Runs on food and music, will sing for chips and pasta.

Wednesday, January 14, 2015

Restless Heart - album-making diary #4 (January 7th, 2015)

 FB entry on January 7th, 2015

[album-making-diary] [Restless Heart album] My friends told me this is the closest I would get to being pregnant - giving birth to an album. I cannot agree more.

All the hours spent inside the studio and near the studio (lunch break, dinner break, suppers, brunch, breakfast, etc); all the hours spent there chatting, working, eating, dreaming, arguing, laughing and crying - I guess, are like the ups and downs of someone waiting to go into labour.

It dawned on me only a short while ago (weeks) that for first timer in album-making, am charging in this brand new field with am ambition so colossal that you would think am either stupid or foolish, or both. A full album of 10 songs that I hope to complete within two moths, all of the songs selected vastly challenging.


If it wasn't for my ego (to finish what I have started) and how foolishly dreamy I am - I would have deem this project suicidal and lethal and raise the white flag. Secondly, "the show must go on" - for the love of those who believe in me and became part of the project and left me a piece of themselves - without these lovers I cannot go on.

We started recording vocals on the 4th song last night. The album title song is now ready to be mixed. It was emotional to listen to the rough mix of Restless Heart and recalled the years I have behind me since I first learn this killer song. I told my producer Seah Song-fan that I am finally proud, of myself (not because the singing on the track is perfect) - for the work that have gone into the song. Thank you Zalina Lee and Elvira Arul for lending your crazy magic in the back up vocals. And Tay Cher Siang for being bossy enough to make me do this, much much love to you, stay bossy.

The songs on this album requires the full spectrum of a singer's voice and abilities - thanks to the faith (and talent) that my composers/arranger have on me, for writing beautiful but complicated materials that call for a `super singer' to take on. The range, tone and character required to do the songs well are frankly, beyond me at the moment. "What were you thinking Janet??" I guess I wasn't thinking enough when the material came to me, I fell in love with the songs and with my own stories and I dived head in, now my body is wet and and cold but my soul is very happy, despite being very scared.

Of course then came along the madness and intensity of an artist from another planet, Song-fan Seah who was crazy enough to say "Let me help you." Without even knowing the album material first, he invested his belief in me.

Now months later, and hundreds of hours of coaching later - Song-fan is still deep in coaxing and guiding the better versions of me to come into light. His bottomless energy (is freaking out of the world that I think he is alien) and tireless approach in teaching moved me so and help me stay focus in the recording booth - no matter how many times I have been asked to sing a line, I keep going, because he can.

Constructive feedback from Song-fan and colleagues help me discover so much of my own voice I never heard or know. It is like living under the same roof with this person for so many years and now for the first time, discovering a new, extremely attractive side of her that you have previously overlooked. Or like staying in the same house all your life but never ever step foot in a room full of treasures - and discovering it after 10 years (this one calls for a separate entry).

I can hear my own voice now, some are clear and confident, some are shy and unsure of itself, yet. There's still so much to do before I wrap the vocal recording of all 10 songs and am happy to say that I'm hooked on the process of discovering. The work is tedious and at times rather gruesome but the rewards are...I have no word for it.

It's a good time to be alive now. Thank you for reading this long post and I hope to share more stories again soon. The studio schedule is hectic this month (this is the last stretch of the race) but there will be lots of updates soon, regarding the Restless Heart concert this March at DPAC. - so sit tight and stay tune.

Album cover shoot next week!!! Weeeeeeee!
#restlessheart #janetleealbum #albummaking #debutalbum #janetleemusic#grateful #living #album #music #janetwrites #diary

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