♪♫I get by with a little help from my friend(s)♫♪

Same song as the last entry, but that's because this is sort of a "part 2" to that email.

Tuesday at work I decided that a good method for choosing my song was to perform both for my residents and let them vote after we'd done our normal music therapy groups for the evening. For those who don't know me, I work on a dementia unit in a nursing home. My residents all have some form of dementia/memory loss. Well, anyway, I wasn't really expecting much, but I sang both songs and one woman had a very clear vote for Broken. Naturally once one person chimed in several others followed suit. A few even gave reasons they liked that one better. Several just said they liked anything I sang which is always nice to hear. So, I made the decision to sing Broken for the audition. Thursday was my audition. I'm grateful to one close friend who was able to come, and bless her heart she tried to make the noise of a crowd to boost my audience response score.

I think the audition went well. I'm never sure though. Now begins the waiting game. The judges will inform us on July 10th who makes the semi-finals on the 14th.

I also have an update to the Money makes the world go around post. I found out about these scholarships through the professional association I belong to (American Music Therapy Association - AMTA). They give out 3 annually, for use towards continued education credits, each in the amount of $500. Well, luckily I found out about them and the deadline hadn't passed yet for this year. Friday night I stayed up late and wrote a scholarship application narrative explaining what I needed the money for and the potential impact it's use would have on my clients etc. I had to put on my intellectual writing brain again for the first time in quite a while, but I was able to come up with a well written and professional sounding proposal for use of the money. If I get the scholarship I will be able to pay for the NMT training institute in October. Praying for that to work out. If not, I will still find a way. I am going to do that institute if I have to beg family and friends to help me finance it.

♪♫Lend me your ears and I'll sing you a song...♫♪

♪♫and I'll try not to sing out of key.♫♪

The title today is obviously The Beatles, With a Little Help from My Friends. I'm feeling quite melancholy at the current moment. The first stanza of this song has been running through my head most of the evening. I have an audition on Thursday. I'm auditioning for a local singing competition that is fairly karaoke based, but it's for the town festival-of-sorts. You have to do a song using an instrumental track that may or may not include back up vocals. You have to have it memorized. You are judged on: Vocal skills(pitch, breath control, enunciation, tone, etc), Presentation (eye contact, expression, attire, microphone technique), Audience response (using a decibel meter to gauge the response level), and then Judges overall impression. They videotape the auditions and the judges watch the videos rather than judging in person. The auditions are held at a local bar on Karaoke night but you are required to bring your own track. A couple of weeks ago during some weird lapse in judgment I registered myself to compete. I hate karaoke and so this is not generally something I would do. Anyway, I've been going through the instrumental or back up tracks that I have for songs and I've narrowed my choices down to two songs. I would really like to actually sing them to some people and get opinions on which one I should do, as I really have no clue which one sounds better or is likely to get a better audience response. I have a feeling to get a good audience response I'd probably have to bring an audience. The problem is I don't have many friends in town, and don't think my out of town friends would care to drive down to sit in a bar for an hour and listen to good and bad karaoke auditions. I need to sing the two songs to people to see which is better, but I don't have anyone to try them on.

So I feel very stuck. I honestly don't know which song is better... and I don't have anyone to ask. My cats really aren't much help. I suppose I could bring both songs to my voice lesson on Wednesday, but that's not really the kind of singing I want to focus on in those lessons. I sing every day, you'd think I could make a decision on a song that fits best in my voice. But I'm my own worst critic.

The two songs are Broken in the style of Lindsey Haun, or Low in the style of Kelly Clarkson. They are two of my favorite songs. Broken feels like the verses sit lower in my range, but the refrain rings really nice. Low is comfortably in my range but doesn't have the same power in the message that Broken has.  I know it's more about which sounds better, but I honestly don't know, I can't tell when singing to myself. I need someone who can listen and give me ideas and constructive feedback. But tonight I don't seem to have that person. How does one get by with help from their friends, if they aren't able to get ahold of anyone? Maybe I'll take them to work and have a mock audition with my residents and they can help me choose a song. How do I make that a therapeutic intervention...

♪♫Lend me your ears and I'll sing you a song, and I'll try not to sing out of key.♫♪