Tag Archive for 'songwriting'

The Song That Rewrote Itself

Published on September 12, 2011 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , .

I have always loved the idea that one song can be interpreted in different ways; that one song can mean something to one person and something different to another. That is one of the mysterious powers of songwriting that I find so completely captivating and one of the reasons why I write the kind of music that I do. But it wasn’t until very recently that I realised to what extent this is true, because it’s not often that one song can have entirely opposing interpretations and then come to mean something entirely different to its writer.

I wrote Alone In The City about four years ago. In theory, it was about searching for a sense of home after losing what I thought defined it. In theory, it was a sad song about love lost and the search for something to hold onto. In theory, it was about finding yourself in a foreign place, struggling to settle into a new reality.

Then, four years later, quite unexpectedly, someone else played it.

It was quite a surreal moment for me, hearing someone else playing a song that I wrote for the first time. A beautiful moment. At first I couldn’t place the song, hearing familiar chords played on guitar when I’m used to hearing them on piano, and words that felt so much a part of me that sounded so foreign on someone else’s voice. But what made the moment even more powerful for me was the meaning the song had for them. “It’s the most beautiful love song.”

And in that moment, a song about losing love became a song about having love to go home to. In that moment, a song about searching for home became a song about knowing where home is and pointing steadfast in its direction. A sad song became a love song.

I guess it depends entirely where you’re at and what noise you’re hearing in the background, because your emotional noise defines how you listen and what you hear. Just like it defines how you live. Hearing someone else play a song that I wrote a lifetime ago, rewrote its place amidst the noise in my head. I don’t hear a sad song anymore. I hear a song about love and hope and coming home. That’s what I love about songwriting, about life, about love. That it changes. That we change. Turn the good stuff up.

The Art Part

Published on August 11, 2011 in Uncategorized. 1 Comment Tags: , , .

I’ve spoken about music as a business before and over the past 2 years I’ve come to accept that in choosing a career in music, I have to accept that sometimes it will be more about the business and less about the music. But, during a conversation last week, I stumbled on the thought process that has been keeping me going, despite the constant “music as a business” battle that rages in my artist heart. I realised that the “art” in my music, the part that I most cherish, is not the performance of it but the writing – that initial, magical moment of creation when a thought and a feeling merge into a sound that makes it all feel sensible. That is the art.

Now this doesn’t mean to say that I view my performances as any less of an artistic expression. The experience of performing for me is something incredibly powerful, but it’s become a means to an end in a sense. It communicates the art and it pays the bills (well, it’s trying to). The songwriting is the true and cherished art that I hold closest to my heart. It’s also not the art that I get to do as often as I’d like. But that will change in time.

Thankfully songwriting is something I can protect, which is unlike the rest of my career (the business side), which is at the mercy of so many other factors all the time. At the end of the day, not every performance is going to be my best, not every tour is going to make a profit, and sometimes touring will be tedious. That’s the “work” part of what I do. When a song speaks to someone, the way my favourite artists speak to me, that is the part that I love most intensely. And it makes all the business crap tolerable.

I think it’s important to acknowledge the difference between that cherished part of my heart, and the relentless passion with which I pursue a career in the music business. I love what I do for a living but sometimes it really feels like a job. But at the end of the day, I can write and whether that song is heard or not, I still have my art and it still has my heart.

Behind The Song

Published on September 9, 2010 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments Tags: .

There are some songs that get under your skin and beat through your veins to grab hold of your heart and they won’t let you go. Perfectly aligned with that place within your heart that creates the song from nothing and breathes life into a moment of time to engrave its truth into the perfect notes and honest words that tell your truth, the song is born.

Songs arrive in different forms. Sometimes I sit at the piano and an entirely formed song presents itself instantly. Sometimes I sit and wait and my truth is mute for days or weeks. Sometimes I am wrestled in the middle of the night by a song that beats my mind awake and won’t let me rest until I’ve explored its existence. I go through writing and non-writing phases. There are weeks in which no inspiration is clear and others where I can’t capture it fast enough. I suppose there is a certain amount of living in between writing that needs to take place, but sometimes the silent phases scare me and I wonder if the song will ever return. But it always does.

It’s interesting to look back over the past year and notice how my song writing has developed. While I am still intent on writing as honestly as possible, the end result is entirely separate from the emotion that got me there to begin with and serves the song itself, as opposed to the place it came from, although it is still my therapy and the reason it exists for me in the first place.

I’ve been impatient to get back into the studio to record my second album. Years ago I had the pleasure of working with a producer of immeasurable stature. The best advice he gave me was to write as much as possible, especially when you’re writing an album. “If you need ten songs, write eighty and the ten you settle on will be as perfect as they could ever be.” As ridiculous and time consuming as that sounded to the young and eager song writer in me initially, who viewed every work as precious as the last, I have slowly begun to appreciate his point. Despite having written ten albums worth of demos over the past year in preparation for this album, I still wasn’t entirely satisfied to present the right selection of them to the world. There is a picture in my head of the mood I want to create and it was missing two pieces and the frustration of not being able to articulate those pieces was beginning to taunt me.

I sat at the piano late Monday night, just before turning in, with no intention of writing. There is a feeling that stirs in me when I sit at the piano and just play, and that was my only intention… to feel that feeling and then drift off to sleep. I’d been playing around with a chord structure for a few days that I desperately wanted to use, but that just wasn’t going anywhere, but in that moment something happened and an entire song created itself from nowhere in the space of minutes. There are some songs that get under your skin and beat through your veins to grab hold of your heart and they won’t let you go. This is one of those songs. I couldn’t stop playing it the next day and my song writer’s heart has worn a smile when I’ve played it since. Following the creation of this honest and emotionally-driven song about perseverance, I then catapulted in entirely the opposite direction to write the last missing piece, the most playful track for the album about new love, contrasting entirely to the emotional space of the previous piece which is perhaps one reason why I am so intrigued by this process.

I write because I have to, because I need to, but I have no idea where it all comes from or when the ignition will spark. As long as the writing droughts last, I know it always rights to write itself eventually. So I am thrilled to report that the album is officially, as of this moment, written and I can’t wait for you to hear it.

The Way Forward

Published on September 1, 2010 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

I’m home after a month on the road and am planning my next attack. It’s been an intense ride so far and I’m pretty chuffed with how this year has panned out, but there’s still more to come. With seven tours to major cities around the country, a national tour, shows on home soil and a few festivals under my belt, there are still more tours and festivals to come before the year draws to a close, which I reckon is not bad going for an independent… even if I do say so myself.

I’m on the lookout for an agent to help streamline my touring schedule a little, and I’m hoping to get more involved in corporate entertainment over the next few months. I would love to say that living the dream pays the bills, and granted, to a certain degree it does, but the reality is that you need money to make money and let’s not beat around the bush, the corporate world is where it’s at. That’s not to say that the adventure so far has been entirely unviable, I wouldn’t still be going if it was, but there are limitations to an exclusively dream-focussed career. There are music videos to make, new albums to record, and many more tours, nationally and internationally, that require an increase in resources. I spent so many years in the corporate world struggling with these same issues so it’s not like my financial situation has really changed much. The good news is that tours have started paying for themselves, album sales have increased, and during my short stays at home between tours I’ve managed to add a few more notches to my voice over portfolio belt, which, apart from adding some extra income to my monthly kitty, has also been great fun.

And so the way forward… this month I’m performing at three festivals, the Hilton Arts Festival, White Mountain Festival, and Aardklop National Arts Festival, before heading back to Gauteng for round five. I’m currently in negotiations for an exciting event in November, which will mark my first venture out of South Africa and will, if all goes according to plan, put me in the financial position to pay for the next album which I’m planning to record at the end of the year in Cape Town. I’m desperate to get back into the studio with an album that’s been (almost) ready and waiting for a few months now, and am determined to find the resources to get it out there into the world. Aside from the excitement of being back in the studio with some of my favourite musicians working on this new material, I’m desperate to hear what’s in my head come to life! The wait is torturous!

As rock ‘n roll as this constant touring sounds, life on the road is not always what it seems. Some tours are awesome, and some are nightmarish. Sometimes, it just doesn’t pan out the way I planned… shows get cancelled, venues don’t always pay, and occasionally I’ve played to a handful of people which can be soul-destroying… but those times when it does work make up for all the times it didn’t, and somehow it wills me on to do it all over again. At the end of the day, it’s not about the money. It’s about the tapping feet, the girl who said she cried in that song when she heard her words in mine, the giggles at my sarcastic jokes and the moments that move me to write more honestly and more often.

Believe

Published on August 2, 2010 in Uncategorized. 1 Comment Tags: , , , .

I write honest music, generally about my personal experiences in this world and appreciate what that means to an audience. It has been incredible to have audiences share their stories with me when they’ve heard their truth in mine, when the words have sounded like their own. The format of their experience most often differs to mine, but the general emotional experience is the same. The notion of shared human experience is a powerful one, especially when you’re dealing with your own suffering. The idea that you are not alone in that pain is of some comfort and the fact that my music contributes in some way means a lot to me because I often work through my own turmoil through music that moves me, so I appreciate the power that a song holds.

“Believe”, a song I wrote a little over a year ago for my new album, has received the biggest emotional reaction since including it in my solo set. I wrote the song just after I left my day job to do music fulltime, and the song has meant a lot to me on a personal level and plays an important role in inspiring me to keep going. Essentially, it reminds me where I’m coming from, how far I’ve come, where and who I want to be, and to keep believing in the dream, and up until now, it has fundamentally meant the same thing to the audiences who have shared their stories. But on Friday night, these words about courage and belief spoke to a different journey.

I played a fundraiser for a 3 year old who needed R200,000 to get to Austria for medical treatment. His parents have been furiously committed to raising enough funds to help their son, with this last event on Friday night in a long series of efforts by this brave family, and I am thrilled to say they now have enough to get to Austria. At the end of my set I played “Believe” as a small tribute to their courage and strength through this incredible journey, and it was probably the most rewarding, most meaningful moment I’ve had as a songwriter thus far. To me, the song is about believing in and following ones dream, but having managed to find hope for her son’s future, hearing these words about personal power and bravery, his mother wept.

To have a song that spoke to her courage, to the hope that she held onto with such conviction in a journey very different to my own, was an incredibly moving and inspiring moment. I love what I do. I live for it. Sharing my story has been incredible, but it is moments like this that make my songwriters heart smile.

 

(Read more about 3 year old Jason Long’s journey here.)