This has been a busy week of mentoring. I believe I have mentored 6 people in the last seven days. One theme that keeps coming up is that people are really stressed out over getting their songs to "the right people". To begin with, I'm still not sure who "the...
One of the biggest factors that keeps songwriters from succeeding in the music business is that they overlook the fact that it's a business. So many times, I hear songwriters say things like "My songs are better than the ones on the radio" or "I just can't get anyone to...
Even those who have written thousands of songs could benefit from reviewing the basics of what a beginning writer does when writing their first song. Every now and then, someone joins SongTown who is just trying to learn how to write that first song - to turn their own...
I had a few minutes alone in the quiet the other morning and I started thinking about all of the different ways songwriting has changed my life. Some of those changes are the result of being successful as a songwriter, but the biggest, most profound changes are ones that...
I believe that it’s never too late to be what you might have been. I was in my mid thirties when I started trying to write professionally. A friend of mine just landed a starring role (Her first) in a movie with some HUGE actors at age 49. I...
I see LOTS of mistakes being made in regard to pitching a song. Here are some tips to increase your chances of success, to help you appear more professional, and to keep you from burning bridges: 1) Learn as much as you can about the artist you are pitching to...
Often I see songwriters who are caught up in the trees that they can't see the forest. They spend their time looking at the minutiae (I've always wanted to say that word) that they lose sight of the big picture. For instance, in a lyric MasterClass, I spend six weeks...
I have had a number of amazing experiences because of songwriting. I've been able to travel the world and see places like Barcelona, Malmo, Nassau, Vancouver, and Toronto simply because I wrote songs that became hits. I've met and worked with people from all over the globe. Those experiences have...
When I'm struggling to find the drive to keep going, or I get discouraged, I think about these things: 1) Failure is not failure. Most great people fail many times before they succeed. 2) The best way to learn is to fail. If I look at failure as an opportunity to...
I started playing guitar when I was 18 years old and instantly fell in love. For a few short spring and summer months I enjoyed the pure bliss of trying to fold and stretch my clumsy fingers into chord shapes and building calluses where none had ever been. I found...