Five changes I made on my path to becoming a good musician

So what did i change about my life and lifestyle to increase my chances of being successful. Here it is.

1. Developed routines: Routines help a lot to stay consistent in practice. Consistency is very powerful. Scales or “alankars” in the morning. Active listening time in the afternoon. Practising songs or raags in the evening. Again active listening just before sleeping. Along with that – meditation, exercise (this one i am still trying to do), journaling and reading. There is so much I need to do every single day if i want to be a good artist. And the only way to ensure it is done is by building in a schedule or routine. I am not claiming that I stick to this routine all the time. But I aim to and I am getting closer and closer towards being consistent.
2. Stopped looking at others for validation: This is a big one and it took me a long time to get there. I praise and tell myself how proud I am, every time I practice well. I craved external validation for a long time from musicians I looked up to, parents, friends, exes and colleagues. After years of feeling frustrated about never getting it, I finally came to a point where even criticism affects me only for a short time. I understand that i started late and I may not live up to some standards right now. But I know that I strive, i know that I am as true to music as is physically possible for me right now. I may never catch up to some standards but that’s not going to stop me. It’s okay if some people assume that I am a failure, it’s okay if some people just downright hate my guts, and it’s good that I am not trying to please anyone anymore. This is my personal journey. As long as I am not hurting anyone else, I am good.
3. Became more spiritual: There is a definite connection between being creative and being spiritual. I believe that something higher than me is channeling me to bring out something creative into this world. Again this is my belief system. But the process remains the same. When you meditate every day, try to stick to being honest in your communication with others and get into states of high focus , you start developing the ability to create – a poem or a piece of music or or even an article like this.
4. Started monitoring what I read / the company I keep / the music I listen to / the TV shows I watch – all of this is going to be a part of my creative work. Garbage in, garbage out. Since i want to be a musician and i am getting more and more focused on music I want to create. So i listen to great Hindustani classical musicians like Ustad Salamat Ali Khan, Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan, Pt. Hariprasad Chaurasia, Ustad Rashid Khan , Begum Parveen Sultana, Kishori Amonkar, etc. I can already feel the influence of the styles of these great musicians in my practice. Whenever i practice after listening to one of them, it’s just easier to sing and easier to think about what to sing. Our brain is very good at getting influenced and it is upto us to be feed it with something that aligns with what we want.
5. Learning to love solitude: This is a continuous process for me. While I have always been a bit of a loner, there has always been some companion on every path before this. But on this path and with my particular process I am alone. Very few are willing to become students again at 34. Very few took as long as me to bring themselves on the right path. Very few choose spending hours learning new music over partying or chit chatting with friends. In fact even i don’t easily do the last bit. But it is important to put in the required time and that means sacrificing some fun time. That is the harsh truth. But it is also a choice I made when I realised how important music is to me.

There is so much more that i have changed and so much more that I am yet to change – like therapy (to deal with issues I have shoved under the carpet), building better focus, anxiety management and networking. I am a work in progress. I don’t claim to have all the answers. But I intend to share whatever I learn as and when I do change. Till then adios, I hope you have a productive day!

Introduction

There is a lot that I want to share. But I am going to try and stick to the parts of my story that might hold some value for my readers.

How did I decide that becoming a musician at this age was an achievable goal? Is career change easy? How many times during the day do I still doubt myself? What are some key changes I made to my life to get on a steady path towards my goal? Why do i still call myself an aspiring musician and what according to me is the definition of a professional accomplished musician? As someone who grew up in a family that placed higher importance to science and considered art to be a hobby or a profession only for the lesser intelligent – how has my understanding of art evolved over the last few years?

As and when I answer these questions , my readers will also understand whether or not they resonate with my way of thinking and whether my approach or advice can hold any value for them. Some of you might decide not to read any further. I believe that is ok. I principally believe that one must shed all apprehensions of what is practical and what is not in order to do something that no one has done before. I approach life purely on the basis of what gives me energy and purpose, on what gives me reason to wake up in the morning and what does justice to my own inner gifts. I believe if we stay true to our soul, life not only takes care of us but surprises us with people, events and experiences that we can only meet on an unconventional path.

Of course, this may sound very impractical and wishy washy. But I only wish for this blog to be of help to those who dare to dream and take foolish risks for the sake of something that makes their soul happy.

Diary entry 2

I’m happy today. The reason is I refused a gig for this Sunday. What? Why should that make me happy. It’s because recently I did like a series of back to back gigs especially on weekends but I felt after a point that I was stagnating. I have discovered a few areas to work on.

1) By hearting the lyrics. Makes a huge difference to the quality of my singing. Yet I haven’t done this for many songs. So that’s one task.
2) Throw of voice while singing. In my bid to strengthen my head voice I think I have been using it too often even in some Indian songs. And that’s affecting singing quality there. So as an exercise I want to spend a few days on Indian classical and Sufi songs. Just to stay balanced. Also Sufi songs work like a charm in gigs. So it should make me better.
3) Doing full songs. I know many songs half way. So I start and it’s already time to end the song. Unless I can do a medley. Might be a good idea to know the entire song.
4) Buy clothes. Really like this is less for the audience and more for my own confidence. Being dressed well kind of eases the mind and you can then confidently talk and sing on stage. But lately I’ve been so busy, there’s no time to pop into the parlour or buy some good dresses. Take away is not that dressing matters but confidence and state of mind does.

That’s it I guess. But yeah. Unless I work on these I’ll just be repeating my mistakes in every other gig. So I’m happy I said no to weekend gigs and made time for self work.

Oh and yes. I have started a new routine for waking up since I struggle often with morning depression. Now as soon as i wake up I sit by the keyboard (piano, not the computer!) I really just sit by it and play the simplest thing that comes to mind. And then more complex stuff for practice just comes one by one. I spend some 15 mins on it. For now I think that’s sufficient. I should be able to play like a pro in few months though. And I am really excited about this. I have always been fascinated by pianists. Guitarists is fine. But I automatically have a crush on pianists. Don’t even know why :P. But yeah it’s one of those things I wished for since childhood. So it would be really cool to start doing it.

Also I have lost some weight. 65 to 59 kgs. And that’s starting to show a difference in my singing. Better breathe control and more energy. Also I look prettier. So I am happy about that too. So yeah there’s a take away there. Being over weight does hinder your singing. Might want to work on those few kilos.

That’s it for today. See you guys. 🙂

Diary Entry 1

I realised that I have not been able to post much because I always wait till I have the time to gather my thoughts and write something.

So now I have decided to just post about my journey like a diary entry. So that nothing is lost.

I was actually not able to practice much today. But I think once in a while it’s ok to have a day when you give your voice some rest. Instead I went to see two concerts. It’s a well known fact that listening to good music is equally important. There is a lot of subconscious learning that is more effective than actively pursuing something every day. Theory is nice, it’s good. But to support it you must have some exposure to good music.

I have taken an interest for Hindustani classical music lately. Mainly the part where the performer improvises over a raag. I think it’s beautiful, how weeks and months of deliberate practice slowly turns into a state of flow where you just put yourself in the mood of the raag and melodies just flow out of your mind. I think this learning will go a long way in helping me compose music and sing my own versions of existing songs.

I plan to end my day today with some Hindustani classical improvisation practice and meditation, not necessarily in the same order.

Meditation has helped. Meditation has helped me a lot on my journey. It’s not easy, taking music so seriously that everything else takes a back seat. Sometimes I get really anxious about how I’ll end up. But then one tends to forget that every day is a gift. We really don’t know when we are going to die. So better live each day pursuing our dreams and enjoying. I do believe that if we are in a state of flow because we are doing something we love, then things somehow work out.

That’s it for today.

Cold weather and warm ups

December is the month when most people party, have annual corporate functions or just get together and have a good time. So for a singer like you and me, there would be a place and occasion to sing almost every day. Cheers to that!!!!

But it is also a time of cold winds, runny noses and sore throats. And I have been struggling to stay in good singing condition while battling all of these. I mean after all the hard work and time I invested in perfecting my techniques and learning few songs really well , I realised my singing is still dependent on the condition of my voice on the particular day.

But there are singers out there who are doing amazingly well despite all these petty problems. So I resolved to find a way around this.

Eventually I have found some tips that worked for me.

1) Water: Winter tends to make our throats extremely dry, so voice ends up cracking easily and the mucus makes it difficult to shift quickly between high and low notes. Lots and lots of water (5 to 6 litres) on the PREVIOUS day. NOT the same day. A well hydrated vocal chord will give amazing control and flexibility to your voice. Tried and tested. Works 🙂

2) Lip trills: I discovered this very late. Western singers swear by lip trills for warm up. And I didn’t realise how effective this is – till one day early in the morning, I felt like my voice had gotten stiff and stuffy and nothing seemed to be working to get my voice to open up. Few lip trills later my voice had cleared out and I was able to sing my entire range (Both mandra and taar saptak or lower and higher octave). In fact it would be a great idea if you can find a safe place and do a few lip trills before any performance. You will immediately feel a difference.

3) Honey: When there’s no time for anything else and the event is about to begin. Get some honey. Don’t mix too much water. Keep it as concentrated and thick as possible. Take a sip every time you feel your voice is cracking or getting strained. Honey has a lubricating effect on the throat. I don’t know how it works, but I have tried this too and it works amazingly well.

These were three hacks that work really well for me. Do try and let me know if it works for you too! Also do you have your own hacks and tricks to fight the cold weather and still manage to put up a great performance? I would love to know. Do share in the comments section 🙂

Running your way to better singing

Okay here’s a quick advice about improving your singing ability. And it’s got nothing to do with vocal exercises.

Run every day. Just eat high iron content food and run. The act of running itself increases your stamina, lung capacity and makes your voice more stable. If you had to develop one habit only to improve your singing, then that would definitely be this. Run in the mornings, relax and sing whatever you like in the evenings. Definitely a good start for improving your singing voice.

That’s it for today. Have a nice day 🙂

Singing in tune

Most of my students at first tend to sing like they speak – kind of curving off the high notes as well as the very low notes to somehow fall into the notes that they can comfortably reach. This makes them sound extremely out of tune and some of them don’t even realise this.

Then there are few who will repeat after me in tune. But when left to sing on their own often don’t exactly hit the note and just graze over it somehow.

They all are able to hit the high notes individually. After some hours of practice sessions with them, they can even sustain those notes for a while. But when we encounter the same high notes in a song, they still tend to round off and not quite hit them.

It used to be extremely frustrating when I would spend hours getting them to remember the tune and at the end of it they got it all wrong.

I sometimes thought they were just being insincere or didn’t remember because they didn’t practice well.

But after many frustrating moments and trying different things to help them get it right, I can proudly say that I have finally managed to get them to sing in tune, even at the higher notes.

If I were divide this into steps:
Step 1: get them to understand each note and how to produce that particular frequency by sustaining those notes for as long as they can. (This I always did)
Step 2: Make them quickly sing 3 or 4 notes of a scale at a time. I used to go slow because I thought may be they are starting off so they need time to speed up. But it’s actually easier to quickly hit notes than slowly hit them. Keep repeating step 2 till they hit all notes correctly.
step 3: Increase the number of notes hit at a time till they are able to sing the entire scale together both up and down. This actually gives them a sense of scales, and helps them to understand on their own when they are out of scale.
Step 4: now help them control the speed by making them pace through a few notes and sustain a few notes while doing scales.
Eg. Sa-Re Gaaaaaaaa, Re-Ga Maaaaaaaa, Ga-Ma Paaaaaaaa and so on
Step 4: Change the scale to a higher Sa, like go from Kaali 4 to Kaali 5 (G sharp to A sharp). Helps them to understand scale changes.

Since I have made this a part of their warm up vocal exercises I have seen a remarkable improvement in their music sense while singing a song. Even if they don’t always hit the note while singing I can at least now see an attempt to hit the note.

I think adding step 4, quickly going up and down scales while hitting all notes made all the difference to their music sense. Earlier they were just mechanically following me. Now they are able to sense when the note they sang is not part of those seven notes.

The mistake I made earlier was never making them sing all the notes at a time. I kept taking three or maximum four notes at a time at a slow pace. Because the pace was slow, any more than four notes was very difficult of them to manage at a time and they would inevitably start singing out of tune. And because they only sang three or four notes at a time, they never got the music sense to understand what out of tune meant.

So if I have to summarise, if we want to develop the ability to intuitively sing in tune, without even knowing the song too well, then learning to hit all the notes in the scale in one go will help.

If the song is in Kalyaan Thaat, then go up and down a few times in the Kalyan Thaat scale. Do it as quick as you can , you don’t even have to be loud. Then start learning. You will find it much more easy to hit the right notes intuitively. It will also help you to improvise your own alaaps while staying within the scale.

Sometimes we take our own ability to sing something easily for granted. There were so many things my gurus would make me sing in class that seemed boring and meaningless at that time. I didn’t even realise it was shaping my ability to sing. And there are some people who are gifted with the ability to intuitively understand some music concepts without being taught. May be because they have it in their genes or they grew up in a household where they heard others doing music practice or talk about a song.

But teaching people at different levels of proficiency in singing and music is helping me understand the importance of some things I learnt as a child. And focusing on these things is actually helping me improve too. I am actually re-learning everything with a new understanding!

Are you a passionate artist?

There are two reasons why artists pursue some form of art. One reason is to express themselves, connect with the audience and enjoy the rush of appreciation and attention that follows. Second reason is more personal – passionate artists pursue art as a form of prayer or meditation. Something that makes them feel closer to God. Something that fills every cell of their body with a kind of energy and drive that brings them to life and makes them want to keep painting or keep dancing or keep writing or in my case keep singing. For such artists, pursuing art becomes akin to breathing for when they stop they become restless, unable to enjoy anything else in life, unable to see any meaning in life besides their passion.

Music for me is that – a religion. Any person pursuing music with passion feels like family to me. Hence my endeavor is to find a profession in music so that I can spend maximum part of my time pursuing my passion and bonding with the music family.

And that brings me to the point I was making through this post. If there is anything in your life that makes you feel the way I described above, then don’t ever let that passion die. You may have a good reason right now for not being able to pursue it full time. But keep the fire burning, keep putting your heart and soul towards perfecting yourself and be ready for any opportunity that will (definitely) come your way. For as Paulo Coelho said,”When your heart truly desires something the whole universe conspires to help you achieve that thing simply because it is a desire that originated from the soul of the world”. In fact suppressing that passion would be highly stressful and detrimental to your health, happiness and success.

Life is too short to ignore the things that matter the most. You never know which day will be your last. So if you have a dream work towards making it a reality. If you have a passion follow it with your heart and soul. And if it’s music I’m here to keep you company along the way 🙂 Looking forward to an interesting journey with all of you!

About the blog

Hi! I’m Harshita, a 28 year old MBA graduate who has recently decided to pay heed to her inner voice that begs her to spend each living moment on music, music and more music. I’m now on a journey towards building a career in music. Still trying to figure out what it takes to become a professional singer. This blog is a journal of my observations, mistakes, lessons learnt, advice received and anything else that will be useful for fellow aspiring singers like me. Idea is to keep a journal for myself to remember and others to learn from.

This blog will help you understand how to become a better singer and musician by following my journey and learning through my mistakes. This obviously doesn’t mean that you don’t follow your own journey and don’t make your own mistakes. It just means that you can learn from a few of mine. And since I am spending a lot of time researching human body’s vocal chord mechanism, music theory and other singing techniques, I might be able to compile the knowledge together in my blog for your ready consumption. Please note that I am on a journey and anything I write is open for questioning and debate. I will also try to cite the source as much as possible because I am not intending to take any credits here. This is just my attempt to share my journey because it’s going to be epic 😀