{"id":271,"date":"2011-06-13T00:13:14","date_gmt":"2011-06-12T22:13:14","guid":{"rendered":"\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/?p=271"},"modified":"2011-06-15T12:46:09","modified_gmt":"2011-06-15T10:46:09","slug":"silly-songs-with-audacity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/archives\/271","title":{"rendered":"Silly songs with Audacity"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>And now it&#8217;s time for silly songs with Audacity: that part of the show where Audacity comes out and plays, a silly song.  So it turns out that if you have a high tolerance for background noise and a poor quality microphone, you too can be a one-man close (or not so close) harmony group.  Unfortunately it does sound a bit as if it was recorded next to a busy highway.  This is sad, but sometimes, if you want to get something sung, you have to sing it yourself.<\/p>\n<p>The way it is done is you record the backing track, and then while you listen to that on earphones, you sing each voice to the microphone.  Once you&#8217;re done, you set some stereo effects to have your virtual clones standing left and right of center, convert to MP3, upload and &#8211; <em>voila!<\/em> &#8211; instant fame.<\/p>\n<p>I recorded the bum cream songs (each kid has one):<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href='\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/bum-bum-cream-in-c.mp3'>Bum bum cream<\/a> &#8211; the famous nappy changing song popularised by Rupert the Bear.  (It&#8217;s also available in a lower key, where the harmony also went a little weird, but it sounds more <a href='\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/bum-cream-in-g.mp3'>manly<\/a>).<\/li>\n<li><a href='\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/time-to-change-your-nappy.mp3'>Time to change your nappy<\/a> (not to say goodbye)<\/li>\n<li><a href='\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/zap-a-nappy-on-the-kid.mp3'>Zap a nappy on the kid<\/a> &#8211; the song for the third kid, who sometimes just doesn&#8217;t get bum cream.  Poor kid.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>There are more family songs:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Since the kids of them are growing out of nappies and into tooth decay territory, the <a href='\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/brush-your-teeth-make-them-white.mp3'>Brush your teeth, make them white<\/a> song.<\/li>\n<li>For Mom, a song of true love, the well known <a href='\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/time-can-burn-the-toast.mp3'>Unexplained melody<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>And I recorded a few songs that I like too (although my nose was blocked at the time, so really quite bad at places).  Unfortunately my &#8220;studio&#8221; and &#8220;voice talents&#8221; could not do any more justice to these serious words:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href='\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/o-love-that-will-not-let-me-go.mp3'>Oh Love that will not let me go<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href='\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/jesus-friend-of-sinners-be-my-friend-today.mp3'>Jesus, friend of sinners, be my friend today<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>For good measure, it was late, and I was tired, and my judgement was impaired, so I added this for the road:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href='\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/show-me-the-way-to-go-home.mp3'>Show me the way to go home<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Maybe I&#8217;ll put them up with the words one day.  Probably not.<\/p>\n<p>Update:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>My mom would always warn us against, well, stuff, with the words &#8220;woebetide you if you don&#8217;t do it&#8221;.  Well, that&#8217;s what we thought.  Wobeytide, verb, transitive: bad stuff happens.  Wobey?  Tide?  Well, it turns out she meant &#8220;Woe betide you&#8221;, which is a more subtle concept with less nautical imagery.  Of course, if the tide was involved, it would be <a href='\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/by-the-woebetide.mp3'>by the woebetide<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>And now it&#8217;s time for silly songs with Audacity: that part of the show where Audacity comes out and plays, a silly song. So it turns out that if you have a high tolerance for background noise and a poor &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/archives\/271\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31,2],"tags":[32,5,30,190],"class_list":["post-271","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-songs-stuff","category-stuff","tag-audacity","tag-kids","tag-songs","tag-stuff"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=271"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":310,"href":"https:\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271\/revisions\/310"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=271"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=271"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mcgill.org.za\/stuff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=271"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}