Lesson 3 – Some finer features of using Sing & See

In this lesson you will learn about the some more options you can change in Sing & See and some simple exercises to check your ability to sing intervals.

  • More detailed instructions on operation – how to change the recording duration
  • Singing intervals

Let’s start singing!

Plug in your microphone. Start up Sing & See. Once you’ve warmed up your voice, let’s start singing!

Time for exercises

  1. OK then, let’s do some more exercises. Today we’ll try some simple intervals.  Start with a Major 3rd – click on C on the keyboard, then on E. Depending on your range, you might like to start at C3 (a typical male range) or C4 (women and children). Wherever you’re most comfortable!
  2. Play the two notes. Mentally try to hear the interval, then sing an ‘e’ vowel on the two notes. You should see the line move cleanly from the middle of the C up to the middle of the E note. If the Pitch Line is not perfectly straight don’t worry; however try to keep it as smooth as possible, without too many pitch wobbles and without going sharp or flat.

    Sing & See showing the interval.

    As you sing the notes in the interval, you will see the blue line move along on the first note, then up to the second note. Check that you hit the middle of each note.

  3. Practice some more. If you’re having trouble, read this article about breathing – having correct breath support can make a big difference to getting intervals.  Or talk to your voice teacher.
  4. Now save an example of your interval singing – this will be useful when you’re looking at your progress. Just click on “save”, and find your files from last session. Save this one with a new name – e.g. “Intervals – 2013 May 16”.  Later on in the week we’ll take a look at your old files so you can see how you’re progressing!

Keep your options open

Sing & See is designed for real-time feedback – to see what you’re singing. But as we saw last time it also lets you play back what you’ve just sung, so you can hear yourself.

The length of time that can be played back can be changed in the Options.  Click on the menu item “Options”, then scroll down to “Record Time”. You can change the playback duration from 15 seconds all the way to 60 minutes.

Sometimes it’s useful to have a short duration. For instance, if you are doing exercises that are about 15 seconds long, you may just want to leave it running. This way you can just stop it and listen to the last phrase you sung. Just press the Space Bar and Sing & See will play back what you’ve just done.

Changing the options to 4 minutes will obviously be good if you’re working on a whole song. Since the recording time can go all the way to 60 minutes, you could even work on your entire set.

 

That’s all for today.  Keep on practicing – you’ll hear from us soon!

Happy singing!

 

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