Leilalicks’s Weblog

Halleluja! I’m in a workflow! After not such a good session on Wednesday from my part of performance (I was somehow not concentrating enough and a lil bit messy) I bound myself behind the piano to work on the intro of one of my songs where it happened – it just splashed out and out and out and lucky me that has a lil dictaphone lying around in my appartment so I could record the whole song. Of course, words don’t come that easy, so I just sang it with some nonsense; this will be the next step, to turn the nonsense in sense and to write some beautiful, meaningful lyrics to the song I now have.

That’s it. I’m back alive, back sober and not tired anymore (ok, I am still tired – I’m not getting younger anymore ). It has been the great night of the concert, the one I have worked towards for about more than two weeks now and I think you deserve to know what I did.

I offered, to my friends birthdays, a lil ABBA-Show. Doing ABBA is somehow very schizophrenic: on one hand, it’s very easy as everyone knows it and loves it and you can’t do much wrong with it. On the other hand, it’s fucking difficult! Really! The harmonies are one thing, but the two girls have such a huge range and most of the songs are very low, which needs a lot of power down there. And then, if you don’t do it with a band but with playbacks, as I did, you are there, on stage, all alone and it’s you the show. And no other girl singing second voice and no guys coming in when it gets really really low… Just you. And although I was a little bit disappointed of all the things that went wrong (still! I told you! I was really well prepared. But it started with the fact that the CD could not be found. But I had another one with me. And then, it was not the sound engineer doing the job but the DJ. And sometimes, he was just a little bit sleeping. And then, he faded the playback in but I would have needed it clear and loud from the first tone on as it was everything I had to start and I had to come in directly. I managed it somehow differently. And then, the last song just ended up in the middle of the refrain! Fuck! I just continued and stopped somehow… you gotta keep cool, no matter what happens!)

So, maybe I should let you know the playlist:

1. Chuiquitita

2. I have a dream

3. Waterloo

4. Super trouper

5. Take a chance on me

6. Happy birthday (a capella)

7. Dancing queen

8. Mamma mia

For “super trouper” I did some special – I got the crowd singing. There’s this background that the guys are singing in every refrain, which goes Supapaaa-troupapaaaa. And I tried them to do that. Which worked pretty well, indeed! It was pretty funny.

And then, before singing “happy birthday”, I surely brought the two guys on stage. And then, I just wanted them to stay there and dance with me to “dancing queen” and I got two of my biggest fans, my dear girly friends, on stage as well and we just shaked the whole song through… big party up there

And for the clothes, I managed to find what I had in mind. I had a long skirt (or, it was a long tissue wrapped around me) and it looked like that:

and then, after the two first, slow songs, surprise, surprise, I wrapped it off

I think, they liked it

And of course, after each concert, there is a big party (for the others, the party began at 8pm, for me around 11, but I caught up quite soon… ) – but no details on that…

So, this was it, this was my concert. Unfortunately, the camera that I wanted to record the whole thing, to show you now, broke down. And I’m very sorry for the long delay, but I had to wait for the pictures to be sent to me. I first thought that I might jump from the stage to take some pictures of me, so no one else has to do that, but then I realised, that I wouldn’t be on stage anymore if I jump down and then I logically can’t take pictures from me on stage… capito?

Thank god it’s only Thursday! I just realised that I have so much left to do til tomorrow. Gotta pack my bags (I finally managed to find the clothes I wanted to wear!), gotta write a playlist so the sound engineer knows what to do when, gotta find out which make-up will fit to the clothes… and it all has to be today, as tomorrow, I will have left no time at all for such stuff. Gotta get my voice warm, gotta put the make-up on, gotta hurry to the train – I only have two hours for everything, which is pretty tight.

Now at the moment, 24 hours before the big bang, I’m a lil bit nervous. I got the finishing touch last night, I know, I can do it. But I want it all, it has to be perfect! And it’s quite a special feeling knowing I’m gonna be up there all alone (as I’m working with playbacks this time), everyone will just look at me, everyone will notice, if I do something wrong. But I have to stay cool (which is not that easy, I should not sing too much as to rest my voice and I should not smoke too much as not to irritate my throat…), everything will be fine! Ooooooohhhhmmm

Further, I have a bad conscience, as I have not spoken to my drummer for days! I’m so much into this concert thing… I have to do this now. And a lot of other things as well… See you soon with a lot to tell!

My concert is coming closer and closer. And I get more and more nervous. Today, I realised that I can’t find the clothes I had in mind to wear on Friday. So I have two possibilities: finding them or wear something else (the option to go on stage naked is not really an option )

At least, I know the lyrics now. Or most of it. I have another singing lesson tomorrow, where I will get the final make-over and then I will be ready, from the vocal part of the show. No singing on Thursday as it’s always good to have one day break before a concert.

I’m so excited – I really have to take care that I don’t tell anyone what I will do (as it’s a surprise) and that I don’t write anything here… But you will see, I will tell you a lot after Friday

I had an emergency. Yesterday at the office. So I had to postpone the soundcheck to today. That’s where I just returned from. I’m now looking even more forward to giving this concert, I tell you! First, I know now that I really did everything to be well prepared! Second, the location is great! It will be at the so called ZAK in Jona, which is just half an hour away from Zurich. The building is an old barn that has been renovated, space for 350 persons and the stage itself is on top floor, just under the roof which gives a very great feeling. And as they have concerts regularly, they are pretty well equiped with a huuuuuuge mixer and old but still good PA, microphones and even monitors! To be honest, I’ve never before worked with a ground monitor (the locations I had concerts at had no monitors or boxes standing behind me or, even worse, boxes in front of me (so I could not at all hear what I was singing…)). So I thought it will be a challenge with the sound coming from below but it is actually very easy, as, for the first time, I really could hear clearly what I was doing. And third reason is, that the guy doing the sound engineering is a pro, really knowing what he’s doing. If you want yourself to sound nice, it’s really good to have someone you trust in. And that’s what I do. It will be greeeeeeeat!

A. Just a simple vocal. A easy vocal, one would think. But it’s a mean vocal, I tell you! It makes your vocal chord let more air through than any other vocal. This means, your voice will sound weaker when you sing an a than when you sing an i e.g. And this is what I try to adjust at the moment. By singing scales up and down, all on a. I hate it. I never can tell if I do it right if my singing teacher is not there. How could I know? I can’t listen and sing at the same time! And I’m sure it’s making my neighbours crazy. But it has to be. I need to improve…

Now, I need to prepare a few things – we will have soundcheck tomorrow for the concert in one and a half weeks and I need to take all the stuff to the office so I can go directly. I’m really looking forward to seeing what kind of room it will be, seems that even big shots have already played there. We’ll see, we’ll see, I’ll let you know…

I was very tired and not at all motivated when I’ve gone to another jam session with my drummer yesterday (soon after I got up, thanks to my spontaneity on Friday). Although I was so much not in the mood of giving a good performance, it just turned the other way around when my voice got warm. We lit some candles to get a better mood and just started where we stopped the last time. And we finished one song! And just in the middle of nothing, he played a beat that I liked very much and it just fit to one of my early songs and just out of nothing, we finished a second song. I was so much in the flow, I could have sung this sung the whole night through. I’m looking so much forward to our next session – I have to get another song ready, we are just much faster than I expected!

He really tries so much to understand what I felt writing a song or what I try to say with something – I have to understand how he works as well!
And today, I ended up après-skiing too much, after a great day of skiing with one of my beloved friends. I realised that I should learn how to say”no” when it comes to go out and drinking. (that’s why there are a lot of faults in this text – my fingers just don’t do what my brain tells them…) So, next week, I will have to focus on the preparations of my concert – it will be surely a calm week (or at least I try to have a calm week ), I’m gonna have a sound check on Tuesday and the other days I will work on the performance. I keep you updated!