Greetings! Nevir the Wolf here with your musical critique!

You’ve picked a _very_ hard song to sing while playing guitar from that master of ethereal, feel-driven music, Leonard Cohen. I appreciate your boldness to share this work as you will never catch me trying to sing anything anywhere near as complicated as this!!

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Initial Impression:

I like your energy and spontaneity with what was originally a bit of a moody song. You take things up a notch, pop up in pitch, and drive out bright chords to energize us with this slightly eerie melody which mr. Cohen was so very famous for. Shifting gears early from the original’s plucked-pattern to favor a strum and guitar-“chunking”-pattern gave a bit more leeway to how you progressed through the song which was great innovation on the tune. I am impressed by how you explored the piece and let us feel that what was happening was important and unique.

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Specifically:

0:15-0:20 Cool transition from the plucked pattern to the strum pattern
1:00-1:05 Great pickup into the chorus by bringing in the vocal first and backing it with the guitar
3:16-3:33 Great expression, your expression is uplifting

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Suggestions:

0:58-1:00 Sounds like you scrolled farther down the page to see the rest of the music; you did it exactly fast enough to cover one drop-measure, but unless that was specifically pre-determined, you might want to make provisions to have all the music open at one time if you can (I regularly print out music when I do songs in 1 take so I don’t need to flip pages ever, specially on 3-page pieces)
1:07-1:08 Careful on the register switch, the anticipation can make the word you sing right before the switch to go very sharp as the throat constricts
1:15 Pronunciation of “body” gets lost a little
1:17 Try not to lose the necessary “D” on “mind”; imagine pushing the “D” out with a bunch of silent “hhh”s at the end so it flows out instead of chopping with a “dTT” sound
2:19-2:24 Work on annunciation through harder to sing, higher notes

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What Needs Work:

It almost feels like the whole piece is a touch quick, leaving not enough time to say the words smoothly. With these ballad pieces with their lyrical meanderings, it is generally suggested to keep the tempo rather mellow and even as it gives the vocalist more time to formulate the words. Slower doesn’t have to mean less energy though, and I believe that even if you took it just a little more laid back we would still hear the brightness of your musicality.

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Suggested Listening:

I had one musical teacher who taught me that our best teachers are attached to either side of our heads: the ears. We can spend money to learn from a person, or, with the right mindset, we can listen to and learn from music that someone else has already spend tens of thousands of dollars to perfect!

I would suggest you go ahead and listen to mr. Cohen’s song Suzanne a few times in a row. Put aside the actual notes and words: feel what is happening. Feel the way the words are being sung. Feel the timing and the pacing. Ask yourself “Why did he sing it this way?”. Feel how patient he is to speak the words. Try to imagine what kind of space he would have been singing this in; try to feel the atmosphere and why he is wanting to communicate what he is communicating through the tone.

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In Closing:

The balance between complexity and control is very difficult to master. I personally work for simplicity with better control over complexity with less control. Music is an experience, one that you are creating for the listener; don’t be afraid to linger a little bit on what is happening when your music is being made. You don’t have to force it; let the energy speak for itself.

Thank you very much for sharing this piece with me. I have enjoyed it.

Feel free to message me if you would like me to expound on a subject or offer more details.

Cheers!


This has been a musical critique by  nevir

Well, I didn't expect that much of a critique - now that I got one, it reads out very well. Very informative - I'll keep all those in mind. And besides, I'll be listening to "Suzanne" quite a few more times during this summer. I can't get enough of it - it's just a beautiful song.

Well, from what I read, it's as if I need to stress my vocalizations (but not too much), work on my pauses (though the first one came out really good), work on my pronunciations (then again, it's one of my first times playing this piece), and slow it down just a tad to let the listener get the idea of the song without it becoming an exact clone of Cohen's original or some soulless Cobain/Prince take on it.

Then again, I recorded this on one track - I tend to pronounce my words a lot better when I record two tracks (one for my guitar and the other for my vox). It was meant to serve as a demo and judging by the critique, it needs work, but I have introduced a lot of individuality into it.

Individuality is really important and everyone will respect you for that! ^_^
Keep up the work!
- nathanaelplatier

You have introduced great individuality to it! I would be excited to hear if you posted a follow up to this, maybe breaking down the recording into two tracks like you said. I think you are really on to something here!