remember the first time I seriously sat down to try to learn to play guitar -- I was eleven, and I couldn't fully finger chords no matter what I tried. So I sat the guitar down on my lap, bandaged my fingers with tissue paper and tape, and taught myself how the guitar worked.

I remember the ecstasy I felt when I discovered that each fret represented a half-step, that each was like a piano key.I think that was one of the biggest musical discoveries I ever made. It was so simple, and it was most definitely a fundamental, something silly, something to laugh at, but it was something I had discovered on my own, unlike the piano, which was mostly taught to me, and at that point in time I wasn't into playing the piano for fun.

I suppose the biggest push to pick up the guitar this time was watching Taiyou no Uta (which I found through Jess sending me a few of YUI's acoustic songs, which, admittedly, without I probably wouldn't have gone as crazy for YUI as I did). Tomorrow's way is, musically, one of the most beautful songs I've heard, and lyrically it's just as amazing.

Tomorrow's Way (YUI cover) - short

Despite the fact that it's much too high for me to sing, I made the excuse to myself that it might not be a bad idea to practice stretching my range and singing up higher without going nasal, and so I started learning the song, and recorded the bit I did manage to learn with a real mic and the $7 converter I bought at RadioShack. I did, however, take it down a half-step, after discovering on accident while practicing the line "teniireru tame no" that it worked better a half-step lower. Interestingly enough, I don't seem to have much problems with breathing on the mic when singing in Japanese as opposed to singing in English.

Still, after all this, I still can't do much more with the guitar... it hurts my fingers too much to try. I suppose I'll be breaking out the tissue and tape again, and this time it will have to be for each of my fingers, instead of just my thumb and index finger.

how he strove to break the chain

So, I've been working on something. I got interesting reactions to it. I'm nowhere near done, but. Here's what I have for now:

The Ballad of the Magic Potato

make a wish
it might come true
for you have heard it told
how the magic potato
saved us from our doom
 
it was hot and sticky summer
while a sproutling, eyed and green
as he grew, he gained a passion
for all things to be made new
 
he waged war against injustice
how he strove to break the chain
in the place of iron fetters
he left kind remarks instead 
 
potato be praised
praise potato
for we stand in awe

Yes, there are a massive amount of puns here (and it will only get better! We shall soon be singing of how the magic potato increases efficiency (down from being at your place in 10 to... more efficient service!) If only I had this amount of creativity when it came to actually writing real actual songs which more people could appreciate >_> Which, sadly, I think have about 15-20 of them sitting unfinished. Rawr.