Songwriting 101

Had the opportunity to attend a songwriters workshop the last couple days. It was sponsored by a group called Nashville West. I don't fancy myself a songwriter, but I get to work with them from time to time, and plus I'm looking for some songwriters, so it seemed like a good idea. Get to understand the craft a little more, hear what others are working on, broaden my understanding of the biz side.

So off I went. Met a bunch of talented people. Cherie Call continues to blow me away with her beautiful songs. I love her voice, too. Mindy Gledhill shared a couple of songs she's working on for her next album. Great voice, cool songs. Lots of up and comers were there as well.

The workshop was organized by Tyler Castleton and Staci Peters, a songwriting team. Tyler's also recently rejoined Deseret Book's music division. He's a solidly good guy and I'm sure will help their music wing take flight (just practicing some of those lyric skills).

Frankly, Nashville music isn't my personal style, but I can appreciate the artform. And I noticed close similarities between a good Nashville song and a good script. Honesty. Strong visuals. Have a point. Write what you know. Good is not good enough -- needs to be great. Practice your craft. Don't get married to your words. Be careful of being too clever.

The presenters were songwriting veterans Pat Alger, Bat McGrath and a rising star Rachel Thibodeau. All were very generous with their time and represented a good cross section of industry experience, styles and tastes.

I liked a little demonstration Pat and Bat did, where they modeled a songwriting session. It was built around an image of a little red balloon that was lingering on the ceililng in yesterday's session. The song started off with just a few chords and a hummed fragment of a melody. It meandered its way through several melody, chord and tempo experimentations, before they started trying different lyric pieces. It went on for about an hour, and given that they had to stop fairly frequently to narrate similarities and differences between this session and a real songwriting session, there was remarkable progress made toward a song. It helped demystify the process for me a little.

Not sure I'll ever actually write a song. But I woke up this morning with a song idea whirling around my brain...