I need some help

[jaws05]

Ok. This might be strange. But I just recently sang for the first time in front of a good buddy of mine. I was singing Tightrope and Texas Flood by SRV. I can sing it perfectly w/ the cd playing underneath my vocals. My friend was blown away and said I nailed both songs perfectly. So we turned the cd off and tried to play it just me and him. And I could not sing it. Is there any way I can get better at this or should I just give up and not worry about it.

[Trigger_003]

Nah, it happens quite a lot. Don't give up, you've obviously got some tallent.

Either you're working off the fact that you have a whole band behind you, or you're working off the vocals. Regardless of what, something is providing you with - this is usually the case anyway - either the pitch or the confidence to sing that song.

If you can work out what you're relying on, it'll make it easier to fix it.
Do you know the words completely? Can you mentally hear the first note you're starting on? The ones immediately following it?
Having a band behind you - usually the bass parts - provides you with a pitch... as well as, of course, the vocals. Singing acapella (by yourself), you're deprived of both, so you've got to know how it goes on your own.

Sometimes all you need is a single note to guide you as to where to start from.

One way to work on this is to find a backing track of this song; the entire song but without the vocals. If that's possible for you to find...

But there's an easier way to get used to singing solo. Start singing with the CD as usual. Once you've sung it through, turn the speakers down a bit (just slightly), and sing it through again. Don't lower your vocals when you do this. Maintain the volume you used when singing it through the first time. Keep repeating this process, eventually getting the CD down to practically a whisper in the background, but with you still singing at the original volume. This way you develop the confidence to sing the piece without other things supporting you.

When you feel you're ready, turn off the CD entirely and sing it in your own time. This doesn't all have to happen in 10 minutes. It might even take you a couple of days to get used to. But once you do, you'll find yourself being able to pick this up a lot faster.

Something else you might want to do is get into a bit of ear training... have a look at http://www.musicianforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=349515 for that.

Hope that helps :thumb:.