SwankiVY Sings: "Butterfly" by Rajaton, Multitrack Recording

[Jase14B]

btw wat u said was true... Im a tenor and im not afraid of the upper range. Oh and tenors also love to try sop parts. too bad i always get the hardest part of the whole a cappella. I personally can reach from G2 to C6... Im first tenor btw. But i strain when i reach C6.

[Jase14B]

actually the lowest note for ssaa version(by the way its 6 parts, 3 sops and 3 altos) is G3. It makes great harmony but sounds a little wierd.... i have the ssaa version on my account on noteflight. If u want u can sign up and take a look and even print it out.

[swankivy]

@Jase14B Yeah, if the lowest it goes is G3 it's not out of my range at all. I actually already have a Noteflight account, but I'll pass on printing out the SSAA version. I'm fine with the one I have. Thanks anyway.

[Jase14B]

but 2 out of 3 of the alto parts are too low to you. since your a sop. 1

[swankivy]

@Jase14B An alto part goes below C3? That's a bit weird. (I quoted the ranges I performed in this song at the end here, so if it's below that, I probably couldn't sing it.)

[Jase14B]

hey swankivy i haven't mensioned but i have a ssaa version of this.:)

[Jase14B]

hey do you think u can post the individual parts?

[swankivy]

@Jase14B Sorry, no, I don't have them (and I don't think it'd be very entertaining). I deleted the raw video once this was edited together because I have space issues. I do have audio-only recordings of me doing the individual parts though. Perhaps if you want those and you contact me privately, I can let you listen to them.

[Jase14B]

@swankivy sure i'd like that

[swankivy]

@Jase14B You'll have to contact me privately and let me know how you want me to share them. I have mp3s of my vocals for all 6 parts and the piano for the bottom 5.

[hpiznxt2myheart]

I love this song! I sang it a couple years ago in high school. Great job with the multitrack, and great personifications of the different voice parts. :)

[swankivy]

@hpiznxt2myheart Thanks, awesome comment! I appreciate it.

[msgann]

this is the best and funniest version:D

[swankivy]

@msgann LOL Thank you. :)

[Jase14B]

what do u use to do this?

[swankivy]

@Jase14B I recorded my singing with the WaveLab software (used that to mix), and I made the different video windows with the Pinnacle Studio software. I just have a USB microphone and an analog video camera.

[Jase14B]

@swankivy tnx

btw ur singing is great! i can't believe u dare tacle the low notes!

ill tackle the high note too:) by the way im a tenor:)

[Jase14B]

@swankivy is there another software that i can se that wont take up a lot of space?

[Jase14B]

@Jase14B where did u get thosee scores i want!

[swankivy]

@Jase14B I bought the Rajaton music from Sulasol online.

[swankivy]

@Jase14B I don't know, I've never had any other ones. If you want to use something that I have no experience with, you'll need to ask someone else or research it, because I'm afraid I don't know.

[fabzMa]

The music starts at 6:11... but the intro is pretty funny :D

[swankivy]

@fabzMa I'd already put an annotation at the beginning that tells people when the music starts, in case they want to skip to it. I'm glad you like the skit.

[msgann]

I Like!:D

[Lonlywayoflife]

Wow. First, in talking part I thought "What the...." and when music began it turn int o"WOW!!"

[swankivy]

@Lonlywayoflife Heh, were you at least saying "what the...." in a good way? :) Thanks for the compliment.

[mrbarandca]

Some peope have a talent. Very few have many. This was beyond even that. I am beyond impressed. Remarkable job. Thank you for sharing this.

[swankivy]

@mrbarandca Wow. Your praise here made me tear up! Thank you so much for being so nice to me. :)

[77danielfelix7]

very good

[pat9784]

Cool I love it. Looks like alot of work.

[swankivy]

@pat9784 It actually wasn't too bad, but learning the song was the time-consuming part. ;)

[iHekFetBoi]

BASS PRIDE :D ! all about the bases!

my class is singing this for our concert :P

[swankivy]

@iHekFetBoi Wow really? I wish I'd ever gotten to do this with a group!

[iHekFetBoi]

@swankivy Don't you have like a choir in your school? :O

[swankivy]

@iHekFetBoi LOL. I'm thirty-three years old. I haven't gone to school in more than a decade.

[iHekFetBoi]

@swankivy oh, LOL you look so young!! i thought you were in highschool!

[swankivy]

@iHekFetBoi Heh. Well, let's hope I can continue to make people think I'm more than a decade younger than I am for a long time to come. ;)

[jerolddavis]

Loved the way you nailed the stereotypes! So funny! I just rolled when the second soprano says nothing for about five seconds! Was that intentional?

[swankivy]

@jerolddavis There were several intentional pauses so I'm not sure if that's what you meant, but probably. Glad you liked it.

[Tamamasensei]

This is really good, a little grumpy at the long intro before the song, but the song itself is great :D

[swankivy]

@Tamamasensei That's cool--but the "long intro" is why I put a note at the beginning saying when the skit ends and when the singing begins so that I wouldn't make certain people grumpy. :) Glad you liked it. . . .

[redhot654]

lmao us sopranos are always getting told we can't read music, complerte buuuuull :D

[canoryon]

... I've just ordered it from di-arezzo in France which looks quite an interesting music store - I've not used them before, so I'll let you know how I get on, and what else they have. They've got rights to the Finnish music, by the looks of it. I'm always on the look out for interesting repertoire. What do you make of Eric Whitacre ?

[swankivy]

@canoryon That's great. As for Eric Whitacre, I'm not familiar, and have no experience looking for more repertoire on purpose. I just kind of fall upon things and end up being inspired to perform them.

[canoryon]

Fantastic job! I really admire the way you put all this together - can you tell me where I can buy the music as I want to get it for my group? Can't seem to track it down. Thanks

[swankivy]

@canoryon It is difficult to track down! The way I got it is from Partitura. Google "Partitura Rajaton" and choose the first link (I can't paste links in YT comments). Then click "order form" for the English version, order item number 48199 (put "Mia Makaroff Butterfly" as "Description"), fill in the price as 3,95 (that's in euros, with a comma), and fill in your own info and the quantity you want to purchase through PayPal, and follow the shipping instructions. Does that help?

[canoryon]

@swankivy thanks for this. I think I might have found it from a company in Finland and another in France called di-arezzo. But as I haven't yet heard back from them, I'll try your connections. V helpful. Ta

[swankivy]

@canoryon Yes, I know the company in Finland that sells it but my problem was that I couldn't pay online and they wanted me to make an international phone call or fax to give them my credit card number, so I was uncomfortable with that.

[Partyburner]

Haha, pretty nice and funny! I love how you bring up so many cliches about the different voice categories.

It would be nice to hear you with better equipment, btw. I know it's an investment. But trust me: When you enjoy recording videos like this one, you won't regret investing a bit.

[swankivy]

@Partyburner Thanks for the compliment. And while of course it would be nice to have better equipment, no, I can't justify it. I've no intention of making a career out of singing or making videos, so dropping hefty sums on recording equipment isn't realistic in my situation. You say to "trust you" on the subject of what I wouldn't regret investing in, but you don't really know what my other obligations are, so . . . looks like you'll have to trust ME when I say it isn't feasible. Thanks though.

[adrienneWHOo]

i am curious what software did u use to edit this? thxx

[swankivy]

@adrienneWHOo Pinnacle Studio is my video editor! It doesn't actually let you split the screen that many times, though, only twice, so this is the result of me splitting a video five different times. Kind of hard to explain but I guess I just tried to find a way around the limitations. :)

[whitedogsrule]

I loved it! I have these six way conversations with myself all the time. Seven, if you count my dog...

[swankivy]

@PaganSteve It wasn't super hard, but there were challenges! :)

[pete275]

I don't care which part they sing, singers can't read music (and why would they? they're just singing! :p )

[swankivy]

@pete275 Heh. Well, I'll just have to assume you're joking, 'cause anyone who actually said such a thing and meant it would be displaying a stunning lack of knowledge about music. (Incidentally, I majored in music in college, and yes, anyone wishing to get such a degree was required to go through years of music theory and practice. But since choral performances all require learning one's part from--you guessed it, sheet music--yeah, they kinda have to know what those funny squiggles mean.) :)

[NarutoNU]

Very interesting. Seems like it must have taken a long time. the diologue was funny too.

[swankivy]

@NarutoNU It didn't take very long actually. I made the recording of the singing in one night, and wrote the script/made the video in one night also. The video editing took a while but I finished it the same day I recorded it. I'm glad you liked the dialogue!

[woodsprout]

Wow, lovely song, and production, I'm delighted you took this on! There is multitasking and thorough multitasking and I'd say you do the latter.

[swankivy]

@woodsprout Thanks. Yes, multitasking is indeed something I'm used to dealing with. . . . :D

[MichaelPaoli]

Lovely! When are we going to see the swankivy's Greatest Hits album in our local record stores? Oh, ... they're not making local record stores anymore? Drats. Okay, we'll still have all your groupies follow you around to your sold out performances on your wold tour.

Thanks for the lovely performance!

[swankivy]

@MichaelPaoli Heh. I wasn't planning on making an album, mainly because most of what I do is not original and I can't sell covers without permission from the artists, but my so-called groupies can just subscribe to my YouTube channel and content themselves with that, I guess. ;)

[michaelsaunders77]

Nice job! Definitely more entertaining than my version. Anything from Rajaton's repertoire makes for great multitrack videos!

[swankivy]

@michaelsaunders77 Thanks for the compliment. ;) I haven't performed any of Rajaton's other songs but I am a fan of theirs. This is the first time I've tried a video like this, and I only just got software capable of splitting my screen. ;)  So this was an experiment kinda. . . .

[violetinspired]

oh my god this is the most awesome video you've ever recorded! every character you do is hilarious and the way they all look at each other as if everyone else but themselves is mad! ahahaha. what a creative and amazing project, i'm stunned at this technology you have and it's good to see how all the different ranges work together! a mismatched choir who learned to work together, what a happy ending :)

[swankivy]

@violetinspired Haha, thank you for the compliments! So glad you liked the personalities of my characters! I might have to use them again for my next six-parter. The technology issue was mainly a creative workaround, though--I only have the ability to split my screen into two, so I had to make the video five times to get it split six times. :( And yes I'm glad those mismatched choral members learned to sing together. Hehe.

[heavensjoke]

Loved the skit. I understood none of the technical stuff yet was so amused by watching it lol. I love the song and beautiful job, as always. Thanks for taking the time and effort to put something like this together and sharing it with us :)

[swankivy]

@heavensjoke Thanks for checking it out. I'm glad you could still enjoy the skit even if the technical stuff was a little jargon-heavy. (I was worried about that, for non-music people or people who don't have the experience of being in choral groups, and I'm really glad to hear that it's still entertaining; I was afraid only a certain select group would appreciate it.)

[artman2oo3]

Holy fucking shit. Well, first of all, singing part, AWESOME, as usual, really cool to hear, except for needing to sing good that part wasn't too hard, just remember what track to do for each individual source file. But, how you coordinated the talking at the start, all in one take for each part, how in the FUCK did you do that??? I mean I know how you did it, but how did you do it without driving yourself fucking crazy with thousands of retakes????

[swankivy]

@artman2oo3 Daha. It was actually pretty easy to do. There were only two parts that I had to re-record with the talking, when I flubbed a line too badly for it to be salvageable. But yeah, I had to think big to talk to myself on this scale. :) I had a master script playing in my ear so I'd know who else was saying what, and I had sticky notes around me reminding me of "who" was sitting "where." The singing was the hardest part actually. Some of those vocal lines were pretty complicated.

[retsamys]

Hey, it's interesting what you have to say. Fortunately I have enough time to listen to it. But maybe, the beginning of your description text should say something like "Song starts at 6:12 " because that's why I clicked on the video.

Anyway, I've heard the original only one time, there's another multitrack/VideoSong/One Man Band/music collab a capella interpretation on YouTube that's impressing. The thing is, your version with professional equipment and I couldn't decide which one is better.

[retsamys]

@retsamys Oh, the video I metioned is the one by michaelsaunders77 (Butterfly: Rajaton A Cappella Multitrack ) and it's actually no music collab. So. People who like higher sung music should listen to this one. Others should watch michaelsaunders77's version.

Well done.

[swankivy]

@retsamys Oh yeah, question--what do you mean by "no music collab"? Mine is of course higher because it's all female voice and Michael's is lower because he does the lead in the tenor range and can actually hit those low notes for the men's parts, but I'm not sure what exactly you were suggesting for me and for the viewers. Your feedback is appreciated!

[retsamys]

@swankivy A music collab (long form: music collaboration) on YouTube is a music video made together with one ore more user (sometimes simply other persons). The specific video by Michael was no music collaboration, whereas others were made together with her sister (? I didn't check).

The part with the low and high notes, I noticed that I and some other persons I know sometimes rather listen to higher or lower sung notes. If we leave ot the sound quality, (for me) it is the only way to choose.

[swankivy]

@retsamys I knew that "collab" was short for "collaboration." What I'm trying to figure out (and am still unclear on) is why you are saying Michael's video is "no music collab" if you're also saying a "collab" can be "one or more users." There's no collaboration going on if you're doing it all yourself, so maybe that's what you were trying to point out about Michael's video?

[retsamys]

@swankivy Exactly. What I wrote was "together with one or more user". Maybe I should have been more precise.

For me, the best form to present an actual music collab is the VideoSong medium, but you can also (like you did) present a multitrack by using the rules of VideoSong.

[swankivy]

@retsamys I have no idea about anything "VideoSong" or "rules" about it, and I've never done any music collaborations like you describe. Though once someone wrote music for a song I sang, and I've done a video for that.

[retsamys]

@swankivy Just in case you come across this word again:

According to Jack Conte (user name on YouTube: jackcontemusic), aVideoSong, a new medium with 2 rules:

1. What you see is what you hear (no lip-syncing for instruments or voice).

2. If you hear it, at some point you see it (no hidden sounds).

It became more popular by the YouTube music group PomplamooseMusic and is used for a lot of multitrack music videos.

[swankivy]

@retsamys That's interesting, but it's also not something I've participated in. I'm not in any kind of group or community that has to do with multitrack recordings, and I guess I don't plan to be . . . I prefer my own "rules" I think. :)

[swankivy]

@retsamys . . . You suggested that I tell people the song starts after the six-minute mark, but I had already put an annotation on the video saying just that long before you commented. Maybe you didn't see the caption there? It was right at the beginning. As for the other collab, I'd actually seen it! I've seen several of michaelsaunders77's videos, including some with his sister.

[retsamys]

@swankivy Sorry about the caption. Didn't see it.

[swankivy]

@retsamys That's okay--and I was thinking later that perhaps you had your annotations off? Some people might, and those people won't see my caption. (In any case I didn't know what the final length of the video was going to be until I posted, which is why I decided to wait until it was uploaded before I included the minute mark for the beginning of the singing portion.)

[swankivy]

@retsamys Oops, I keep thinking of more questions/things to say! What did you mean by "your version with professional equipment"? I ask because I don't have professional equipment--I'm just using an ordinary USB microphone and an 8mm video camera.

[retsamys]

@swankivy I have to admit that I have no idea. I simply watch other YouTubers recording their videos with diferent sound and audio quality, and sometimes they switch to a better equipment. That's all, I only *see* the difference. You should ask the users who use those equipments... But I think your version and interpretation of this song makes it more attractive to the comon viewer if you put it into the right quality.

Do not hesitate to ask. There's allways hope anyone could answer. I try to.

[swankivy]

@retsamys There must be some kind of communication glitch here. I'm asking questions about what YOU MEANT. I'm not asking technical questions about equipment or trying to get any recording advice.

I'm saying that I do not have professional equipment. Your first comments seemed to suggest that you thought I did have professional equipment. I was trying to figure out if you had misunderstood something I said, or if you were suggesting I change to different equipment.

[retsamys]

@swankivy Communication glitch? This could very well be possible; English is not my native language and I'm still learning it. Sorry =).

I did perfectly understand and I was able to hear that you don't have an equipment as good as some other users. That's no reason to change to whatever equipment, unless you really want a great quality in order to get more viewers.

I hope, I could answer your question this time.

[magmadragon92]

Realy good.

Well done.

[swankivy]

@magmadragon92 Thank you very much.

[theuninspiredpoet]

Fantastic! It must have been so complicated to make :)

[swankivy]

@theuninspiredpoet Yes, indeed it was, but thankfully . . . it was about AS complicated as I expected/planned for, not more so. ;)