Lessons with Lady GaGa’s vocal teacher

Last night I scheduled singing lessons with prominent vocal coach, Gordon Grody. He’s taught Alicia Keys, and has recently been training Lady GaGa over the last year and a half. Not that I plan on turning into Din the Diva or singing like those two lovely ladies but it’s still pretty cool. He’s also sung with John Lennon & Yoko Ono, David Bowie, Blondie, The Talking Heads, and countless others. I guess Gordan will be another degree of separation for us from the Thin White Duke and Lennon after Earl Slick. My first lesson is next week so we’ll see how it goes.

Recording vocals for these sessions has been a pretty grueling experience so far. It wasn’t a case of not singing well or not hitting the right notes, but more about being under the microscope and trying to sing differently and avoiding bad habits that detract from the tune. Being in the isolation booth for 2 1/2 hours or so, trying to get just 2 lines right just totally sucked. But also the really cool thing is that I’m learning how to sing better and can feel and hear the difference. We sent him an mp3 of How Long and he loved it! Surprisingly he said the vocal was already strong and almost there. He’s basically going to teach me how to sing my own song better. So it’s pretty exciting and hopefully I’ll get to realize the possibilities of what my voice can really do.



Din