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Hey singers!
Today I’m so excited because we’re starting
a brand new series with the legendary,
ten time Grammy winning group,
Take 6.
[Mark] Hey Justin.
[Justin] Hey hey hey! Welcome!
[Joey] Hey! We didn’t know you were here!
[Justin] Good to see ya!
[Joey] When did you come in?
I’m here, I’m here.
I’m ready.
You’re a video star.
[Justin] I guess so.
Well!
I guess we’ll start off with a great place to start
with any kind of sound that we make,
breathing.
What do you guys think of?
Is it just so natural that you don’t even
have to think about breathing?
Or is it something intentional for you
when you breathe to sing?
[Mark] Well, why don’t I jump out there.
Yeah, breathing for us actually is very important.
Over the years we’ve learned that
there are times that we need to
make sure that we have the support
and the sustain.
Because in the arranging-
I’m the primary arranger for the group-
I actually arrange sometimes that we have
to hold notes for a very long time.
[Laughter]
And um-
[Claude] That only he can actually hold.
[Khristian] He’s the only one that can do it.
[Mark] Oh no no no.
[Khristian] 6 minutes.
[Mark] We’ve learned that when you first try
to hold out a note and you’re nervous,
you don’t have that much sustaining.
But after you relax and you realize
that you actually do have the capacity
to hold the note, we’re able to do it.
Obviously it’s a lot easier for the top
voices to do it than the bottom voices
because they need more air.
Do you have an example of one of these
cruel and unusual notes that you’ve written
for the group?
[Dave] Well even before we go there,
one of the things that I realized when
I got in the group,
that I guess my vocal cords had a little bit
more nodules on them.
So I had more space.
So when I make sound, more air
flows through anyway.
And I was like, Mark there’s no way
possible I can do some of the sustains
that you’ve written into the arrangement.
So then I had to learn how to sort of
change certain things.
So there’s something about the folds
and how they close.
It’s not just the air, it’s also how it gets resisted.
Absolutely.
So I think one of the best
examples of that is actually something
I did not arrange.
But uh, our former member Cedric Dent
arranged.
And it’s called, um…
“A Few More Miles”.
And the beginning of that has us
holding a note for a very, very long time.
And um, that would be a good example
to start with.
[Justin] Yeah?
We won’t go through the whole song.
Because, you know, it's...
[Claude] Watch what we do though.
It sometimes can be emotional,
and, you know.
Watch out for this guy.
Oh yeah, yeah.
Put the camera on me.
[Laughter]
[Claude]: Alright let’s see if we can do this.
It’s uh, actually, [sings note].
[Mark] That sounds close enough.
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I start the song here.
And I take my time.
I make sure I take a long time.
Just to see how far these guys can go.
[Laughter]
[Claude] Here’s the funny thing
we had no idea how long we were
supposed to hold it,
because he’s not singing.
[Dave] But what that just showed
is that at the time-
first Claude actually gave up, um-
[Laughter]
But KD hadn’t started singing yet.
[Khristian] I hadn’t started singing yet.
[Dave] That was the, one thing,
because his part doesn’t come in.
But Mark was singing the whole time
and he still hadn’t breathed.
[Khristian] He’s still not breathing now!
[Dave] He probably has some time of
eye-lid circular breathing technique.
[Claude] Looking at his watch.
[Mark] Anyway, anyway.
That’s just an example of one of
the long holds that we do sometimes.
Well that’s fantastic.
[Khristian] I will say this too, um, a lot
of the times when we get tracks from
Mark to record,
and I’m recording my part and I called
him one day and I asked him, bro,
did you like, like… like cut?
Or did you splice, or?
Because there’s no way you held this
note this long.
And so, what he was talking about was,
just basically relaxing.
I was just giving out all of my air
because my heart is beating and all
this kind of stuff
and I’m looking at this line and I’m like
I’m, I’m not gonna make it.
So once I learned to relax-
and somebody was saying,
I can’t remember who it was,
but they’re like, it’s like blowing
up a balloon and letting the air out
a little bit at a time.
I think that was Claude McKnight who just
raised his hand to affirm.
Be really conservative especially at the beginning.
[Khristian] That’s it. Exactly.
And so once I get over
that first hump, then I recognize that yo,
I can actually, I get it.
It’s still a work in progress,
especially live.
Because we can do one thing
in the studio,
[Claude] Yes…
[Khristian] live is a whole different thing.
[Claude] Whole different ball game.
[Khristian] Yeah.
[Dave] And the practice I would think is uh,
one time I remember at the beginning
of my history with the group,
Mark said that you gotta control the
amount of air that you release,
kind of like what Khristian is saying.
But I couldn’t understand how to do that
because like I said, I hadn’t really healed
the cords yet.
So at that point, I couldn’t do it.
[Justin] Yeah.
And your cords are healed now
would you say?
[Dave] A little bit more.
You know. Depending on, for instance,
if I catch a cold or something,
that just happens to me.
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