Welcome to the community Matt, and that was some nice playing. I love that song, you inspired me to add it to my must learn list.
I liked how you incorporated the moving bass.
One tip on the guitar playing. Your barre, for the F, is coming down after your other fingers. Getting into the practice of getting the barre down first is important, it results in less dud notes and will make your change faster in time (even though to start it will be slower).
On the singing. I’m also someone that struggles and I’ve been working on it for a year and a half and improving. I think you are doing what I used to do, which is trying to sing with your talking voice and trying hard. It can be hard to know what “just go for it” means when you’re doing the best you can. I think you need to learn to project with your diaphragm. There is a good online course called Discover Your Voice by Chris Liepe that might be worth checking out, it’s helped a few of us here. Costs some $$$ though.
Hi Alan. Thank you for the very kind feedback. I appreciate it. I’ve put a lot of time into playing, but it’s something I enjoy so much that it never feels like a chore. It’s nice to have something where the end goal is really just to get better and nothing else.
Again, thanks for the watch and feedback. Much appreciated.
I agree with you about the F chord. It is something I’ve always struggled with. If I put the bar down first then my hand tends to not be in the exact right position and the rest of my hand does not land where it should. It’s something I need to keep working on. I definitely agree I would be faster if I could drop the bar first.
I will check out that singing course. I need to change something to get to the next level. I do think singing with more confidence, as many people have said, will help but I’m sure there are other technical things I am doing wrong also.
In case you’re interested, this is the lesson I used to learn California Dreaming. Took a little time, but I got there.
Well done I thought your guitar was really fluent including an F barcode (I think)? Singing while playing is a difficult skill for most people to learn and you can do it already so well done on that!
Welcome to the community Matt! For some reason I find that I can do it on some songs, but still struggle with others. Maybe find a fairly easy song to play that you feel more comfortable singing, what I call car or shower songs. This made it easier for me to feel comfortable singing while playing. Great introduction!
Thanks so much. I really appreciate it. I’m definitely dealing with a confidence problem on my singing so it’s great to hear some positive feedback from people I am not related to.
Hello. I definitely find the same things. My range is pretty limited, so there are select songs that I sing better thank others. I’m also trying to focus on my breathing when singing, so I’m better off to play something I don’t need to think about too much.
Nicely done, Matt. Not an easy song to play and sing IMHO and you delivered an enjoyable rendition.
I quite liked the talky, breathy timbre of your singing. As others have said, keep at it and you’ll improve. The Liepe course delivers, being one of those who invested time in taking it to improve my singing (and I really needed it )
Thanks David. I appreciate the feedback. As the second person to recommend the Liege course, I’ll check it out. Sounds like it has probably helped a bunch of people on this site.
Nothing at all against Justin’s lessons, of course. I’ve learned a ton from him. It just happens that the Rob Swift lesson is the one I used for this particular song.
Sorry, one more thing. I checked out a bunch of your songs posted on YouTube. They sounded really good. I think your voice carries very well. I don’t know what it sounded like before the course, but you can certainly sing now.
Congratulations on your first AVOYP posting as well. Not an easy one to do as those push chords make it difficult to get into the rhythm at first. Your singing is good, you just require a little more belief in your voice.
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