Joan, do you sing all the parts yourself?
Yes. I’m an alto, but I do alright singing soprano and tenor as well.
I sing all of the parts myself because I want to be sure that they’re done the way I want them. If I got someone else to sing some of the parts for me, I would have to wonder about whether they would get them finished on time, and then I would have to double check to make sure that they had gotten the notes correctly. I would also have to pay them, which would mean increased prices on the final product.
Some of the high soprano notes (especially on classical pieces) can be a strain, but I believe that I’m still offering something useful at a friendly price.
For bass parts, I use technology to help me. I sing the bass parts higher than they really are, and then use a Pitch Shifter to shift the audio down to what the true notes are. The result is that the bass parts have a different sound where you can somewhat tell that they have been altered (it sounds sort of like a guy with a bad cold). But again, you can hear the notes clearly and people do find the tracks useful for learning bass parts.
Can you change the key on a song for me?
Yes!
If you make a custom order for a song, I can do it in any key that you choose. If you want any parts modified — make it lower, make it higher, switch the altos and the tenors, you name it! — I’ll do it.
If you want changes made to a song that is already in our catalog, you will need to make a custom order for your own individualized version of the song.
Can you make sheet music or print lyrics for me?
I would have to find that out on a song-by-song basis. Getting the legal license to make a recording of a song is quite easy. I notify the publisher, pay the royalties, and nobody can stop me from making the recording. Also the royalty rate for recordings is set by law and it’s the same for all songs.
To sell sheet music or reprint lyrics, I would have to get a different kind of license, and it’s not so easy. I have to contact the publisher and ask for permission first. The publisher has the right to say “yes” or say “no” to my request. And the publisher also gets to choose how much they want to charge me for royalties.
So if you want sheet music or anything with the lyrics on it, I would have to go through a process to see whether it’s possible and figure out how much I would have to charge for it.
