Took a great music-related job!
 

Say hello to the Music Director for the soon-to-open Sorrento/Mesa branch of the Paul Green School of Rock Music.

Yeah, I took the job. The pay ain't much to start with, but it will go up in the next few months as enrollment reaches a certain level.

I will also be doing sales and marketing, and be in charge of enrollment. I will be the one and only vocal coach in the school as well. I will teach private voice lessons, supervise the band practices, and be in charge of all aspects of the school's productions. Our first production will be Pink Floyd's The Wall.

I am retiring from my massage practice of 9 years, but will continue to work on some of my dearest clients on an outcall basis. The others I will refer to two other therapists in the area who are also my good friends.

Here is the blurb that is being distributed about me in the organization:


I am a happy camper. :D Between this job and my band's gigs, I will officially be a full-time career musician.

fuckin' eh girl........good for you.

see.......hard work does pay off.

congrats and keep the music comin'.

Wow divagrrrl, Congratulations! Sounds like a great opportunity for you to influence young minds and watch them reach their potential. How cool is that!

I'm impressed, is there anywhere online we can hear your beautiful voice?

YAY! Another music professional in the fold. Congratudamnlations!

Cool.

It's always good to hear that someone's got a dream job.

Hope it works out well.

Hey, congratulations. Sounds like an interesting position, along with that elusive sense of stability so hard to come by in the music industry. Hope it works out for you :)

Right ON! :thumbsup:
You have been working damned hard for a long time. It's wonderful to reach this milestone in your music career. Congratulations divagrrrl.

Thanks everyone, for the kind words! :D

Yes, you can hear different facets of me.. the original rock stuff is at www.myspace.com/voiceofmeliesa and you can download some of my Nightwish audition songs at www.meliesa.com/coversongs/nightwish. I suggest Nemo and Walking In the Air to start with.

small hitch...

Our location was ready, we were MOMENTS away from signing the lease, when we got the call that we could not use creative verbage to get around an issue with zoning/land usage. So, we are now scouting for a new building. We expect to have this sewn up by the end of next week, and should still be able to open on schedule in mid-March.

divagrrrl, I just listened to some of your music, the rock was raw with an edge and your Nemo and Walking In the Air are hauntingly beautiful! You definitely have a gift!

*blushes* Thank you! :)

do what you love and you'll never work another day in your life

I took a listen to some of your Nightwish audition stuff, since I'm generally a fan of them. Very good! I enjoyed Walking in the Air much more than Nemo and I think your style is more suited to that song. Nemo seems to require a more classic vocal sound, at least if it's to retain the original Nightwish feel. That said, your rendition is an excellent cover :) Your voice works great with the acoustic guitar; I just had a hard time imagining it backed by the heavier sounds that are in the original recording of Nemo.

EDIT: I gave both a listen back-to-back to try and pinpoint what the main difference I was noticing was. I think what it comes down to is your vowels more than anything else - in order to fit with the full sounds of the original recording, your vowels would need to be more pure than they are in your own recording. That said, I write all this knowing that you may have intentionally softened your sound due to using acoustic guitar rather than electric. In which case, just ignore me :thumbsup:

Hope you don't mind this post, but I figured I'd give you some feedback since it was something you did for an audition. When it comes down to it, your renditions are very good, so you shouldn't feel like I'm saying they're not by any means :)

Congrats on the new job, sounds like a great opportunity :)

Thanks!

When I did my auditions for Nightwish, Therion, and Elis, I tried to stay true to my own voice, rather than copy someone. Since I am pretty versatile, this was easy to do.

I have heard back from all three... Therion you knew about. For Elis, they loved me, writing that I was clearly the most qualified candidate and perfect for the job, but it came down to wanting someone more local and a native German speaker. A few weeks ago, Tuomas from Nightwish emailed me through his management company, and said that though I was not the voice the band was looking for, he really enjoyed my demo, calling it "good stuff! :=) " I had thought it might have been a "form letter," but after some discrete inquiries, discovered to my pleasure that it was not. So it feels pretty good to have had great feedback in all three instances.


As for the school.... we have our new location. There is only one thing we need to double check before signing the lease. Zoning and use are going to be no problem, but we have to submit our plans to make sure we are ADA-compliant, since we are a multi-story facility with no handicapped access to the 2nd floor. We think that as long as any of the services we offer can be done on the ground floor, it should be ok.


EDIT: I just put up our MySpace page. Hope you like it!

Congrats :) Glad to hear the location issue is worked out! And, in case it wasn't clear in my previous post, I do agree that your demo is "good stuff! :=)"...hope I didn't give any impression otherwise! :D

I knew what you meant. So thanks! *hugs*

Did you guys get a chance to see the school's mySpace page yet? www.myspace.com/schoolofrockdelmar

Let me know what you think! :D