[nabs-l] voice lessons help needed

Mon Oct 14 23:30:02 UTC 2013

Hi Kelsey,

I am a jaws user and have used ITunes to burn CDs several times.  It
just takes a lot of tabbing around to find the burn CD button.  I'd
recommend running an older version of ITunes with the tree view on the
screen all the time, not the newer ones which hide it and make you
jump through hoops to get to it.  Just make a playlist and when you
find a song in your library you want to add to the playlist, just hit
the applications key and go down to add playlist.  Once your CD of
backing tracks is done, just go to the playlist, find the burn CD
button, and everything else should be accessible with JAWS too.

This is only applicable if you want to study with him.  If you're
looking for good vocal training, it might be worth paying a higher
rate for better instruction.  Back-up or karaoke tracks are really
tacky, not to mention very measured so they might hinder your
performance as a musician.  It's really hard to be musical with a
backing track because even if you pull off the vocals, the
instrumental part of the piece doesn't match, you can't take liberties
like playing with time, and instead of having the accompaniment follow
you it can in some cases be the other way around.

I'd look into the other teachers around you.  I can sympathize on the
financial end of things as the budget is tight for any student, but
I'd rather spend the money well and have positive results than to have
it go to waste.

On 10/14/13, Joshua Hendrickson <louvins at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi Kelsey.  I have never taken voice lessons before, but your
> situation is interesting.  I am a guitar player so, if I wanted to
> take voice lessons, I wouldn't want to use backing tracks at all.  I
> would go to a voice teacher, so I could improve my singing technique
> and that's all.  Personally, I don't like backing tracks at all.  If I
> learn a song on the guitar to sing at church, I play along with the
> original song which includes vocals, and not just music.  For a lot of
> the kind of old country and bluegrass songs I play along with, there
> wouldn't be any backing tracks to use even if I wanted them.  So if a
> voice teacher told me, they wanted me to bring along a backing track,
> to some bluegrass song, I'd have to tell that person the track doesn't
> exist.  Good luck.  I use express burn if I need to make cd's, and it
> is a very very good program for burning cd's.  I'd highly recommend
> it.  Good luck.
>
> On 10/14/13, Sophie Trist <sweetpeareader at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Kelsey, I'm not sure if this is what you're looking for, but I've
>> recently discovered a website called www.musescore.com. It's
>> designed to be a source of music for people who play instruments
>> such as piano or violin or whatever. People can go to the website
>> and listen to songs for free. I don't use JAWS, so I'm not sure
>> how accessible it is.
>>
>>  ----- Original Message -----
>> From: Greg Aikens <gpaikens at gmail.com
>> To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list
>> <nabs-l at nfbnet.org
>> Date sent: Mon, 14 Oct 2013 17:04:21 -0400
>> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] voice lessons help needed
>>
>> Your question made me curious so I did a couple of quick searches
>> in the iTunes store.  I found several tracks when I searched for
>> "performance track" and "accompaniment track."  There may be
>> other phrases that will get you more results.  Most of what I saw
>> was pop music, musicals, and christian music.  I'm sure if you
>> had something specific you were looking for, you could try that
>> search and find something better.
>>
>> As to burning CDs with JAWS, this used to work well with Windows
>> Media Player.  I don't use iTunes on a windows machine much so
>> can't speak to that.  But, why not just load the track on your
>> iPod and take it to your lesson?  Your teacher likely has a way
>> to connect an mp3 player to his stereo, unless he has already
>> told you that you need a CD.
>>
>> The amazon mp3 store is also very accessible.  You could try
>> searching there too.
>>
>> Best of luck,
>>
>> Greg
>>
>>
>> On Oct 14, 2013, at 3:51 PM, Kelsey Nicolay
>> <piano.girl0299 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>  Hello,
>>  I am currently shopping around for a voice teacher.  I have
>> found a couple.  However, one teacher has a requirement that I am
>> not sure I can to meet.  The teacher is a vocal coach who teaches
>> his lessons based on his performance experience.  He teaches all
>> styles of music.  However, he does not play an instrument.  So he
>> requests that his students obtain backing tracks for the songs
>> they want to sing.  Since I use JAWS, I don't know if there is a
>> way I can do this.  Most of the web sites that have these are not
>> very accessible.  I could use itunes, but I have not found a
>> reliable method for burning CD's without using the mouse.  So I
>> have no idea how this could be done.  I would think that walking
>> into a lesson carrying a laptop is not practical.  I play piano,
>> so do you think I could avoid this by saying that I could play
>> the chords on the piano? Someone who has gone through this,
>> please help.  I would like to study with him since his rate is
>> reasonable, at $10 per half hour.  He does know that I am
>> visually impaired and is fine with that issue.  However, I just
>> don't know how to deal with this issue.  If you have ever burned
>> a CD using JAWS, how do you do it? Itunes is what I normally use,
>> but if I have to do it with Windows Media player, I could do it.
>> The only reason I prefer itunes is because I use an ipod.  Or is
>> there another free source where I can find backing tracks which
>> would be more accessible? Is youtube good? I've used it for other
>> things, but I have found that JAWS tends to interfere with the
>> video a lot.  So, fellow JAWS users, what do you recommend? Can I
>> use the excuse that I cannot get a backing track because of the
>> issues I described above?
>>  Thanks,
>>  Kelsey Nicolay
>>
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-- 
Kaiti