Smart Music

That's right I said it.  Throw away your karaoke CD collection.  I'm talking to you Mr. “I think it's cool to get up and sing Johnny Cash every third song”.  Or how about “hey I'm a drunk college student and am going to sing the Bohemian Rhapsody with my drunk college friends”.  You know what?  Me and the rest of the bar, we don't want to hear it. Unless you're some cute blonde that is going to jump up there and sing Taylor Swift we don’t want to hear it.

Stop Singing and Get Help

Chances are you need professional help.  Not the kind where you are mentally insane but you need some vocal coaching.  Most of you get off on performing karaoke, getting up on stage night after night sounding horrible.  The worst part is that your goofy smile implies that you think that you are good at singing.

How To Find A Good Vocal Coach

So you think that you might need a good vocal coach?  The best thing that you could do is call your local university vocal performance department and ask if they are taking on any private students.  Chances are you can find a classically trained vocal coach that understands the physiology of singing.  The coach will help you understand how to properly use air supply and apply musicality, including pitch and vocal fluctuation.

If you're not near a local university, the next best thing they could do a search Yahoo, Google or Ask for the term's “private vocal coaching”.  There you will find vocal coaches in your area to help you learn to be a better singer so that the next time you go to a karaoke bar you're not booed off the stage.  Furthermore, patrons like me who just want to enjoy a beer don't have to sit through bad singing and witness your goopy smile, implying that you think your hot stuff.

Some People Don’t Have It

If you give the local training a chance and you still can't sing after six months to a year, forgot it, you're done, that's it, you'll never be a singer.  If this is your case, just throw out your karaoke CD collection, because we don't want to hear it.  Don't feel bad, don't feel sad, we all have our own gifts and talents.  Your talent may be like mine, sipping a beer on a barstool making fun of bad karaoke singers.

You may be wondering what the difference is between karaoke and karaoke instrumental versions of a song.  The karaoke version will play back-up vocals when put into a karaoke machine and it will read off the lyrics.  The instrumental version will be only music and have no words or singing.  It's also important to note that the instrumental version also includes the melody.  This is not present on the karaoke version.

How To Create Karaoke Instrumental Tracks

It's possible that you have a song that is not available in instrumental karaoke version.  You may be dying to perform the song at your favorite karaoke bar and have searched the world and beyond for a karaoke recording.  What are you to do?  The answer is finding voice elimination software.

Voice elimination software will typically allow you to eliminate the lead voice from a recording leaving only the background music for your karaoke performance.  Even with software this is hard to do because music is recorded using a multi-track recorder and a finished musical product is mixing down into left and right channels.  The easiest way to remove 99% of vocals from a song would be in a scenario in which a vocal track was mono.  However today most tracks are stereo and the removal of vocals is hard to do even with software.

There are several machines or software programs out there that will reduce the vocals of a song using filters.  Most of the voice elimination software only reduces the vocal tracks, which also reduces other parts of the recording.  A popular device can be found at your local RadioShack called Karaoke Mate.  It often retails for around 40 to 50 bucks but it will create a recording for you in which the vocal tracks are filtered.  Unfortunately, you'll find that a lot of your other important tracks are also filtered in the process.

How To Find Karaoke Tracks

When looking for instrumental karaoke track it’s best to do a simple web search for the track name and artist.  Some of the most popular places to purchase an instrumental track would be iTunes or Lime Wire.  There are also specialty websites that cater to the karaoke audience.  Worse case you can sing your karaoke to a complete track with the lead vocals.  I know a lot of experts will whine and cry about this however you may sound better with the artist singing along.

There are literally hundreds of different places that you can find instrumental karaoke tracks however if you can't find a recording, just make your own.  Although software cannot completely eliminate the vocal tracks or make a perfect karaoke recording it oftentimes is your best and only solution.  So if you desperately need a specific karaoke track, go pick up some software and go to work.

Chances are that you just finish your musical masterpiece and recorded it on a CD.  Now you’re in the final stages of creating your musical product, but just need a CD cover design.  We are here to help you decide how to accomplish this, whether you’re looking to make a CD cover scratch or looking to outsource your CD cover label.

How To Make A CD Cover

The first step to make a CD cover is to come up with a CD cover design.  Several artists use programs such as Adobe Photoshop to create an image for their CD cover label.  Generally we recommend that you start with a 912x912px dimension for your CD cover labels.  We like to start with a high-resolution image; however, later if you feel that you need a lower resolution you can always compress the image file.

To get design ideas for CD cover we recommend that you do a simple CD cover search on the Internet to stem your creativity.   Once you have a few ideas, use the Web to find tutorials on how to get the visual effects that you're looking to add to your CD cover.  Your first CD cover may take you over edge of wearing the programs that you are using to create your first CD cover.  And time invested now will be well stocked as the next time you create a CD cover you will to do it much quicker.

When finished with your CD cover design, it's time to print your new artwork.  It's recommended that you take your CD cover to the professional printer to give you professional quality.  If you have a high quality printer at home you can opt to print your own CD covers; however, you'll most likely spend as much money on toner and ink cartridges as you would in having your CD covers professional printed.

How To Outsource A CD DVD Cover

If you're limited on time you can always outsource your creation of your CD DVD cover.  It's recommended that you start a simple web search to look for graphic artists who specialize in CD covers.  Next choose three graphic artists and requests quotes for your CD cover design.  Don't necessarily choose to graphic artist has the lowest quote.  It's wise to look at the artist’s portfolio and choose the graphic artist that has the best work yet the best price.

If you outsource your graphics work often times the graphic artists will have a relationship with a professional printer.  Therefore outsourcing the graphics for your CD cover should be one-stop shop for creating your CD cover.  Another consideration is if you're having your CDs professionally made you can send a CD company your image file created by the graphic artist and they will give you a finished product including printed covers.

There's lots of ways to create your own CD cover.  It really comes down to how much money and how much time to spend.  If you have the money it's recommended that you just outsource the creation of your CD cover.  However if you have a slight artistic flair, why not create your own CD cover.  It really comes down to your passions and how you want to spend your time and money.

Downloadable music has been available for the past decade. Folks used to set-up FTP servers to trade digital downloadable music in the form of an mp3. FTP users would provide visitors a list of mp3’s that they were looking for and downloadable music that would be available in trade.

In the new millennium, peer to peer (P2P) networks began to gain popularity. Just like a Google search bar, P2P music services offered users the ability to gain access to downloadable music at the click of a mouse. Because P2P networks allowed all internet users (not excluding the less technological savvy users), the music industry and artists saw P2P as a threat. The ease at which internet users were able to download mp3’s and other downloadable music stemmed a series of lawsuits via the music industry.

Today, the history of lawsuits makes internet users think twice before downloading mp3’s or other digital forms of downloadable music. The user experience of the P2P networks had been so positive, that today’s legal methods for streaming or downloading music offer the same search and access functions. Today for a low price ranging from $10 to $15 a month, users can have unlimited access to streaming music and downloadable music.