18 things you will only understand if you are a singer 

Mohammad Forster

singer

So many people dream of a career as a singer. Competitions such as “Germany is looking for the superstar”, “The greatest Swiss talents” and as they all are called, many people are interested in becoming singers. Many people discover a talent that has been dormant for a long time and even teenagers are already seeing themselves as world stars on the big stages of the world, in duets with famous singers.

What do you need as a singer? A good voice is the number one requirement. Certainly a little luck, because without it you can achieve almost nothing in life and iron discipline. You have to keep many things, care for body, voice and health.

About the tedious life of a singer this list reports:

microphoneYou hum vowels

Everywhere you do it: On the street, in the subway, sometimes even in meetings. Normal for the singer, a little less normal for the people.

You stick out your tongue sometimes

The tongue must be moved to prevent cramping in the jaw. Again completely accepted in conservatories and backstage. However, one could reap one or the other oblique view if you do that on the street. Or how would you react if a stranger suddenly sticks out his tongue?

You need humidifiers everywhere

But it’s really dry here, right? Especially in offices one hears singers often hysterically looking for humidifiers.

You always order drinks without ice cubes

A hypothermia, the enemy of every vibrating vocal cord.

You have different identities

In the office you are yourself, with friends you are yourself, but on stage you mutate into a rock star, or to Don Giovanni, depending on that.

You are not very popular in the neighbourhood

Loud volume. Instrument lessons. Gargle. The neighbours do not like that…

audioYou are super proud when you add a note to your spectrum

For a long time, you trained for it. Many neighbours upset. But now it is there, in all its beauty: the next, higher tone.

You are allergic to sick people

No, nobody wants to get sick. But for a singer, a cold is bad for business. Accordingly, all of them avoid the dangers that a normal winter in our latitudes entails.

You practice register transitions

The supreme discipline of classical singing – the uniform transition from one register to the next. Even after two hours of warm-up exercises.

You love water

Nobody cares so actively about being hydrogenated all the time. Tea and water, the singer’s best friends.

Practice time is sacred

The hottest lover. The most tempting movie. The best book. Everything has to stay outside: the time spent practicing is sacred.

You have a strange understanding of social activities

A piano. And an audience. That’s enough. Although, the piano is optional.

You cannot understand why people are screaming

That’s bad for the vocal cords.

music

You know that you can sound bad in the practice room

Nobody sounds great from the first try. Practice creates masters.

You do not like karaoke. Actually.

Professional singers, or at least experienced amateurs do not like karaoke. Except after a few glasses or when they have heard enough bad singers.

You sing barefoot

At some point you no longer hop around with the high heels. Controlling the voice is difficult enough and the heels just make it unnecessarily difficult.

You speak Italian, French, German, English

Reciting in languages ​​that you do not really speak is commonplace. But you have to sound like talking fluently.

People are amazed at where you take so much time from

Hey, it’s your passion. Time just flies like that.

Music videos that are better than the songs themselves

Mohammad Forster

music

Today’s teenagers no longer know how important music videos are. When I went to elementary school, it was the afternoon job of watching MTV or even Viva. Even later, during puberty, especially the pieces of Shakira and Sarah Connor were popular with us guys, not because of the melody …

Lady Gaga “Bad Romance”

Probably many people will not even know the band by name. Nevertheless, the video is definitely recommended: The band jumps on the treadmills, totally acrobatic. Definitely worth seeing.

Daft Punk “Around the World”

Released in 1997, this video is still a blast today: instruments are brought to life, robots are the vocals, mummies are the drum machine. A visual firework.

Laid Back: “Baker Man”

If famous directors are directing, then something spectacular must come out of it: Lars von Trier has proved true acrobatics here, but the film is shot in freefall, with skydivers who, in addition to instruments on which they play, all sorts of strange things that you do not need at high altitude.

Blur “Coffee and Tea”

Animation videos are wonderful, since childhood this genre is popular and we are all fascinated by the technical skills of the creatives. In this video you can see a family at the breakfast table. Everyone is very depressed and you understand that the son has been missing for some time, because his photo is on the milk carton under “missing”. This box then goes in search of the missing person. On the way, the milk pack must pass all sorts of adventures. This music video is certainly one of the warmest hearts, what’s out there, in pop music.

R. Kelly “Trapped in the Closet”

The legitimate question is who would listen to this song without the music video. The song is actually not very remarkable, but you could even say it was bad. The video, hip-hop mixed with operas is monumental.

Dead life lasts longer, because in recent years, various journalists have written that with the new media like Spotify and so on, no more music videos would be produced. Nevertheless, a video is shot for most of the songs. What Viva was to us is for the new generation Youtube. The videos are pompous, often famous directors are used and written scripts, special locations are selected, extras are clamped and MTV awarded at the awards for the best video.

It will be interesting to see what awaits us and who will excel when with which video, because of course, every year is more pompous, more elaborate each year, better every year?

 

Modern rebels – bands that use music to protest

Mohammad Forster

music

As a protest song, a song is called, which was created to protest against the status quo. The song is associated with a movement for social change and can come from different genres. Well-known are songs that highlight women’s rights, animal rights that should strengthen civil rights, but anti-war songs are also part of it. Nowadays songs are also sung against the consumption of meat or against the production of fur.

Music of the moment

musicThe fact that songs are perceived as protest music often depends on the situation, so well-known protest songs on the surface are actually love songs, but because of the background knowledge about the singer, the band and their history, the perception changes and the words have a different meaning. Thus Beethoven’s “joy, beautiful divine spark” already has such a note and is intended to bring humanity closer together.

Especially in the US, protest music is deeply rooted, where people have gathered in pubs and together, cheered and shameless, have sung about the actual state and have longed for change.

USA as a fulcrum – still

Music that protests can come from many genres. For example, in the 1990s, a group called “A Tribe called Quest” was successful. “We the People” was the most popular song and has unfortunately not lost its validity today: “All you black folks, you must go. All you Mexicans, you must go; All you blacks, you have to go. All you Mexicans, you have to go.” These lines have a very timely context, especially with the new president of the USA.

When police riots broke out in the United States a few years ago, it was the hour of Kendrick Lamar, who is the icon of the Black Lifes Matter movement with his song «Alright». The song, which is very hopeful, has served as a strong shoulder, as a song on which a whole movement can lean on.

Sarcasm and irony

Father John Misty’s “Bored in the USA,” a cynical, sarcastic anthem on the current status of the greatest nation in the world, a song that has brought some criticism, because the text does not leave a good hair alive in the United States, speaks of it that the education is bad and only a loan has been left hanging, in addition to the mortgage for a house that was left over during the subprime crisis, the crisis in which many homes have lost a large part of their value, and now throughout his life will burden.

Which song best describes our society?

Mohammad Forster

music

Music as a mean of communication

Humanity has been making music for many centuries, we have been singing songs for a long time. For just as long, the texts have to do with the respective context. They are among the current problems of society, the current issues, governments, wars, diseases.

So, every epoch has its song that best describes the circumstances, that describes people’s situations and points to problems that are there.

Our generation

What describes our generation? What makes us different? What defines our worldview? Is it the uncertainties? The possibilities to achieve everything, but not to accept liabilities? What we are looking for is the fulfillment, the fulfillment of our dreams, we are not willing to sacrifice our lives for the career and want to achieve a work-life balance that can actually be named as such. We are trying to reach higher goals, we want to change the world, we want to make sure that climate change stops, that justice is coming, that animals are spared, that our lives are getting better. That the EU is growing, that states are merging, growing together, not threatening each other, and finding more mutually agreed solutions. That people get along, become brothers, as Beethoven described it. That we are fighting, that war is never over again, that our children will have a better future and that they will have less to do with uncertain times.

musicWake up!

What fits better with such a life motto than a hymn? Arcade Fire has created a hymn with “Wake Up”: epic, broad, instrumental. With a choir, big words. The urge to presence. We’re just a million little gods provoking rainstorms that make all good things rusty Not the most explicit words that can be chosen, but rather subtle between the lines. While American bands here choose the offensive and move forward briskly, Arcade Fire here has chosen the quieter approach, with many instrumental parts, but have lost none of their motivating effect, the same as the listener, like direct incitement. Maybe they are even more insistent, because the melody does not get out of the listener’s head and lets him listen to the song again and again.