Cabaret & Private Functions, Band Lead Singer.

Most weekends I perform one or two nights, either booked privately or through one of the two agents I use. 

I also take private bookings to do a combination of singing and playing music (at weddings and parties). I won't profess to being a DJ but can usually get 'em dancing! I do, however, leave the arranging of any party games that may be required to the customer/organiser. I've recently started working with a full covers band, Stellar

During my act I can choose tracks from the list below:

NB This list is not exhaustive and I add new material on a regular basis. 

I can also learn any songs you require of me, provided I have at least two weeks' notice of the booking

Joanie's Bits...

My Equipment:

I like to chat with other singers and sometimes find myself giving advice to people who are interested in starting out working clubs and pubs for a living.  Below is a brief insight into the technical aspect of my solo show. I hope it answeres a few questions for anyone who wants to know what I use. Just email me for further information if needed...

My system has been a Mackie DFX6 mixer feeding two Mackie SRM 450's for a while now. Al says it was worth every penny. (£1200 ish with stands and leads, back in 07) The system was bought from Sound Control's shop in Kirkcaldy. With a little haggling Al and I reckon we got a good deal. Its always worth taking a print out of internet prices when shopping. I also now use a set of dB in ear monitors, these cut the chances of feedback because the main PA can be in front of me and I still hear myself and my tracks. A couple of hundred pounds well spent, but worth it to keep in tune. My mic is a Sennheiser ew 145. It is supercardiod mic so that the chances of feedback squeals  are reduced and sounds fantastic.... but it in pricey. Mind you I've never had the local taxis comng through my system so the extra cost is maybe worth it.

 Al has fitted all the above and a lighting controller into a 6u rack box. My mixer is screwed to a drawer unit so that it pulls out for use and my laptop sits on top, along with its usb fan unit, to keep it cool. It means we can set up / pack up in minutes. Our box also has a tophat speaker mounting socket on the bottom which allows us to sit it on top of a cut down speaker stand... meaning we don't need a table in the tight corner of the pub.

My Lighting:

I've simplified my pub and club lighting. We now only take the NJD Euro 4E lighting controller (fitted into our rack case) feeding four PAR 36 coloured lamps spotlighting the dance floor.  I use two Kam par56 LED lamps on pole mounts (under the speakers), linked together to synchronise the colour and timing. I use these to highlight myself

For weddings and larger venues we can still pull out our Tripod Stand holding "Beam Effect" XTC and Wild Blaze Lights and Botex LLS-403 LASER.

I bought a medium sized mirror ball to use at birthdays/weddings etc, it gives is quite stunning effect but is really too much hassle to set up.

To produce my backing tracks we now use a HP laptop, our Fujitsu Siemens Lifebook was starting to have problems with its battery and power supply, so it is now the backup. We did try using the laptops sound system but was getting a helicopter sound between tracks so I've added a USB Soundblaster soundcard to get an output that will sound good at 800 watts. Popular opinion is that the best equipment is mini disc but the way forward will probably be to use a laptop pc.

I have a large selection of karaoke discs from lots of companies and I would recommend the "Sing To The World" website as a way of getting hold of individual tracks that you find yourself short of.

My Tracks:

I use an HP Pavilion laptop now to play my tracks. I have only ever had three problems with this...

1. When working outside it can be difficult to see the screen. (a small tent over it does the trick)

2. Overheating caused my screen to go blank once... I now use a very cheap (ebay) usb cooling unit that sits underneath the laptop. We think that the felt covered box that held the equipment was blocking the fan inlet and caused the problem.

3. Laptop power supplies can be very electrically noisy and sound terrible through a pa. Alan tried using a di box to reduce the chance of groundloop noise, but that didn't work for us. In the end he removed the earth from our power lead, which is not recommended and against pat testing rules but as the computer has no metal showing... Al says it is safe.

I use a program called DJ2000 to select my tracks and have set this up to feed Winamp (free) which also has a free plug in on it to try to keep the output level. Although some tracks need altering with Audacity first to amplify or reduce them. In the breaks I use Mixmeister Pro 6 to play previously prepared playlists... It fades mp3's together like a DJ.

So how do I prepare my tracks???

Well it is (for me) a long process. I choose the tracks I want to add into my set, then I listen to the original along with a set of lyrics (I use the internet to find them).  I have my own way of customising my lyrics to make them easy for me to follow.   I highlight any important high sections in red, and any low sections in green.  Alan reckons I am a bit anal about my lyrics sheets, but if my method works, why change it?  If you are thinking of starting out, then why not come to a gig and marvel at my (over) attention to detail.

Seriously though, it is a good idea to have some sort of method.  I was covering at a gig recently using someone else's lyrics book, and I was quite unsettled at how higgledy piggledy it was.  Some lyrics were typed, some written, some photocopied, some ripped and well thumbed. 

But, each to their own as I say. 

Anyway...  After practising along with the original a few times, I sing along with the backing track, changing any timings or phrasings as needed.  Some backing tracks differ slightly from the original.  If you need to key/tempo change anything, I find the free program Audacity (free) as good as any other. I recommend you only move them small amounts as backing vocals can sound terrible if you keychange them to the foghorn or chipmunk stage.  I tend to use mostly karaoke tracks (sing to the world are excellent), so I find they need to be trimmed in length (you know the really long bit at the beginning where the logo comes up on the karaoke track).  I use Audacity for this too.

After all this, I need to move the tracks into my player on the laptop.  I move them wirelessly from our home pc, and load them into DJ2000.

Easy?  Easy!

If you don't have my menu or my heading up top then please click here for the full, frames driven "Joanie's Web Site"