How can I record my high harmony vocals beyond my vocal range?

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mcphert1

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Hi there

I'm Mike from Australia and this is my first post. I am a singer songwriter who likes to record my own original songs. When I sing the main melody, I usually like to do so towards the top of my range (my highest note is about D or the tenth fret on the thin E string of a guitar). For years I had a Tascam four track cassette recorder (244). It had a knob on it which changed the pitch very easily. So when I would record a higher harmony vocal, I would turn the pitch control down by turning it anti clockwise, record my vocal at a lower key, then turn it back up to normal position. I would then have a tenor harmony vocal beyond my top pitch capability and it had the advantage of changing the timbre of the second vocal so it blended better with my original main melody vocal (without getting into 'chipmunk' territory. Sadly my Tascam gave up the ghost and I am now looking at getting a new home recording system (thinking of using the FocusRite Scarlett interface with my computer using its bundled software (Pro Tools Lite or Ableton) which I know very little about.

With all that said I am looking to record simply. I loved that aspect of the Tascam. If I go to computer recording, can you good people give me some advice about

-how I would simulate the process I used on the Tascam for lowering the pitch for high vocals and then raising it again on modern software. The other way took only half a second and I am keen to avoid complex pitch shifting. (I also can't sing falsetto easily).

Any advice would be appreciated.

Best


Mike
 
There will be a 'pitch' change option on any modern DAW. Melodyne is better at the task but more expensive.

Welcome to the forum Mike! :)
 
There are a number of ways of doing.

As Jimmy said, you can use the pitch shift option that most DAWs have.

In most DAWs you can also change the playback speed and replicate the method you used with tape. In Reaper this means simply shifting a slider a little bit.

In Reaper you can also craft a harmony from your original vocal by using ReaVoice. You can also use a formant shift to make it sound less chipmunky
 
Cubase can do this rather nicely too. Each version of software nowadays can do this kind of thing better and better.
 
There's a tool for that.

wclc-04-a.webp

Sorry, couldn't resist.
 
Sampler. A good keyboard should handle the recoded voice take as a sample. Pilot that sampleon a MIDI controller like a starship using the bend wheel. Play your vocal. Add some white noise to thicken or bit reduction. Stereo reverb as icing on the cake, ducking.

Probalby a VST in a DAW but , I use an old hardware VP-9000.
 
how do said:
er how about training and lerning the notes that are to high for your voice rather then foolling your self like silly little man (who no longer posts hear after the abusse I suffered). But we dont do stuff like that hear do we now as that would lead to unconstructive critasisum on the jellus little didums job!
Click to expand...

While OP is almost certainly not coming back, this isn't a very helpful comment.

Everybody's voice is different. There's gonna be notes that you just can't hit. No amount of training is gonna get someone who is naturally a bass to hit a C6. You can't become a world-class musician on any given instrument just by training.
 
Well - I do happen to know little about vocal training and training as a subject, and singing and musical achievement is a quite documented subject.

There's the physical side. Everyone has a voice, everyone can sing. The differences are in the objective quality - as in pitch accuracy, rhythmic accuracy and the techniques of music applied to it - plus the subjective quality - as in how it is received by experts and non-experts. One important feature is that none of us have ever heard our voice live as others hear it, because of the split method our ears use. The direct trip down the ear canal and the indirect route through bone conduction. Hence the dislike of the sound of our own voice when recorded.

In practice we have our main voice, and the most, a falsetto upper register, which can be amazingly wide. When somebody asks what their voice is like, we get a combination answer. I can sing very effective BVs, with complex harmony, with considerable and repeatable accuracy, but the subjective judgement by people I respect is that it's a good, but unremarkable voice. My lead vocals are bland - but accurate. Bob Dylan, on the other hand was very well received despite the fact that by the objective standards he was terrible. Some people have objective and subjective aclaim. Some people cannot sing in tune, with acceptable rhythm. If they also have a very average or below average voice that is not easy to listen to, then by any standard - they're a bad singer. It may be possible to learn to pitch. Rhythm accuracy can be learnt. Syncopation is unlikely to be developed. With proper structured training, range can be extended down and up by support to the muscles we sing with, but with some people the best they might do is a few tones extra. For others, no amount of training makes it better because they simply lack the aptitude or don't have access to good trainers.

If you have an average voice and ask for advice, most people who do understand the objective and subjective criteria for singing quality can comment, and I think they did. If you cannot accept anything other than a pat on the back, it's always best to not ask. I do demos of tracks I produce for other people to sing with my voice singing their part. I'm not embarrassed by it, but I'm fully aware that even with lots of work, it is what it is. Why are you so grumpy about people who say "well, you're never going too be a great singer" if it's true.

If you use Frank Sinatra as a singing quality subject, he fails badly in many areas, but like Dylan, he pulls it off. On the other hand quite a few pop singers are bad and just don't make it. We forget them quickly.
 
Everybody can sing, but not everyone can sing well. It's partly to do with nature, and partly to do with training. This is true of any other human activity, like playing golf or painting portraits.

I have experienced a huge variety of singers over the years. Some brilliant, some tuneless. But it's interesting to see how singers differ. For example, some will sing a melody very well, and if they do a second take, it will be a virtual replica of the first. However, if you ask them to do a harmony, they cannot do it . . . they just lapse into the melody. On the other hand, I've had singers who can sing a melody, and can naturally harmonise very well, but have real difficulty remembering how they sang something to start with, so it is a battle for them to get their phrasing to match.

This applies to me as well:
rob aylestone said:
I can sing very effective BVs, with complex harmony, with considerable and repeatable accuracy, but the subjective judgement by people I respect is that it's a good, but unremarkable voice. My lead vocals are bland - but accurate.
Click to expand...

But I'm happy to accept my limitations and I still enjoy recording my own material.
 
Seems he's gone for now. I think that when I listen to people sing I only really have three categories. Dreadful, shouldn't even be trying, OK but boring to listen to and good - which stretches up and up as they are better and better. If you are in the first category, give up you will never cross the barrier to the next one. If you are in the middle category, hard work and dedication can make some improvement, but again, crossing the line will be impossible for some. If you are in the best category, it doesn't guarantee you are a nice person.
 
I'm with you guys...rob and gecko.......about the overall quality and actual ability. I've always been amazed at how MANY people cannot hear if they're singing is bad......and how vehemently they sometimes disagree with that assessment. It seems that singing is such a tender spot for some....and maybe those same people have the same reaction to other areas of their talent or ability that is criticized.....and their just overly sensitive to begin with..........but I doubt it. On the other hand......if one is "tone deaf".......then it's 100% realistic for them to not hear any problems and react as if they're being attacked for no reason.

Of course........we've hashed that topic to death here before. Just always amazed that so many people can't hear themselves.
 
in our band, I sing BVs for every song, and like I said - they're in tune and actually quite critical, but when we learn a new one, I often do the track and produce the the four parts which we send to everyone to learn - so I get track left, then my vocal part and bass in the right. the drummer gets track left then drums and his part right and so on. Next time we get together we do the song. the band leader never gives me the lead, or as our music swaps, the alternate lead, but I get the trickier bits and leading notes, or the horrible 9ths and 4ths - because I'm reliable. I do actually have a lead vocal song, but it's the very, very last one - so we finish, do the encore but if then we need another because of the momentous applause, I get to sing mine. this of course never used to happen. the first time I sung it when we needed it I was really surprised to get a big cheer - I always considered it just 'ok', but it proved some audiences clap anything!

My funniest singing in tune moment was when I was teaching and took one student (18) to one side and said lets spend five minutes on pitching because sometimes you're a bit lost. in truth, she was 100% always wildly wrong. I played a note on the piano, she sang - wrong. over and over again. So I got her to sing a long sustained note as I went up the piano keyboard, telling her to stop me when we were on the same one. I got to the top and she said - "No, none of those". On the positive side, I had one fella who was terrible and tuneless. he is now 40 and makes his living as a club singer, and he's rather good. After leaving us he had some lessons and it clicked and that's how he earns his living, so some people can get better, and even good. Just not all!
 
rob aylestone said:
Well - I do happen to know little about vocal training and training as a subject, and singing and musical achievement is a quite documented subject.

There's the physical side. Everyone has a voice, everyone can sing. The differences are in the objective quality - as in pitch accuracy, rhythmic accuracy and the techniques of music applied to it - plus the subjective quality - as in how it is received by experts and non-experts. One important feature is that none of us have ever heard our voice live as others hear it, because of the split method our ears use. The direct trip down the ear canal and the indirect route through bone conduction. Hence the dislike of the sound of our own voice when recorded.

In practice we have our main voice, and the most, a falsetto upper register, which can be amazingly wide. When somebody asks what their voice is like, we get a combination answer. I can sing very effective BVs, with complex harmony, with considerable and repeatable accuracy, but the subjective judgement by people I respect is that it's a good, but unremarkable voice. My lead vocals are bland - but accurate. Bob Dylan, on the other hand was very well received despite the fact that by the objective standards he was terrible. Some people have objective and subjective aclaim. Some people cannot sing in tune, with acceptable rhythm. If they also have a very average or below average voice that is not easy to listen to, then by any standard - they're a bad singer. It may be possible to learn to pitch. Rhythm accuracy can be learnt. Syncopation is unlikely to be developed. With proper structured training, range can be extended down and up by support to the muscles we sing with, but with some people the best they might do is a few tones extra. For others, no amount of training makes it better because they simply lack the aptitude or don't have access to good trainers.

If you have an average voice and ask for advice, most people who do understand the objective and subjective criteria for singing quality can comment, and I think they did. If you cannot accept anything other than a pat on the back, it's always best to not ask. I do demos of tracks I produce for other people to sing with my voice singing their part. I'm not embarrassed by it, but I'm fully aware that even with lots of work, it is what it is. Why are you so grumpy about people who say "well, you're never going too be a great singer" if it's true.

If you use Frank Sinatra as a singing quality subject, he fails badly in many areas, but like Dylan, he pulls it off. On the other hand quite a few pop singers are bad and just don't make it. We forget them quickly.
Click to expand...

Congratulations on taking the time to write a thoughtful comment in perfectly understandable English with correct punctuation...a joy top behold !...some of the other comments here are barely intelligible !
 
Some really talented people here. Let's make some gret music.....
 
Last edited:
how do said:
OP is almost certainly not coming back
Click to expand...
why is that then?
Click to expand...
They posted once two weeks ago. That's usually a sign that someone's not gonna follow-up on the thread

Really then! so tell me how you know all this with your years of experance training and studdying, tell us where and who trained you and for how long and if you have trainind people your self.

We look forward to your reply sir.
Click to expand...

how do said:
This forums argument is founded on the point that no emount of training will improve things like pitch and rhytham things and increasing ones vocal range too (the argument hear).
Click to expand...

Who made that argument? I just said there's limits on it.
Am I a vocal coach? No. But I know enough physics and theory to know that a violin can't hit a C2. The human voice has its limits, and everyone's limits are different.
 
I started playing and singing in bands in the mid 1960s. Some times I was the lead singer but more often over the years I became a back-up vocalist. I realized over the years that while I can sing in key, nail the phrasing and control dynamics, I have the kind of voice that is not interesting or particularly pleasant to listen to. I am perfectly happy to sing back-up, and I love finding the harmonies that best go with the melodies.
 
I have been using a "harmonizer" (TCHelicon Play Electric) to generate harmony when I sing a melody while feeding in some type of accompaniment with the chords I am using. This isn't a perfect solution because the computer within the device generates harmony it "thinks" best to go along with your melody note and chord at the instant. I have been able to "pilot" the harmony parts a bit by connecting the output of my electronic keyboard to the "guitar input" of the unit and playing strategic keys or chords as I sing in order to get or at least influence the two harmony parts wich the TC Helicon generates. If your needs are more complex so that you actually need to sing the notes you desire, you will need a computer which emulates a mechanical recorder in a way. Such functions are sometimes labeled as "pitch shifters." I have a Peavey DualFex box which has pitch shifting both up and down as one of its functions. You might even be able to locate some used equipment of the ilk of your Tascam 4-track cassette deck; but I wouldn't advise you to go that way unless you couldn't find anything else; such a road would, in my opinion, be a step backward. Perhaps you could enter "pitch shifter" as a search string in your favorite Internet search engine. I also suggest two pieces of software which might have the function you want, though I am not certain. These programs are Audacity and Goldwave. Goldwave is available in a demo trial form for free, so you could download it to see if its most current version might have that function. Audacity is a free open-source program which you could download to see if it has that function. I have used it but only for straight-forward "single-take" stereo recording as a means of transferring my multitrack recordings from my Tascam DP24 to my computer (I am totally blind and do not yet understand how to operate the Mixing and Mastering functions totally without sight). Some of the karaoke machines also have that function, but the final result might be a mono recording because such devices often use electronics to "phase out" a lead vocal by operating on the two channels, adding your voice, but ending with a mono recording - and I'm sure you don't want that. I hope the above information at least gives you some ideas on where to look. By the way, I'm not sure whether TC Helicon has been taken over by a new company, since I'm sure that the original firm has gone out of business.
 
I've got one of those! They're really good sound quality wise, but I know exactly what you mean about having to 'play' the harmony. If you use it with a guitar, it seems happy with Major and minor and 7ths, but go further and odd things suddenly happen, don't they! It's impressive though. Handy for a solo singer with guitar or keys and straightforward set list. Surprised they weren't more popular.
 
I've been using the TC-Helicon Voice Live Touch, original version, for some time now and I really love it. It's great for live use of course.......but I've used it many times on my recordings for custom harmonies. It wasn't cheap to start with.......and the ebay prices for used ones aren't cheap either it seems. It does seem strange that I don't see many of them in live use. One of the things so many live bands seem to struggle with is harmonies and just having enough decent singers in the band to start with.
 
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