Songs

I am headed out this morning to teach a songwriting class for the Music City School of Music Business and The Arts. I really love teaching. especially when I see the light bulb appear on the top of the student's head when the concept is understood.

I have been writing songs since I was a child. I learned about songs from the greatest teachers. My dad always had Sinatra, Tommy Dorsey, Glen Miller, and other great artists on the stereo. Many of the great songs of that era were gathered from Tin Pan Alley. Tin Pan Alley was a real alley on East Fourteenth Street near Third in New York City. There were so many pianos clanking out songs there that, for all the noise and commotion, it was given the name, "Tin Pan." The publishers would go out to establishments where the crooners were. They would go to nightclubs, the back doors of Broadway theaters, etc., and push their songs to any artist who would hear them. Thus began the art of song plugging.

Like the Tin Pan Alley publishers of the early to mid Twentieth Century, we songwriters today have to be very persistent when it comes to getting our songs heard. Very few opportunities materialize outside of simply being bold and promoting our songs to get a place on an upcoming project.

I am thankful for those who took a chance, stopped, and listened to my songs. I have to thank Gerrit Gustafson, especially, for taking Ancient of Days to Integrity Music. Because he believed in the song as well as Gary and me as writers, I am forever grateful.

This morning I will do my best to convey my process of writing a song. I think that you either have the gift or you don't. Some people try all of their lives to write a song that will be recorded. I am afraid that 99% of even good writers will ever hear their song on the radio. Even so, I say keep writing, pitching, and believing in your songs. You never know, someone might be listening. You just have to write and keep writing. There is no such thing as luck. Dreams come true after you have prayed, prepared, practiced and are in the right place at the right time.