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Dennis Martin Brooks's avatar

Wow! Having studied piano since I was 6, singing in a community chorus, studying the guitar, and trying to write literary fiction, i must say this was inspiring and informative. Thank you.

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Lev Raphael's avatar

Glad you enjoyed it!

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Liz Gauffreau's avatar

When songs are in a language I don't speak, I tend not to seek out the translation. I let the accompaniment and the sound of the words tell the story.

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Lev Raphael's avatar

I've sung in languages I speak besides English: French and German. But even then I've checked translations and sometimes re-translated them for myself or found a word that's poetic or old-fashioned. One of my first songs was in Swedish which I can speak a little and was studying at the time, but I did need to understand the poem it was based on to find the emotion, so I read the translations. Whatever works, right? In this case especially, some of the words were archaic.

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Liz Gauffreau's avatar

That makes sense. I would need to know the meaning of the words to sing a song in a different language.

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Lev Raphael's avatar

And I discovered that knowing how to speak a language was very different than singing it. So many discoveries--and one of the first personal essays I published early in the pandemic was about that: https://www.levraphael.com/healthyaging-levraphael.pdf

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Susan Oleksiw's avatar

Beautiful post. I hadn't thought about understanding the accompaniment, and then the words. Each is its own offering to the listener. Wonderful.

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Lev Raphael's avatar

Thanks! I'm working on something now and listening to the piano's moods and what they might indicate.

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Nov 13
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Lev Raphael's avatar

My range as a bass/baritone has expanded thanks to this amazing new teacher.

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