Blog & News
How Mary Kay Made Blue Little Girl
Can't see or hear it? Click here...
It took about 16 years for Mary Kay to complete her song Blue Little Girl. Nevertheless, this song is now published and available for your listening pleasure.
In Blue Little Girl, Mary Kay sings her own sweet life story, "It's my song about growing up, which is probably why the last verse took me a good many years to write."
How I Created Blue Little Girl
When I first composed Blue Little Girl, I created a music score in Noteworthy Composer software. Then, I used Noteworthy to export the melody to a midi file. After that, I just posted the serene little melody online in one of my blog entries, and invited viewers to enjoy the tune.
At this point, I had created some lyrics, but those lyrics remained unfinished for over a decade. Why? Because the song needed a conclusion that would be happier, since I was no longer either blue or a little girl. During the following years, I sometimes noticed Blue Little Girl in my songs folder on my computer; but, I guess I just had to wait for my muse to give me a spark of inspiration to finish the song. Then, finally I realized that I couldn't really recall the blueness of my childhood at all! What a relief, and I guess the third verse that concludes Blue Little Girl just sort of wrote itself at that time.
The Making of The Video
When viewing the video, as compared with others on our @tuneytwosome Youtube channel, you may have noticed that I have been improving my videography, as well as working on my songwriting. First, I used the awesome Panasonic Lumix DC-G95, although I still had not figured out how to make my videos HI-RES or control the auto focus for the Blue Little Girl video. Although it's a wonderful camera, I am still figuring it out. But each future video should improve as I do.
As for video editing software, I really like using Corel Video Studio software. Over time, I started out with Video Studio Pro and then upgraded to Video Studio Ultimate, which I used for the Blue Little Girl video. The software does have a bit of a learning curve, but I really think Corel does a good job of providing user guides and tutorial videos. So, I usually stumble my way through these resources and through perseverance and patience, end up with a pretty nice result.
As for the backdrop in the video, don't you love how it fits the lyrics to Blue Little Girl? I found it on Amazon. It's the BELECO Magical Window Backdrop. The material for this particular backdrop is fabric, so any creases ironed out easily, and I am still super happy with the mood it adds to my finished video project.
When searching for the best stand to support the backdrop, a sturdy and easy-to-use stand looked to be made by Julius Studio. So, I ordered the stand from Amazon as well, and my pretty staging for the video was complete.
Song Mixing for Blue Little Girl
To create songs, I always start with a music score in Noteworthy Composer software. This music notation software for Windows computers is free to try and inexpensive to buy. Noteworthy Composer allows me to create, record, edit, print and play back my musical scores in standard music notation. It's such a full featured score writer that I publish sheet music right out of Noteworthy Composer, and have sold many of my scores on Sheet Music Plus. You can view some scores I have for sale on Sheet Music Plus.
How does Noteworthy Composer work? Note entry is accomplished via your computer keyboard, mouse, on screen piano, or a MIDI instrument. For example, I usually use my computer keyboard, but I can also play a song on my MIDI accordion in order to create a score in Noteworthy. Then, after creating my score, I use the export function of Noteworthy Composer to make a MIDI file for the next step, which is editing and mixing.
About Mixing and Editing
My favorite song mixing and editing software is Presonus Studio One Pro and with Celemony Melodyne. Both Presonus and Celemony have ample customer support tutorials and instruction videos, and as I learn more about how to use these powerful products, my songwriting has improved immensely!
In a future blog entry, I will write more about the hardware that Tom and I use for recording and mixing. Yunno, our choice of microphone, preamp and so forth. Tom is the genius behind these choices, and he has found tools that are fully capable of tackling the job of making our music into digital creations.