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The Tone Deaf Vocalist
By Fran Ashcroft

One of the most interesting challenges I’ve had over the years was working with a tone deaf vocalist. Yes – and well before autotune and cut and paste came along; purely analogue, no automation.

Tone deaf perhaps, but he had a great musical sensibility – and articulate enough to explain exactly how he heard the songs in his head. My job was to translate that, and the tracks were effective. I’d also made sure there was an instrument in the arrangement that followed the melody, which could sit unobtrusively in the mix to underscore the vocal line.

So, how to handle vocals? His phrasing and delivery were good,and though he couldn’t pitch accurately, he could sense the difference between a higher or lower note. As long as we could get the first note more or less right, the rest would follow, if I could think of a way to demonstrate the intervals. Adopting the old singalong ‘bouncing ball’ concept, as he sang, he watched my hands move up or down proportionately in line with the next note of the melody, imitating notes on a stave, which gave him a visual reference point to work from:

higher than before
lower
a little bit lower
higher
same
start note
back to start note

You get the idea.

We’d record three full takes on separate tracks in the same way, then I’d A/B/C  and just keep the most in tune words from each on the mix. It worked surprisingly well, and we recorded together several times in the USA and UK.

Though his band wasn’t successful, he did create enough interest to be given half a million quid the following year from one of the majors to run his own label imprint!!