To choose what covers we were going to perform for the assignment, our group decided to make a Spotify playlist which I have linked below. The group added their favorite songs and artists into the playlist so all members could listen. This was the most successful thing to come out of the session, as it allowed us find common artists that we all felt comfortable performing, making for a better performance. Collectively, we decided that the songs we would be performing were Don’t Dream its Over by Crowded House and Stay by Rihanna. These songs fit our individual playing and singing styles and so got the best result out of all of us.
For Don’t Dream it’s over, I played the guitar whilst each of the singers performed a verse each and for harmonized for the chorus; Caitlin singing the high harmony, Eleanor on the low harmony whilst Ellie sang the main melody. This song played to all the members strengths as it included melodies and harmonies that suited all singers whilst also allowing me to show off my technique and ability on the guitar. A negative of this song for me, however, was the fact that the song was made up entirely of bar chords and so was quite a challenging song for me to play. To combat this however, I used a Yamaha Classical guitar which is made up of mostly nylon strings and is a smaller build to the guitar I was originally using; a Merida Diana Electro-Acoustic. This made the song more comfortable to play making for a better performance as well as providing an accurate representation of my ability. I have attached this performance below.
Next, we performed Stay by Rihanna. For this piece, I played the piano whilst the vocalists sang the melody for the verses whilst harmonizing in the chorus in the same way as Don’t Dream it’s Over. This song showed the group’s ability due to the harmony’s needed for the piece, as well as the chord changes for the piano. Personally, it emphasises my flexibility as a performer as I used different instrumentation in both songs. A challenge of this performance was that we had to do multiple takes due to the multiple levels and segments of the song. This means that there was a lot to remember leading to a few mistakes being made and so multiple takes needing to be took. However, I am still glad that we chose this song as it showed our determination to stick with a song and make it work for us. Again, I have attached this performance below.
Sarahs Sound Dubbing Blog 