In our band, we had Faith as our singer, Ben as our guitarist and I played the keys. However, our singer didn’t really come in to rehearse so we ended up having Millie as our singer for 2 songs and Faith just did 1.
Our setlist was quite difficult to come together, because we all had such different tastes in music, but we ended up choosing 1 song each. We started with “Not Prepared for you – Lauren Jauregui” and then we did “Easy on me – Adele” first because then it’d be less switch overs, we had Millie sing these. Then, we were supposed to do “Pink Lemonade – The Wombats” but we had no guitarist so we didn’t end up performing that one.
I learnt most of the chords by asking the guitarist what he was playing and then creating up my piano part until it sounded kind of cool. For “Pink Lemonade – The Wombats”, I just played octaves in a rhythmical way and then I had the piano solo at the end of the choruses and the end of the song. “Easy on me – Adele” is a piano ballad so I just learnt the original piano. Then, I played arpeggios of the guitar chords for ” Not Prepared for you – Lauren Jauregui”.
Practice:
We’ve rehearsed about 3 classes before this but haven’t got any videos, so we need to remember to track our progress so we can write about it. As you can see, we have no singer so we’re just performing wit the track, which is good but it’ll also be different when we’re recording with a singer, because we don’t have the drum clicks to keep up in time. My back is towards the audience, which can’t really be helped here but we need to remember not to do this for the actual performance. I have quite a few breaks, and a long break from the chorus and bridge, so I need to look like I’m still into the song. However, at the start, you can see me adjusting my own volumes because I was too quiet, which is good because it keeps the performance looking professional, instead of someone coming to change it for me. The end is really long so we do need to discuss how long, exactly, we’re wanting to do it. Then, we need to capture footage of our second song, “Not Prepared for You – Lauren Jauregui”.
We’ve picked our 3rd song! We’re going to be playing “Easy on me – Adele”. There has been some issues with the setlist, with the singer not actually being here to rehearse and then the singer wanting to drop a song, however, we’ve settled on performing this set list and just having different singers to perform with us, if our singer doesn’t show up.
This was my first time performing this song. Ben hasn’t learnt the chords yet and our singer wasn’t in, so I asked Millie and Meg to sing for me. I played through the whole song really well and pretty much in time the whole time. However, the little melody in the verses were a little tricky and I ended up playing it a little different to how I was supposed to. Next time, I want to be able to play that melody right and keep in time better on the chorus. I’m going to practice over the weekends and see if I can get it better.
Individual Practice:
My timing seems to go off on the “changed who I was, to put you both first” line because it’s supposed to follow the singers vocals so tightly. Then, the chorus seems to always fall either short or it goes over so it’s not smooth. I need to work on following the vocalist more and then remember the counts for the chorus. I’ll do this by going back and practicing over and over. Lastly, I stopped playing at the end, I should’ve finished the song because I might’ve been able to pull myself back into the song. In future, I’ll keep going, even after mistakes.
I’m pretty confident with verse 1 and the intro now, so I started on the chorus. I stayed much more in time here and I followed the singer closer. I’d like to work on varying the dynamics a little better now, possibly being quieter on the verse, until the little build up, and then moderate on the chorus’ and loud on the bridge and build ups.
School Performance:
I wasn’t actually in the band that went to the school, but I got asked to perform “Easy on me – Adele” and a solo piano piece. For my solo piano piece, I played “Experience – Ludovico Einaudi” but I didn’t have time to learn the whole songs I just kind of improvised the ending. When I was performing, my hands were really shaky so I didn’t play it as well as I’d hoped but no one really noticed so it’s ok. I could’ve slowed it down a little and make it more expressive but I don’t think anyone really noticed, I just did because I know how it’s supposed to sound.
Final Performance:
To begin with, you could see Lucy walk into the frame but in the other edited version with different camera angles, you won’t be able to see that and it’ll look more professional. On the quieter parts of the song, you can hear the keys kind of cut out because my foot slipped off the sustain pedal. I could’ve held the keys down more but my hands had already moved when I noticed. However, we had good stage presence by looking at each other but also staying within the zone of playing. Millie had really good mic control when it came to the high notes, there was no clipping and everything was very clear. To say I was looking down a lot, I feel like I came across very confident in my playing, and I kept looking up to vary it and overall I had really good stage presence. I think Millie was a little nervous because she was singing with us last minute and it kind of comes across because her hands are in her sleeves. I think with more preparation, she’d also had been confident. The “oh no” part at the end made it more unique and I think it was a nice little end to make it our own.
Mine and Ben’s timing was really tight on this song which really give the song the push that it has. The singer stepped in for us at the last minute so she needed her phone for the lyrics and didn’t have the melody down 100% but if we had more time to rehearse with her, she’d of got it down better. The other camera guy is actually in this shot so in the edited version with the different camera angles, you won’t see that and it’ll look more professional. On the bridge, I fell out of timing slightly because not every hit was on time with the guitar. However, you couldn’t really tell that much because we all just kept going. On the bridge, it didn’t really sound exactly how it was supposed to so it kind of sounded a little off but again, the singer joined us last minute so she just did her best.
Overall, I think we did really well to say how unprepared we were. For most of the rehearsal time, me and Ben were playing along to the track because we didn’t actually have any singer to rehearse with. I think we did practice as much as we could but it’s different playing along to a track than it is to be playing the track, because playing along kind of keeps you in time whereas playing the track leaves all eyes on you. I think I was so confident with my parts because I practiced a lot on my own so I had my parts down and I just needed to keep the timing with the guitarist. I wasn’t as nervous this time either because I think doing the other performances, like Live Wire and the lunch time performances, really helped me feel a little more comfortable in playing the songs. If I was to do this project again, I think I might’ve practiced a little more with the singer that actually ended up singing with us so we would’ve been more prepared.