![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
Recording poetry: why does it appeal to me?
As I said in the last post, I do some recording at Librivox. A cool feature of Librivox is the culture they have of reading poetry--there's no prestige attached to it, and anyone can submit readings. In fact, they encourage multiple readings of the same poem: there's a weekly poetry project where everyone reads the same poem, and also monthly collections where everyone can submit two poems each. Of course, everything has to be public domain, which is a bit limiting. You can check out their current poetry (and short prose) projects here, and previous projects are in the catalog.
Anyway, I dived right into the poetry readings and discovered that I loved it. It felt like a new thing, but I realized that it wasn't--when I was in my early teens or thereabouts, I learned, for example, Tennyson's "The Lady of Shalott" by heart and stood reciting it to myself in my room. *g*
I've always loved singing, and I think reading poetry aloud shares something with that. For one thing, the rhythm feels more important to me than when I'm reading prose, even when the poem doesn't keep to a set meter. Since poems are often fairly short compared to prose pieces, I'll practice the reading beforehand in a way I don't do with prose. I'll try different ways of reading, sometimes making notes in the margin, until I find something I like. This is like what I do when I practice songs, trying to find the phrasing that works for me (which can obviously be very different from how someone else might do it).
I also like reading poetry out loud for the pure pleasure of the sounds in my mouth. I get this with prose too sometimes, but with prose the plot or action or characterization is likely to be foremost in my mind when I read. Obviously there is meaning in the poetry too that you have to think about when you read, not just pleasurable sounds, but sometimes my brain gets side-tracked and goes "oooh, yummy allitteration!" and I have to concentrate to get back to what the poem is actually saying.
So, here's "The Lady of Shalott"--yeah, I went for the nostalgia. : ) And I still really enjoy reading this poem! It's got a clear rhythm, but it still doesn't feel like I fall into a monotonous sing-song rhythm; it has lovely sounds and images; and there's a clear narrative and even some dialogue, which gives me forward momentum and makes me feel like I'm actually telling a story. Which is not to say that I always want those things in a poem, but I enjoy them in this one. And of course, I care about the lady of Shalott. Emotional connection to the characters or the theme of a poem means a lot to the reading for me, too.
Since it's fairly long, I'll just link to the text.
Please do link to your own readings in the comments, or tell me how reading poetry aloud works for you and how it makes you feel!
Anyway, I dived right into the poetry readings and discovered that I loved it. It felt like a new thing, but I realized that it wasn't--when I was in my early teens or thereabouts, I learned, for example, Tennyson's "The Lady of Shalott" by heart and stood reciting it to myself in my room. *g*
I've always loved singing, and I think reading poetry aloud shares something with that. For one thing, the rhythm feels more important to me than when I'm reading prose, even when the poem doesn't keep to a set meter. Since poems are often fairly short compared to prose pieces, I'll practice the reading beforehand in a way I don't do with prose. I'll try different ways of reading, sometimes making notes in the margin, until I find something I like. This is like what I do when I practice songs, trying to find the phrasing that works for me (which can obviously be very different from how someone else might do it).
I also like reading poetry out loud for the pure pleasure of the sounds in my mouth. I get this with prose too sometimes, but with prose the plot or action or characterization is likely to be foremost in my mind when I read. Obviously there is meaning in the poetry too that you have to think about when you read, not just pleasurable sounds, but sometimes my brain gets side-tracked and goes "oooh, yummy allitteration!" and I have to concentrate to get back to what the poem is actually saying.
So, here's "The Lady of Shalott"--yeah, I went for the nostalgia. : ) And I still really enjoy reading this poem! It's got a clear rhythm, but it still doesn't feel like I fall into a monotonous sing-song rhythm; it has lovely sounds and images; and there's a clear narrative and even some dialogue, which gives me forward momentum and makes me feel like I'm actually telling a story. Which is not to say that I always want those things in a poem, but I enjoy them in this one. And of course, I care about the lady of Shalott. Emotional connection to the characters or the theme of a poem means a lot to the reading for me, too.
Since it's fairly long, I'll just link to the text.
Please do link to your own readings in the comments, or tell me how reading poetry aloud works for you and how it makes you feel!
no subject
Re: LibriVox, have you listened to any of the recordings for Jazz Fantasia? I stumbled across a set of them some years ago, and especially enjoyed the first and seventh readings (the readers were Alan Davis-Drake and Ianna Drake respectively).
Re: taking notes on poetry and practicing them prior to recording, I'll definitely keep that in mind as I start recording pieces that I don't already know by heart. (Yesterday's recording of 'Books' by Billy Collins is one I've declaimed live to an audience.) I'm curious: how many takes you usually do before you have a recording you feel satisfied with? Right now I'm averaging about forty-five minutes from opening Garageband to record to exporting the mp3 to iTunes, and about four to six takes.
Re: saying poetry aloud, it reminds me of a conversation I had with
no subject
I'm curious: how many takes you usually do before you have a recording you feel satisfied with?
Hmm, it depends what you mean by take. I mean, I usually only do one recording of a poem, because I'll have practiced it beforehand enough that I know how I want to read it. Of course, sometimes I still stumble over a word, but then I'll just redo that line and cut out the stumble when I edit. I tend to view it as a performance in the moment, and while I do cut out mistakes and pauses, I don't do any other production stuff. I mean, I know there are people who view a recording as something they create at the editing stage as much as at the recording phase--they'll do lots of takes of individual lines, and then splice together the finished product by choosing among the lines, or splicing bits of lines together, or even splicing a word together from different parts! It's really up to your individual style. I know the way people do recording and editing varies wildly, and there really is no right way to do it.
*tabinates your links*
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
I'm always impressed by people who can read things aloud. I love listening to people read out poetry, but I hate doing it myself. It always strikes me as a bit weird and funny that I'm such rubbish at reading stuff aloud while I actually have a really audial-oriented mind. Part of the problem with my reading aloud is probably just my intense hatred of hearing my own voice, though. That really doesn't help.
Have you ever tried singing some of the poems you've recorded or thought about reading the lyrics to a song aloud? I've been thinking about those over the past few days and I'm wondering how different the experiences would be. (I've already linked two samples of poems-to-music last week, but I don't think I've seen lyrics-to-poetry before and now I'm curious. ^_^)
no subject
A lot of people who record stuff actually do hate hearing their own voice, but they do it anyway. Or they hated it at first, but then got over it. So it's not really an issue of being able to do it or not--it's more a matter of practicing and getting better at it over time. But obviously there needs to be something that you enjoy about it, because otherwise it's not worth it. : )
Yeah, I've put music to poems (that's what my next post will be about) but I've never tried reading lyrics as poetry. That's a pretty cool idea--I'll have to try it!
no subject