Hi everyone. It's been a whole week since I've posted! Last week I decided to actually have a life...I didn't realize it would be so much work! Having fun in the evenings after my adult job did not leave me enough time to record or post anything last week so I went digging in my archived files and came across this little gem from the beginning of December. I was working on my head voice at the time so it's a little different from my recent posts but nonetheless, it's me making noise. I will be posting more this week and will be uploading my guitar/vocal song soon to complete the goal I set a few months back.
Hi everyone! After having a conversation with my best friend last week I felt like belting this one out sans backup instrumentals (mostly because it was after 1:00am and I couldn't be bothered). It's super scary to sing without a track in the background, your voice all naked and exposed, but I'm kind of just sick of being afraid so I thought, "what the hell, let's do it"! I'm a little pitchy because my voice is tired and I probably could have hit record a few more times until I got out a better version, but I realized...I'm actually (and shockingly) not looking for perfection anymore! I am always going to feel that I can do more or that I should have done more, done better. However, I think that making an honest effort is more important. This self realization blows me away because, despite my very smart friends telling me all of these things months ago, I didn't actually believe that I would ever be able to change the way I was hardwired to think.
Rihanna does this thing where she makes me think a song is fun, flirty, summery and reminds me of drinking umbrella drinks on a beach some where....that is until I actually listen to the lyrics. I think it's because in two of my favourite Rihanna reggae inspired songs, she addresses pretty depressing topics. This happened in Man Down from her Loud album and she does it again in her Unapologetic album with the song below, titled No Love Allowed (the title should have tipped me off but the only "i" anything I own aside from my new computer is an iPod shuffle so I never know what any songs are called). I would often listen to this song at work and would groove along to its repetitive Caribbean rhythms feeling soothed and lovely, when all of a sudden my brain would start to work and I would process that she's actually singing about a breakup - great. This juxtaposition stirs me up inside since my emotions don't know what to do....do I keep swaying or do I stop and reflect on some of life's most difficult challenges? Hmmm...well I sing along, get it all out and continue to sway along. The result is documented below :)
You guys may have caught on by now that I routinely have dance/singing party's in my room. I used to do these alone by myself just for fun when bored or feeling kinda down from a hard day/week/month. Now I record them and you get a tiny little glimpse into my world as a hibernating female, by day pretending to be a responsible legal professional and by night moonlighting in my own one woman show live (or not so live) from my tiny apartment in Hamilton Ontario. It's a lonely life really, but who better to share it with than Beyoncé? A long overdue tribute to my favourite diva - monologue and all (lol), below you will find my cover for Ego.
Thanks for watching and as always, Thanks for the support!
I am so excited about this year and about leaving all of those yucky old negative things behind in 2013 - it's gonna be a good one.
Speaking of the new year, some of you may or may not have noticed that I did not in fact post a video of Jessie J's Who You Are which was the task that I originally set out on in my first post here. This is because, well...simply put, I ran out of time. I was delayed by about a month by basically everything around me breaking down (read about that here if you like). If it hadn't already been obvious to me at the beginning of all this, it is certainly now clear that I CANNOT control everything and this new found acceptance has been quite liberating (I think this is the first time in my life I've actually truly believed it). While there were indeed a few emotional breakdowns along the way (as predicted), I am happy to report that none of them were about this blog or stage freight - I have you all to thank for that. Your support has been amazing and I am grateful for it everyday.
It is with this new Laissez-faire attitude that I have decided to correspondingly post-pone my goal by a month. In the meantime, I will continue to post videos. The video below is dedicated to my friend Mandi Taylor who I solely blame for the skip in my Lauryn Hill CD (never mind that it played on repeat in my car for all three years of law school)!
Also, if my vocally knowledgeable friends could provide me with some tips on hitting those low notes with more "oomph" I would really appreciate it!
I heard someone once say that when performing music, especially vocals, you have to pretty much not care about what you look like in order to really emote and connect with the song and, therefore, the audience. I know this to be true of myself when I play flute - my sister informed me a long time ago that I look like a "compete dork" when I'm playing. I think she was referring to my animated (and I'm sure pretty dorky) body movements and accompanying facial expressions. I never recorded myself playing so I have never actually seen this for myself - taping yourself is a whole other ballgame. I am still getting comfortable in front of the camera, but I think I've come a long way from when I started. I think it helps that I record alone in my room but I used to cringe watching playbacks in the beginning thinking "omg, do I really look like that"?! I've never thought anyone else performing looked weird. In fact, I always just thought that they were extra great because they were so into the music. It's funny the self-cringing phenomenon that occurs when you see or hear yourself for the first time (and I know I'm not alone in this), whether it be on an answering machine, tape recorder, or in my case, camcorder/YouTube/internet blog. Like I said a while back...go big or go home!
Hello friends. I'm so sorry I stayed away so long. I didn't mean to and I certainly didn't want to but things broke...like my computer, and my car, and my voice (again!), and the skin on my finger tips and my long streak of maintaining a pest-free home (in case you're wondering, the roach kind of pest and I ain't talkin' Papa). It took me some time to replace/heal/annihilate all of the things that broke and then it took me some more time to figure out how to use the new things (like my brand new awesome MacBook Air), but by Jove, I think I've got it! ....or maybe I'm just close. Either way, I need to upload a ton of new things. The first of which (below) I recorded a month ago after deciding that the content of these videos had become way too gloomy and serious - it was time for a dance party...in my room, by myself, on a Saturday night, cuz I'm cool like that. As you will see, I tend to make faces and sway a lot so sorry I'm not sorry because I had fun and will probably do it again.
Emma - out.
Seriously though, thanks for bearing with me. During my blogging absence I have received tons of calls and texts from y'all asking for updates, requesting songs and offering help and I'm so very grateful. My original goal is still in the works and I will have an update on that soon.
