How many of us can sing?

Mike Perlowin · From: Los Angeles CA

I know 4 players who are also excellent vocalists including our fellow forumite Jim Bob Sedgewick. Any one of them could easily be front men if they chose.

I couldn't sing if my life depended on it. My singing is so bad that to suggest it be flushed down the toiled it an insult to the material that usually meets that fate. In fact I took up the steel as a defense against guitar players who were beating me out of gigs because they could sing.

Fess up people. Which of you can sing well, and who is as bad as me?

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I'm not fat! I'm horzontally enhanced!

Ray Montee · From: Portland, Oregon (deceased)

Great topic! I probably know the words to a couple hundred songs, mostly country but some good pop tunes also. I've done live radio in talking parts while in elementary school, playing over radio and on TV, but no one has heard my voice except for a three year stint back in 1966-69 when I flew traffic watch for our local 50,000 watt radio station KEX. I was was on twice daily and for extra local events.
HOWEVER, I couldn't so much as hummmm a tune in front of any bystanders or anywhere else. Oh, I did some 350 radio and television talk shows some years back but again, I just responded to questions asked of me, not an actual performance as such.
Thank goodness for showers, wilderness areas and motor vehicles. You can sing your heart out there and NO ONE will ever really know, unless they read one's lips.
I recognize my limitations and will never put anyone to that pain and suffering.

Rick Schmidt · From: Prescott AZ, USA

Mike...Are we talking singing in JI or ET?

Eric West · From: Portland, Oregon, USA, R.I.P.

I was forced to sing harmony in a band for a while, but I fired them for other reasons. I think I did pretty good.

For years, I've practiced Hank Jr's "Won't it be nice", and one day I might just grab a mike, and sing the hell out of it.

" You know I don't all-ways, get standing o-vations. And I don't always knock the ball over the fence...." Great tune. Story of my life.

As for "on the bandstand", I tend to know the words to most of the old stuff, and I've learned how to "prompt" the singer for the old Merle, Hank, Hank, Ernest, George, Patsy, Kitty, and other tunes. Since I have to be rather loud, and prompt them just before the verse or chorus, overlapping, it comically comes out like "Tonite the Jukebox", or "Hello I'm a Truck" with my nonmiked vocal promptings being the "spoken" sections. What's really funny is that when and if I prompt lines that I make up, with end words like "purple" or "orange", there's no way they can "rhyme" their way out of it.. Or if somehow I forget, I prompt some horrible word that they can't say on the mike. The singer promptly chokes, and the whole works ends up laughing like hell, especially the first few rows.

"I don't usually "sing" unless there's 10 or more years involved."- Me-

EJL

[This message was edited by Eric West on 22 April 2003 at 11:12 AM.]

Dave Van Allen · From: Doylestown, PA , US , Earth

I can sing what I write... tailor made for my voice and range...

John Knight · From: Alaska

I can sing lead. I prefer backup. Singing lead and trying to play steel fills at the same time is tough duty. One of them has to become automatic and to often it is the steel fills that take back seat.

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D 10 Thomas with 8&6, '61'D-10 Sho-Bud 8&3
S12 Knight 6&4
Nashville 400 and Profex II
81' Fender Twin JBL's
Asleep at the Steel

Mike Delaney · From: Fort Madison, IA

I can sing or play steel, but not at the same time!

Don Walters · From: Saskatchewan Canada

Mike, if we ever have a chance to meet, I challenge you to a "world's worst singer" contest. I bet on me!

Frank Parish · From: Nashville,Tn. USA

I don't even sing in the shower for fear the water would cut off or dramatically change temperatures!

Johan Jansen · From: Europe

Rick Schmidt is THE singer!! I'm forbidden to sing

JJ

Jim Eaton · From: Santa Susana, Ca

I have done up to 5 or 6 tunes per night from behind my 75PP. Panama Red, Smoke Smoke Smoke that Cig, Momma Don't Allow....
Really just loud talking if you ask me LOL!
JE:-)>

Fred Shannon · From: Rocking "S" Ranch, Comancheria, Texas, R.I.P.

Me Sing????Only if you want to get rid of the crowd or run some wild animals out of the neighborhood.

Remember the old saying, "IT IS AS 'BAD' AS YOU THINK AND THEY 'ARE' OUT TO GET YOU!"

Fred

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The spirit be with you!
If it aint got a steel, it aint real

Joe Miraglia · From: Jamestown N.Y.

I took up Steel Guitar,becuse I can't sing. Most guitar players can sing

Now that I think about it ,Can't play steel either

Joe

Stephen Gambrell · From: Over there

I sing "Surfing Bird" nearly every gig. Keep forgettin' the words, though...

Chris Bauer · From: Nashville, TN USA

In a world so filled with troubles and with so little that any of us can do about it individually, I've always enjoyed the thought that I can make the world a better place - in my own small way - by not singing in public.

Sadly, I'm kinda from the Yoko Ono school of voice. Much as I've long aspired to increase my skills up to being a merely terrible singer (as opposed to being an unfathomably unspeakable one as I am now), to date I've not come even close to that seemingly modest goal.

[This message was edited by Chris Bauer on 22 April 2003 at 02:11 PM.]

CrowBear Schmitt · From: Ariege, - PairO'knees, - France

well it's precisely because there's so much trouble in the world and that i't gives me the Blues that i wanna sing about it and i do !
i just backup myself w: simple chords on steel and wait on the solos to get fancy

no tomatoes so far ! but loads of women !!!

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Steel what?

Tony Prior · From: Charlotte NC

Well..yes....but not for ego....

I have and still do , sing up front, or behind, harmonies etc...or not sing. The past few years though I have been having a problem with a vocal cord or something as my voice breaks up at a mid point in my range . I went to a throat guy and he said nothing was wrong. So I don't know what to think..maybe it's time to stop singing ? Maybe it's a sign from Bill Engval? Here's my sign ?

Playing Tele' and singing, Bass and singing, or Steel and sort of singing has kept me as busy as one would like for many years.

It's kinda fun to front a tune or two..especially comping chords under the vocal lines...

And still getting paid after doing it is a good thing too...

tp

David L. Donald · From: Koh Samui Island, Thailand

I sing. In NYC I sang bluegrass harmonies for a few years. That was real nice.
And of course many rock and country band gigs over the years. There were some people I could sing with all night long, and others I could never get a good part with, ever. All their harmonies keys where right through the bad nodes in my voice.

Since there is so little english sung over here in France I have gotten WAY out of practice the last 7 years. I am singing now, back up, but I am forbiden on some songs. The other 2 singers are VERY strong and want to do a brother duet all night long. But I need to sing more to get the voice back, so I do where I am confident of a part.

I write jazz songs a bit, country and reggae too, and I WISH I could sing my own songs like I hear them.
I have been looking for a lady singer for over a year to record my stuff. No luck.

Never born with the right pipes and always wanted them. DRAT!! I wear all the production hats except singer.

[This message was edited by David L. Donald on 22 April 2003 at 03:47 PM.]

Joseph Barcus · From: Volga West Virginia

I feel im a better singer then steel player lol, i have wrote 20 songs in my life but of course the fine fine folks in nashville dont like them, but ive sold a pretty good bit around here, i have alot of bar experence lol they didnt care what you sounded like.

Bill Fulbright · From: Atlanta, GA

I have been singing since I was about 6 years old. I sang in choirs in middle school and High School. I was usually the front man in my bands from age 12 to age 15.

I began writing my own material when I was 18, 19 and 20 when I began to sing my way around Europe during 1971 with my own material. Then, I returned to the US to enter NTSU as a Comp/Theory major, and began studying voice privately - not a part of the curriculum. After school I continued singing in various venues while I worked a straight job. after nine years of that I quit the professional business world and began singing professionally in the Dallas Market. I was a front man for bands, I did a Single Variety Act for about 6 years and did pickup/casual dates as a front man for 3, 4, 5 and 6 piece bands. I was singing 7 days a week: a happy hour 4-7, or 5-8 then my night gig usually 9-1.

Not too many vacations!!! However, I was fortunate enough to earn a good reputation as a versatile entertainer and front man. My last days of playing regularly as a singer in the Dallas market were doing conventions and private parties, and traveling with some corporate clients to do their hospitality suites each year.

During the middle 90's I helped create the South East Texas Blues Society by hosting the Open Jam Night for a year and a half and devoting myself to organizational duties to build the organization. My last public band was a trio and we played a supper club with jazz standards, blues standards, r & b standards, country, country swing and some pop.

I now enjoy playing as a trio when I can find the right players/chemistry. Otherwise, I am extremely content to stay home and play my D-10 Mullen.. I am so hooked on playing steel.

I have played and sung in churches of a wide variety since 1980. Now I am looking again.

So singing to me has been a major part of my musical expression in private and in public.
Being a front man to me is as natural as breathing. Just very hard to make a living at it these days.

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Bill Fulbright
Mullen D-10 8x7; Gibson ES-165; Peavey Vegas 400;
ICQ# 2251620 My Music Site

[This message was edited by Bill Fulbright on 22 April 2003 at 04:28 PM.]

Jimmie Misenheimer · From: Bloomington, Indiana - U. S. A.

Mike and Don - - It's a damn good thing that I'm so good lookin', 'cause when it comes to singing, and being BAD at it, I've got you both beat HANDS DOWN!!!

Jimmie

R. L. Jones · From: Lake Charles, Louisiana, USA

Mike ,, you`re always starting something, I once did sing and play, I courted my wife with guitar and song. Now she could really sing, so we had fun. For four years during W W 2 I played guitar and sang.

I sang in church choir, created a men`s choir. Time is taking it`s toll, I still sing in jam`s , but my voice is fading. I still enjoy trying to sing,though

R. L.

Al Marcus · From: Cedar Springs,MI USA (deceased)

When I played the guitar, I used to sing, mostly old pop stuff, "all of me','when your smilin","thats my desire","I can't begin to tell you","mamsell",I left my heart in San Francisco","I can't escape from you",.

Boy, talk about dating myself with these old tunes....I used to sing harmony with the bands too..Yes, I think it was harder to sing and play steel at the same time, a lot better standing up and playing the guitar....73's....al

Smiley Roberts · From: Hendersonville,Tn. 37075

I sing,"Whether You Like It Or Not".

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Leslie Ehrlich · From: Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada

Perhaps the question in this thread could be altered to ask: How many of us can sing and play steel? In the band I'm playing in right now I sing lead on two songs where I prefer to play PSG. I play in between vocal lines to 'fill in the gaps'. As for singing and playing at the same time, I'll have to try it one of these days. And as my for vocal ability, well, I won't go into that.

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