A-Z Guide to Happiness: S

S

Singing

I think I have always sung really from about the age of 6 or something. When I was in year 3 at middle school I joined the choir, and that was it from there really! I always loved singing and was always belting out the hymns in our assemblies.

I begged my parents for singing lessons and they always said no until one day I wrote my first song, after that they then let me go for singing lessons and within 3 years I had achieve grade 8 of the Rock School exams.

I studied music at college, which involved a lot of performing and I loved every minute of being on stage with my very dysfunctional family :) I was with such a talented bunch of musicians and I really hope they make it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CB6_W7YzCmY

I love singing a variety of things from Rock to Country! My favourite is acoustic stuff though. I like to take chart songs and make an acoustic version. My old duet partner Harry was incredible, him and I always performed an acoustic set, he would play guitar and sing harmonies and I would sing the main melody, and if i say so myself it sounded bloody amazing! I'm gutted I don't get the chance to perform with him anymore (Adult life got in the way for me, and he's now at uni) as he is one of the most talented musicians I've ever met!

Another thing that's good about singing is if you are listening to music and focusing on the lyrics, it is a very good distraction against anxiety or things that are worrying you or making you feel low!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69PevoT0WOw

What makes you happy?

Much Love

LJ xo

A-Z Guide to Happiness: J

J

Jim Chapman, yes I know he's another youtuber, I have a slight obsession with the tube of youuu, can you tell? I can guarantee you now I will be mentioning atleast two others throughout the rest of this guide! I'm sorry!! I tried to think of something else beginning with J but it's very hard. Has anyone else got something rather than a person?

Soooooo Jim Chapman is from Norwich, his brother is also a youtuber doing some form of fitness channel, and Jim's Fiancee Tanya is also from the youtube world. Tanya's mum actually taught me English at college! I spoke to her once telling her about my youtube videos for a presentation and she told me her daughter is on youtube and it doing quite well with it, 4 years down the line she's massive in the youtube community and has her own beauty range for sale in Superdrug.

Jim seems like one of the kindest people you can ever meet, from what you can tell from videos, he is incredibly down to earth, a very gentle person and I think he would quite happily be friends with everyone if he could!!

I think that's why I like his videos, they're always pretty positive and he's always so nice and sometimes social media is full of negativity but he always has something fun and nice to say!!

What makes you happy?

Much Love

LJ xo

30 day snap challenge day 12

Hey hey,
Most of my day was spent doing an assignment that's due in tomorrow, fun fun! Out of all the areas on my course this is probably my weakest, writing songs on logic and stuff like that, I'm a lot slower than the others, probably because I'm a singer and they're all guitarists so they know more about keys and stuff like that. I'm a bit rambly this evening, sorry!
I also had talent scouts from the voice come to my college today so I auditioned for that too, so fingers crossed :)

Bed time now

Toodles <3

30 Day Snap Challenge - Day 10

Hey Hey!!

Today's snap is of my music stuff! Didn't realise I had quite so much stuff until I got i all out. I'm not actually that good at guitar but I like them and I cant bring myself to get rid of any of them!!

From Left to right in this picture I have

Microphone : sE2000 - around £80 but you need an audio interface box with it ( I use Cakewalk  UA-4FX )
Keyboard : Yamaha PSR E403 - I don't use this anymore since I got my electric piano but it was very good for learning and you can record on it too which is VERY useful when song writing!:) -
not sure if this is still available

Now the guitars

Electric - Westfield baby pink - I got this 2nd hand from the music school that I went to, I've never been able to play power chords or anything like that so I cant get a very good sound out of it! I'm sure a good guitarist could though :) 

Chantry - I bought this from a charity shop called Sue Ryders I'm not sure if its just a local one of its nationwide, but it only cost £50 and its not 2nd hand, the shop actually make and supply them themselves, very good for a starter guitar!! 

Tanglewood - this one is my baby!!! My FAVOURITE guitar, It has a hand painted design on it and my name written on it also!! It's a lovely sounding guitar, its an electric acoustic so good for gigging also and has a built in tuner which is always handy! I bought this from Ziva guitars - this is the make/shape of the guitar I got http://www.zivaguitars.com/#!Tanglewood Discovery Deluxe|c1crq but I got it in black and with the design "la fleur" which made it end up looking like http://www.zivaguitars.com/#!la Fleur|c1m2e 

Westfield - Another westfield guitar! I've not played this one really, I have it out on display though as it's pretty, I got this for my 18th birthday from one of my bestfriends at college. When he passed me the guitar case and said happy birthday I was like.. haha very funny you cant have seriously got me a guitar, and refused to open it thinking something was going to jump out at me, then when I saw it was infact a guitar, and pink it was clear that it was infact for me!! Talk about a good friend or what?!

'Herald' - This one is my slight guitar of shame lol! It was my first ever guitar, I must have got it when I was about 8, it is a nylon strung guitar (at first I thought that was all you could get then I didn't understand why mine sounded different and later realised it was because I didnt have a steel string) & I got this from Argos.... Sorry musicians! I didn't play it for a good few years though! then eventually I did, picked up the basics quick enough and then my collection grew!

Finally!!!! The electric piano - this is a Korg SP250 which costs around £600 and it is VERY good! I was given this for me to learn my piano grades on !:) 

The software which I use for recording is Sonar Le - and I have NO idea how to use it, if anyone knows how to use this software I would greatly appreciate some tips!!!

Anyway this has turned out to be quite a long blog post so time for me to shhh!!

Toodles ♥

If you want to know what this 30 Day Snap Challenge is click here to go to --> Sprinkle of Glitters <-- Page whom I am doing the challenge with along with many other bloggers:) 

Follow me on twitter at https://twitter.com/ell_jaye

Follow me on Instagram at http://instagram.com/elljayeblog

30 Day Snap Challenge - Day 3

Hey Hey!!

Today I spent 4 hours from 9 until 1 working in the recording suite at college, firstly setting up the equipment, and then recording all of the tracks for a band in my class as a part of the course I'm doing. I have to say it was INCREDIBLY stressful!!! Trying to set up 14 microphones and check that each one is working (and if its not - trying to work out what the problem is) and communicate with everyone, whilst people are missing around and not paying attention... very hard work! But eventually we did it and got the song laid down! Now  the next step is to mix it! Although next week it's my turn to do the performing so I might mix our track instead of another band's :)

I'm now sitting at home on my own, procrastinating... I have lots of assignments to be in, some that i didn't even know about until today! Woopsie! But I really don't know where to start, or have the will power to do anything after a 9-4 day at college, but it needs to be done! So anyway, must be off now! Feel free to drop me a message on here or twitter, would love to talk to some other bloggers :)

Here's my snap for today...

Toodles ♥