Working on my new song

I wanted the starting phrase to sound a little like Fergie in 'let's get it started' where the singer comes in before all of the other instruments, at the moment I think this sounds effective but my pitch is off and so I need to re record this later. It would be great if I had a proffesional to do this part for me as I improvised a little bit and so my voice doesn't sound amazing.

In order to create the different voices I am singing at different pitches but today I tried using the semitones on Mixcraft to raise and lower the tone of my voice however I think the sound becomes very mechanical and not natural which is not what I want for this type of song (often a little like Alvin and the Chipmunks actually). In order to sing the different parts I either muted different instruments or turned that audio channels sound right down. Some parts I had to concentrate extremely hard.

The organ is at the start and I'm layering the voices and creating solo sections throughout the song to provide different textures. It is thicker when I also add percussion and bass guitar versus parts with just the voices, organ and piano.

For the "no wars, no sadness" I created a call and response effect as this includes the choir and echoes the message. This part since it only has one main voice is an excellent contrast to the rest of the piece which is sung as a chorus. This effect is also used in songs such as:

I don't particularly like this song and it is very religion oreintated (Christian Gospel music originates from the church and praising the Lord through song) however you can see what I want to try and achieve with the power of the choir.

I added in the guitar which is playing broken chords at the beginning in order to create a moving effect and begin the song quietly. You can also only detect it if you listen hard which makes it especially interesting as people will know there are more layers to the music but they will not necessarily know what these are.

Dynamics - Today I used dynamics of a gradual crescendo in the "it's the real world" gospel section which slowly builds up to the chorus which is forte.

Since the second chorus came around so quickly I made it so that it had harmonic development - there were different background harmonies which made it sound like repetition (so people can sing along and find continuity) but slightly altered (to keep people's interest).

Although I'm using the same verses and chorus as before I'm making subtle differences to them and singing them in a different style compare here: (I had to upload them to YouTube with random pictures).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYU8jOZaCS4&feature=youtu.be

I spend the most time trying to actually cut up the music and record in pitch and putting it all together, thinking about what instruments sound right rather than actually doing new recordings. I have this great stringed instrument which just doesn't seem to fit anywhere so I may end up leaving it out which is a massive shame.