Quotes about Writing / Songwriting
/ Creating - 2010
"When you play the right note and sing the right melody and
the right lyric and the right time, it connects with people in a powerful
way. It’s magical.” — Jonathan Tyler, quoted by
Brian T. Atkinson in "On the Horizon: Jonathan Tyler & the
Northern Lights," American
Songwriter May / June 2010
"Songwriters that work in particular genres get strong in some
areas and neglect others. It’s kind of funny how we tend to regard
'our' genre as being the one that is 'legitimate.' We tend to ignore
or disrespect other genres. And yet there are no pure song genres in
our culture. We are an eclectic culture. Our music is filled with cross-fertilization.
Rock music, for example, bears hefty influences from jazz, country,
gospel, pop, classical, you name it. Meanwhile, pop, rock, gospel, modern
and contemporary classical, etc., all bear influences from music that
came before, as well as music that came later." — Michael
Kosser, "Street Smarts: Why Lyrics and Melody Matter, " American
Songwriter May / June 2010
"In Nashville, there is a historic tendency to work the lyric
to death while settling for music that works. In pop or rock, it can
be the other way around." — Michael Kosser, "Street
Smarts: Why Lyrics and Melody Matter, " American
Songwriter May / June 2010
“I’ve always known that I was a gifted person. ... I’ve
always felt like I would be punished, severely, if I didn’t continue
to make use of that gift. It’s very important that you don’t
let the muscle get flabby. It’s really hard, as an old human being,
to press as much weight as you pressed when you were a kid.” —
Merle Haggard, quoted by Peter Cooper in "Merle Haggard: As He
Is," American
Songwriter May / June 2010
"I think it was Tommy who told me, ‘When your song is
called ‘XYZ’ or whatever, every line has got to make sense
against your title.’ He showed me little methods of proving
to yourself whether the line belongs, and ways of finding out whether
you were able to get more out of a line if you tried.” —
Merle Haggard, quoted by Peter Cooper in "Merle Haggard: As He
Is," American
Songwriter May / June 2010
“We need to have music that contributes to the well-being of
the spirit. Music that cradles people’s lives and makes things
a little easier. That’s what I try to do, and what I want to do.
You don’t want to close the door on hope.” — Merle
Haggard, quoted by Peter Cooper in "Merle Haggard: As He Is,"
American
Songwriter May / June 2010
"...she knew the intensity of adolescence, and knew no cure
for it except growing up. And then one has age and experience, and
mourns the loss of intensity. Maybe it's why musicians and mathmaticians
are said to peak young—poetry needs the fire of an unbounded
universe." — Sara Paretsky, "Bleeding Kansas"
"When I write a song today, basically it goes on the stage tomorrow.
That's the way it works. You cannont interrupt your consciousness; it
all comes from the subconscious, it can happen anywhere. It could be
in a telephone booth." — Richie Havens quoted by John Kruth
in "Richie Havens' Mixed Bag: From the Basket Houses to Yasgur's
Farm and 40 Years Hence," Sing Out! Autumn '09 / Winter '10
"All I know is when I start getting serious about songwriting...
it's like a playground. All responsibilities slip away and you're
with your essence. There can be delight there and self-discovery.
You can dance there... I think of it as my serious playground."
— Laura Nyro, quoted by Paul Zollo in "Laura Nyro: An Angel
in the Dark," American
Songwriter, March / April 2010
"I don’t know exactly where the ideas come from, but when
I get into a songwriting mode and it’s coming along, it’s
like you’re on the front end of a boat and you’re going
through the water, and the breeze is blowing through your hair and the
water’s smooth, and you’re going out to sea. I love that
feeling.
"...I've sat in a chair for three hours and nothing happened, and
then all of a sudden something starts happening." — Robert
Earl Keen, quoted by Matt Fink in "Legends: Robert Earl Keen,"
American
Songwrwiter, Jan / Feb 2010
"I think I have to work to write a happy song. I write them
carefully; they’re simple and they’re about when it’s
fun to walk down the street. You know? Because that’s the best
thing about when you’re happy. It’s just one little thing
that makes you happy, and you’re making friends. The kind of
thing I can do is capture this moment." — Rickie Lee Jones,
quoted by Paul Zollo in "Legends: Rickie Lee Jones," American
Songwriter, Jan / Feb 2010
"I think the more the listener can contribute to the song, the
better; the more they become part of the song, and they fill in the
blanks. Rather than tell them everything, you save your details for
things that exist. Like what color the ashtray is. How far away the
doorway was. So when you’re talking about intangible things like
emotions, the listener can fill in the blanks and you just draw the
foundation." — John Prine, quoted by Paul Zollo in "Legends:
John Prine," American
Songwriter, Jan / Feb 2010
"It’s very elusive. You gotta learn patience. I know that
I’m basically a very lazy person. As much as I enjoy writing,
I would rather do anything in the world but sit down and write. But
once I get into it, I’m into it. I mean, if you said, “Let’s
go get a hot dog first,” I would always go for the hot dog.
I know that about myself. So I have to balance out my patience waiting
for the right thing to come along with my laziness, knowing I’m
trying to avoid working.
" Some of the songs come so fully, it’s like they are pre-packaged.
There have been a couple that came in the middle of the night. And
I thought, jeez, I’ll never forget that. And went back to sleep,
and it was gone. You’ll hear something years later that another
songwriter that you respect writes, and you go, jeez, I think that
was the remnants of that song that got sent to me." — John
Prine, quoted by Paul Zollo in "Legends: John Prine," American
Songwriter, Jan / Feb 2010
"I edit as I go. Especially when I go to commit it to paper. I
prefer a typewriter even to a computer. I don’t like it. There’s
no noise on the computer. I like a typewriter because I am such a slow
typist. I edit as I am committing it to paper. I like to see the words
before me and I go, “Yeah, that’s it.” They appear
before me and they fit. I don’t usually take large parts out.
If I get stuck early in a song, I take it as a sign that I might be
writing the chorus and don’t know it. Sometimes,you gotta step
back a little bit and take a look at what you’re doing."
— John Prine, quoted by Paul Zollo in "Legends: John Prine,"
American
Songwriter, Jan / Feb 2010
"I think you can refine what you do, and become more consistent.
And you write better songs that have a better shape and a better feeling.
You evolve into and out of things, and go through stages, but, ultimately,
you do improve." — Richard Thompson, quoted by Paul Zollo
in "Legends: Richard Thompson," American
Songwriter, Jan / Feb 2010
"Every song really tells a story. Some are more fleshed out than
others. Some are more linear than others. But most pop songs, apart
from pretty basic dance music, is telling some kind of a story—usually
a love story, sometimes a political story. In modern songwriting there
is a lot of cinematic technique, where you jump into the middle of action.
You might be writing in first person through the eyes of the protagonist.
It’s a little cinematic scene, and you do hard cuts. And some
more is left to the imagination. I do a lot of that in addition to the
narrative songs, and I enjoy both. I’m surprised by how popular
the ballads are, the story songs. So in a sense, I’m reacting
to what the audience would like." — Richard Thompson, quoted
by Paul Zollo in "Legends: Richard Thompson," American
Songwriter, Jan / Feb 2010
"Well, you wouldn’t think that that would be a way that
people still enjoy receiving a story. In the 16th century, before
the gramophone and the cinema, the way people heard news was not from
newspapers; it was from ballads. You’d hear about the local
murder and it would be a ballad.
" Today, I’m surprised that people have the attention span
to sit through a long song. I’m glad they do. I’m rewarded
to know that this process, which goes back thousands of years, still
works in the age of distractions and so many ways of mediating information."
— Richard Thompson, quoted by Paul Zollo in "Legends: Richard
Thompson," American
Songwriter, Jan / Feb 2010
"I think it’s absolutely possible to write a song and go
somewhere where no one’s been before, uncharted territory. In
terms of content, I see limitations where there should be none. I know
there are things I wouldn’t write about, but that shouldn’t
be the case. You should be able to make a song out of anything, out
of any situation." — Richard Thompson, quoted by Paul Zollo
in "Legends: Richard Thompson," American
Songwriter, Jan / Feb 2010
"Asked what these experiences taught them, both men said in
unison, 'Nobody knows!'—meaning that nobody can predict what
will become a hit, and they related the story of their friends Johnny
Mercer and Harold Arlen, who were told by the Paramount folks that
'That Old Black Magic' was too long and, therefore, worthless. 'It
had a 64-bar melody,' [Jay] Livingston explained, whereas most tunes
were usually half that length or less. 'But they were big enough to
say, We’re gonna do it anyway.' [Ray]
Evans, ever the wordsmith, summed it up: 'So never give up. Nobody
knows.'” — Paul Zollo, American Icons: Livingston and
Evans, American
Songwriter, Jan / Feb 2010
"[Non-performing songwriters] climb the mountain the first time,
take their successes in stride, and when they tumble down the mountain,
they just consider the tumble part of their profession and don’t
even waste time mourning their slump. They continue to write, make new
connections, and move forward toward a new round of success." —
Michael Kosser, "STREET SMARTS: Toughness Trumps Talent,"
American
Songwriter, Nov / Dec 2009
"The healing power of music is vast. Music therapy is in its
infancy in Western psychology. If we knew more, we'd be able to do
amazing things, and maybe even make permanent changes in the brain's
mysterious workings. With a simple song and four chords, you might
be able to do something useful, even life-changing. With all the songs
you know, you might be a virtual, veritable medicine chest for the
right person." — Gary Talley, "Guitar 101: Hear Those
Jingle Bells?," American
Songwriter, Nov / Dec 2009
"Writin’ songs is like a mystery. The most difficult thing
to do is have a good idea. If you have a decent idea, the songs are
the easy part. Actually having something to say is the hard part. If
you get an idea for a song, then it pulls you along. There are just
some ideas that you get that are really hard to edit out; it’s
hard to stop thinking about some bad ideas. So you just finish it and
you end up putting it on a record." Lyle Lovett, quoted by Lynne
Margolis in "Lyle Lovett: It Just Comes Natural," American
Songwriter, Nov / Dec 2009
"Beyond hoping that someone will like one of my songs, I don’t
think about how a song will be received. I just hope that, when somebody
hears one of my songs, they’ll want to hear it again. I don’t
have an impact or an effect in mind. I really just try to write something
that makes sense for me, that seems true. For me, songs are sort of
sacred ground, because it’s a place where you can actually tell
the truth. You don’t have to be diplomatic. I think the point
of a song is to just say something that’s true, or that expresses
an idea that reflects something that’s true, whether it’s
a truth about human nature or about the way people bullshit one another.
A song doesn’t have to be serious to be true… but to me,
that’s what a song is. And if I can get that right for me, then
it’s worth writing. …You’re asking people for their
time and attention, and it’s a chance to tell somebody what
you think, or to share a joke. I just always hope that whatever’s
in the song is worth demanding somebody’s time [for]."
Lyle Lovett, quoted by Lynne Margolis in "Lyle Lovett: It Just
Comes Natural," American
Songwriter, Nov / Dec 2009
"You know, it's a pretty mysterious thing still, why you start
the songs you start, and the specific flavor of them, the nature of
them. I don't know about other writers, but, for me, it's still somewhat
out of my control. It's not really a logical process." —
Gillian Welch, quoted by Jewly Hight in Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings
/ Welcome to the Machine / Modern Sounds in Their Partnership,"
American
Songwriter, Nov / Dec 2009
"Hoagy Carmichael, who usually wrote his own words as well as
music, had composed an extended melody that was beautiful, but which
was a challenge for him to write words for. [Mitchell] Parish heard
['Stardust'] and was unimpressed. 'I didn’t like it,' he said
with a sly smile. 'When I heard it, it was a swing tune, but I didn’t
write it that way. It sounded just like another swing tune. It was
nothing like the way it is now, which is sweet, mellow and romantic.'
Victor Young did an orchestral arrangement of the song as a ballad,
as opposed to a rhythmic swing melody, and Parish heard it then as
if he’d heard it for the first time. 'It was altogether a different
mood, a different feeling. Really beautiful. And it became what it
became.'" — Paul Zollo, "American Icons: Mitchell
Parish," American
Songwriter, Nov / Dec 2009
"Asked if he knew how important [Stardust] would be, [Mitchell
Parish] said he did have a gut feeling that this was a momentous one.
But had no idea it would become a standard. 'You don’t sit down
and write a standard,' he explained. 'A standard evolves.'” —
Paul Zollo, "American Icons: Mitchell Parish," American
Songwriter, Nov / Dec 2009
"[Mitchell] Parish understood that a great lyric often emerged
over time, and cannot be forced or contrived. 'If I had to labor over
a lyric too long,' he said, 'if it became an arduous task where I
sweated and toiled and struggled, I would drop it. And not because
I shunned arduous work, but because I felt it wouldn’t be fair
to the composer. The lyric would show its toil and sweat and that
wouldn’t be good for the song. The sturm und drang
would be evident.'” — Paul Zollo, "American Icons:
Mitchell Parish," American
Songwriter, Nov / Dec 2009
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