Cover of Uriah Heep's "The Park" Instrumentalist Jean Pierre and vocals Corné

[the physics teacher]

A few weeks ago I asked Jean Pierre If he could do me a favour to play "The Park"by Uriah Heep.
This is what we both ended up with Jean Pierre wil explain the work he had with the DAW.
Pay extra attention to what JP did with the flute.
Lyrics:
Let me walk a while alone
Among the sacred rocks and stones
Let me look in vain belief
Upon the beauty of each leaf

There is green in every blade
The tree tops lean providing shade
Maypoles spin in happy sound
All nature's strength around

And there's a horse that feels no pain
Its iron strength to take the strain
Children rock it to and fro
And gaily drink its colour-glow


   Above, the sky, devoid of cloud
Thinks not to cast a thunder shroud
Upon this place so full of joy
A field of gold of loves employ

So, why my heavy heart? You say
When tears would stain
The sights so gay
My brother's dreams once here did soar
Until he died at the hand
Of needless war




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlh2T4nlm2w

[StephenM]

I know this band but not this song... no matter... I love what you have all done here..

it is so lovely and that keyboard into the vocals sounds amazing... then the flute... stunning and lovely...

mesmerizing... you would never hear anything this good on the radio... sure beats Taylor Swift or Beyonce for example...

[Jean Pierre]

Thank you Stephen for that kind compliment
a little explanation about the musical construction

...I didn't know Uriah Heep, nor this song "The Park".
When I listened to the song I really liked this band's vocal work.
As it happens, the song is in Dm, so it was too difficult to play the organ part (I'm not a keyboard player...)
I thought of bridging the gap with the wisthle flute, so I did one track and then a second in thirds... and I found that it didn't sound too Irish... but rather Peruvian (El condor passa and so I replaced the final instrumental bridge (which in the original version is rather jazzy) with a little flute improvisation that sounds a little more Celtic here, as I used a Bodhram, and bouzouki (from Band in a Box).

For the vocals, I used and mixed Corne's three vocal tracks and dubbed his main voice in thirds with melodyne.

Melodyne is a great vst utility for working on sound, enabling complex melodic and harmonic corrections on both instruments and vocals.
the advantage on voices is that when notes are moved to a third or fifth, the voice is not distorted and retains its timbre (no Mickey effect, so dear to Fenderbender with its Octavia's).
For the voice doubled in thirds, there are still a few wrong notes to correct, as at 2'24 for example.
for the flute, I also corrected a few notes that sounded wrong
Note that when I put Corné's voice through melodyne's "mill", Lee is very accurate, with practically no discrepancy between her voice and the theoretical notes of the key detected by melodyne.

Thank you Corné for this collaboration and the discovery of this interesting group and song.

[StephenM]

Very helpful information JP.  I admit a bit over my head but I get the idea... as to hitting wrong notes, I generally either let them go or just pull them way down.  Ha!  I like your idea.

Informations très utiles JP. J'avoue que c'est un peu au-dessus de ma tête mais j'ai l'idée... quant aux fausses notes, je les laisse généralement partir ou je les baisse simplement. Ha! J'aime votre idée.

[Pete C]

Not a song that I've heard before but a very interesting song both instrumentally and in the way the vocals have been layered.

Pete

[Zoltan]

I'm familiar with the band and i've seen it live (and it sucked ), but for some reason i don't remember this song.

The instrumentation works a treat and the vocals have a lot of emotion. Great collaboration of a very melodic tune!