Third song in a week. Argh. Sorry - "inspiration" seems to have struck a number of times, with me, this week - and I'm curious to hear what you genuinely think of this one, so ... thank you so much for listening, for any feedback, and especially for your patience with me.

When One Loves A Rose

EDIT: following your truly kind advice, I have remixed the song. Is this better? Feedback welcome - thank you!

When One Loves A Rose (Take 2)

SECOND EDIT: David Cuny very kindly re-mixed this for me, with Synthetizer V's Eleanor Forte and Kevin voices. I put this link in a separate post ... maybe I should have put this here, in the first place. Sorry. Anyway, for convenience, here it now is ... thank you, David!

When One Loves A Rose (mix by David Cuny)

THIRD EDIT: I dared to mess around with David's mix, a little, tonight ... I made a couple of changes, mainly in volume contrast. I hope you like this, and, hopefully, that David won't mind me tinkering a little more with his mix? See what you think? Thanks


When One Loves A Rose (4th and final remix?)


P.S. I made a video for it, too - today, 29 May 2023 Hope you enjoy.





THE LYRICS:

(DUET)

And that's how it goes
In this world of woes,
When one softly knows
That one loves a rose.

***

(MALE VOICE)

For he doesn't understand
Just how much she loves him,
And he doesn't understand
Just how bad she wants him,

And he doesn't understand
Why she's been so harsh to him,
So he walks away, once more
From his loved one's open door ...

By the fountain where they met
He is there on odd days,
Mondays, Wednesdays and the Fridays,
That is where he will stay,

And on Sundays, he goes home,
And he lets his eyes pour
Tears, awaiting the return
Of a flame that's no more.

***

(DUET)

And that's how it goes
In this world of woes,
When one softly knows
That one loves a rose.

***

(FEMALE VOICE)

For she doesn't understand
Just how much he loves her,
And she doesn't understand
Just how bad he wants her,

And she doesn't understand
Why he's been so harsh to her,
So she walks away, once more
From her loved one's open door ...

By the fountain where they met
She is there on even days,
Tuesdays, Thursdays and the Saturdays,
That is where she will stay,

And on Sundays, she goes home,
And she lets her eyes pour
Tears, awaiting the return
Of a flame that's no more.

***

(DUET)

And that's how it goes
In this world of woes,
When one softly knows
That one loves a rose.


THE SOLOISTS:

Lucy and Jay (from Emvoice)

THE BAND:

****** Song Summary *************
Title: When One Loves A Rose - 23 May 2023
File:When One Loves A Rose - 23 May 2023.SGU
Key=C , Tempo 60, Length (m:s)=3:16
No intro. 45 bar chorus, from bar 1 to bar 45. Repeat x1 chorus
No Melody
No Soloist track.
Song is saved with Volume, Pan, Reverb, Chorus, Bank0,
Style is _LILIES.STY (Lilies Nylon New Age Pop Ballad)

RealTracks in style: 2702:Bass, Synth, CloudRapSub Ev16 075
RealTracks in style: 1543:Synth Pad, PopBelieve Ev16 065
RealTracks in style: 3910:Guitar, Nylon, Fingerpicking SongwriterSlow16DADGAD Ev16 060
RealTracks in style: 1840:Synth Pad, PopModernGrooveMellow Ev16 075
RealTracks in style: 2704:Synth, Rhythm CloudRapLowOrgan Ev16 075
RealDrums in style:Cajon and Chillout Loop [Multi]

*******************

Mixed in Mixcraft Pro Studio 9

James,

A pleasant song.
Backing track is nice.
Cool to see you trying out the synth voices.
Jay sounds pretty good. Lucy sounded like a computer.
When they sing together, it sounds more like some "modern" effect on a single voice than two voice doing a duet...

Looking forward to where you go with this...

fj

Hi James ...

I've downloaded the free version of Synthesizer V, but haven't figured out much yet. You have a good foundation to work from. Floyd pretty much summed up the vocal qualities of the voices. Good first effort with the synth voices. Keep at it, and I'm sure your skills with it will improve with each attempt. Kudos for putting it "out there" for the feedback. Hang in there with it and show it who's boss!

Alan

James, I also agree with Floyd's vocal comments.

But this is a really good start.
Super groove.
Nice mic.

I'm sure you will get much better with those synth vocals as you gain experience.

My genuine thoughts?

Musically, the song is pretty good. There are some notes that much too short. Robots can sing the notes, but they don't sound like what a human sound sing.

The vocals? When the voices sing together, it's bad.

The synthesis sounds like 1990s formant synthesis. Jay, the male voice, isn't "real", but it's pleasant to listen to. Not at all convincing, but it gets the idea of the song across without drawing too much attention to itself.

On the other hand, Lucy, the female voice, sounds like Jay pitched up an octave with some formants shifted. It's doesn't sound even remotely human, it's distracting to listen to, and worse, it's hard to make out what's being said.

It's not any fault on your part. I just listened to demos that Emvoice posted of their singers, and although you can hear the character of the person behind them, the vocoder that Emvoice is using simply isn't capable of rendering the female voice realistically.

Thanks, everyone Yes, David Cuny, I asked for genuine thoughts, and I'm glad I got them Just a couple of things I'd like to add, if that's ok:

1) I didn't "treat" the voices with any post-production effect at all, in an attempt to make them sound more "human", perhaps. I just put them to work "as they came", out of the box. That's my mistake. That female voice, as you say, needs humanizing, lol. I will see what I can do - though, knowing nothing about post-production, I am mostly "doing it by ear". I will try, though

2) Thank you for giving me honest opinions on the technical aspects of things. My knowledge of those things is zero. I just write songs, that's all ... how they are performed, I often leave that "up to the performer", as it were. HOWEVER: I have indeed noticed that, if I do learn about how things can be worked on, from a post-production standpoint, they can truly improve the end result of the recording, so that it sounds less like an amateurish, perhaps, "demo" - and more towards the professional end of things. Again, I'm only a songwriter, that's all - but your advice has been invaluable in making my little demos more palatable to the human ear - so you all have my most grateful thanks, for this!!!

and finally, a question:

3) Where would you think I can get some better-sounding vocaloids? I've got absolutely no money to spend on something like this, right now, but - if that changes in the near future, why not? I only bought Emvoice, last December, because they were on sale - and I thought that two English-singing vocaloid voices is better than nothing at all. So yes, just out of curiosity, if possible: what would you recommend instead?

THANK YOU!!!!!!! Without your advice, coupled with PG Music's miraculous Band-in-a-Box software, none of this would be real.

P.S.

4) Thank you also for the kind musical thoughts, on this. As I wrote, above: since I like to focus a lot on the songwriting side of things, these thoughts of yours really do help in making me a better songwriter Please, please, keep them coming!!!

and

5) thanks for your incredible patience in putting up with me and my songs

This isn't something that can be fixed in post production. No matter how much EQ or reverb you might apply to the vocal, it's still going to sound robotic.

If the vocal were sung at a lower pitch, it wouldn't be as bad, but it would still be very robotic. Emvoice simply can't do realistic vocals. They sound like they're coming through a vocoder because... well, they are using a vocoder. It's just not one capable of creating realistic female vocals, and the higher the vocals go in pitch, the less good they sound.


At the risk of breaking the "no advertising other products" rule, the best synthetic singing software on the market is SynthesizerV by Dreamtonics. That's obviously subject to change as time goes on.

Since money is an issue, I'd suggest using the free Basic editor and the lite version of Eleanor Forte and Solaria (scroll down the page to find it). These free voices have restrictions and are for non-commercial use only, but should be fine for your purposes of making demos. There are currently no Lite male English voices, but you can use the Gender option on a female voice to morph it to a male voice.

The Lite voices aren't going to fool anyone into thinking they're listening to a real human, but they'll still be far better than Lucy.

Thank you so much, David!!! Will check these voices, and the editor, now. What an amazing forum this is, where people so kindly help one another in their common quest to create better music. Thanks everyone, again!!!

Just remixed it all. See what you think? Thanks!!! (link at the top of the page - Take 2 version).

Hi, James.

The vocals at the very beginning now sound even more synthetic and harder to recognize as vocals.

I've got mixed feelings about the reverb - in some cases, it makes the consonants harder to hear.

On the other hand, there are places where the /s/ is more clear than where it was before.

Fair enough

For the record, I kind of WANT those beginning vocals to be more synthetic. They represent Destiny ("that's how it goes", etc.) versus the (doomed) Love Story that the solo voices sing about - and which I'd therefore prefer to be more "human" in timbre. That said, that beginning must not be SO synthetic that the words cannot be understood ... argh Back to the drawing board?

Thanks, David!!!

Sounds cool James!

Sounds like everyone is getting in on the synth voice act now.



Hmmmmmmmmm.......

I have to say...well, I think I am the biggest fan of the real James to tell you the truth.

Haha, thanks David Snyder ... but, seriously, could you ever (even as such a big fan of mine ) hear me hit any sort of a high note? I still struggle singing in my one-octave register, lol ... whereas you can now hit high Bs, as I've heard from your superb, latest song ... but THANK YOU for the kind words! I promise: wherever possible, I shall use my own voice to sing/speak/whatever, when recording Thanks again

Def. too many clustered notes in the melody and that reinforces the synthetics.
Larger intervals do the same.It's a great start though and a good song to start with.
Consider working the voices to match your own range or mine - within an octave and with smaller intervals.
GREAT potential sir.

3rd ONE!! Sheesh, I must've missed some-- gotta check. Had good excuse though because I have a lot of your music playing in the background here. Inspirational.

I listened to this one without reading first. I actually thought that was you singing. I sounds a bit like you, but the range is way over the top. It's really cool that you're exploring the synth voices, and there a some good advice in that regard on this forum. I agree that Lucy sounded rather computerized, but Jay sounded like you, so that's good. I still like your speaking vocals, but this is an interesting diversion and I hope to hear more as you develop it.

This is a good song. It's till in my ears when it's over, so I know it's good. Well done, James. And now I have some catching up to do.

Cool tune and ditto on the Synth V recommendation. The whole secret, if there is a secret, is to take your time and work on the details. Which is pretty much like everything else you want to do and do well.

Ray: David Cuny's remix, I believe, addresses some of the range and note congestions concerns ... thanks for pointing them out, Ray! Glad you liked the song!

Marty: Haha - no worries about catching up Glad you liked the song. I have work to do, with the synths, myself - but David Cuny has done a superb re-mix For me Thanks!!!

Guitarhacker: Yep. Detail. Spot on. I entirely overlooked the need for post-production work, the first time around. Anyhow, David Cuny's saved me, this time, with his new mix, but yes ... next time, I mustn't be "napping on the job", haha. Thanks!!!

David Cuny: ever so sorry. I decided to fiddle a little with your mix - I hope you won't mind? See what you think? THANKS

Also added a YouTube video, now ... argh ... Thanks for any views/listens and further comments

Hi, James.

It's your song to do with what you want.

It was a fun project. I haven't really done anything so "musical theatre" before, and I think the result makes it easier for people to hear what the song could be.

For vocals, obviously real vocals are going to be far beyond what synthetic vocals can give. But I suspect that even the female vocals using the free version of SynthV will give a better presentation that Emvoice will. There are currently no free English male voices for SynthV, but there apparently will be a "lite" version of "Asterian" voice in the near future.

As for the mix... every mix has specific goals. For mine, I wanted to create a sense of movement while still keeping the original instrumentation. That mostly involved using gain faders and some low-level edits on the drums.

The rest of it - the balance between the instruments, how much and what sort of effects to use - is subjective. You've heard my suggestions. On another day, I might make different choices.

Thanks for letting me work on this!

James (and David) ...

This sounds much better than the initial effort. This is now shaping up to the point the potential of the song can be heard by the listener. David is really great with these synth voices, and you gave him some really nice material to work with.

Alan

Getting better all the time!

David: let everyone know this: you are nothing short of a miracle worker. Not only did you help with the voice replacing, you also helped so much with the mix, and also corrected some of my actual musical writing mistakes. Examples: you changed the beginning (for the better), you helped with the ending (for the better), you changed the pitches of the duet voices (for the better), you pared down the orchestration in the "so he/she walks away once more / from his/her loved one's open door" sections (for the better), etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. You, of all people, should not be thanking me - it is I that have nothing but thanks for you for such amazing work. If the song is any good, now, a real huge chunk of that is due to you.

Alan: thanks. I gave a rough precious stone to David, he polished it. Glad you like the song ... hope all is good with you and yours Thanks so much for, as it were, "stopping by" .

I listened to all the versions, and it's fun to finally see the little gem what was hidden underneath.
Good job, James and David!

James / David,

This mix is a winner. It sounds great. Very nice job.

Bob

Very lovely song James. Very pretty melody and such delicate vocals. Well done David. Loved this collaboration