Making Moments Into Songs and Songs Into Moments

 

 

 

 

 

         For those of us who grew up in the sometimes stodgy world of church music, in the late 70′s when Amy Grant came along it was permission to go a little crazy.  I know her music and persona seem very tame now but her leopard jackets, wild hair and (gasp!) three-button shirts were quite controversial then.  I was such a gospel music nut and I had no separation in my head between what was then called contemporary Christian music, inspirational and southern gospel music.  Even southern gospel then was fresh and innovative and going through times of incredible growth and creativity, and all genres of Christian/gospel music were playing off of each other in very fun and challenging ways.  Amy Grant came along wonderfully and scandalously challenging those in the genre and those of us wanting to be in the genre to make music that was more vulnerable and perhaps a bit more honest than what many of us were used to. 

 

Tonight I had a rare night home and so I sat and listened for a couple of hours to some podcasts Amy did recently where she recounted her musical history through a series of interviews I found on itunes.  One thing that struck me was how well she remembered the writing process of many of the songs — where she was, what was going on in her life, how she felt about them as the songs were unfolding.  Part of me thinks that’s a luxury only an artist/writer has — she only has to write a very few songs in a year so she can afford to let them happen a little more organically than those of us who sit in writers rooms day after day writing songs for other people to (hopefully) sing.  But then as I started re-living my own musical journey, it dawned on me that some of my favorite moments in writing have given birth to some of my most successful songs as well.  I’m sure there’s a correlation. 

 

A year ago tonight I was just six days into a month-long writing retreat on Cape Cod.  I had a tiny little bungalow and a rented bike and a head full of way too much life.  I also had almost no confidence that I would ever really write anything of relevance again, mostly due to just being so removed from the music industry through my illnesses and my parent’s illnesses.  Things seemed so uncertain and I just knew I needed to go there for many reasons, the least of which was creativity.  And yet, I hoped it would be creative.  I needed a catharsis.  The retreat gave me a chance to really grieve for Mom, prepare myself even more for Dad’s death, which we knew was near and to really get healthy again.  It was truly a life changing experience and I ended up working on songs that I feel like will be important songs in my career. 

 

I will never forget sitting on the beach as the sun was starting to go down…I had propped my bike up on the fence and I was pulling my sweatshirt tighter because it was really getting chilly but I wasnt ready to go back home yet.  If you look at the pictures from that trip, there’s a picture of a lady playing fetch with her dogs – this was that evering.  Someone a ways down the beach was having a clambake and I cold smell the wood burning.  I had brought an idea with me that came to life in that moment and I started singing it there on the beach…it was a song about moments in our lives called "ashes and snow" and I haven’t yet, for whatever reason, even played it for me publisher.

 

But It was a moment in my writing I will never forget.  I think the song will be very successful…someday.  I worked on 22 songs in those 30 days and they’re just now starting to see light.  The opening cut on the new Perrys project is a lyric I wrote on the cape and later gave to Wayne Haun to write music for and another song, "Grace For Goodbye" I just gave to Cindy Morgan and she put an amazing melody to it.  Other songs I have been slow to share only because I’m a little more cautious with the timing of them.  But I do think it was an extremely great creative season for me that I will always remember. 

 

But I don’t think you always need a beach or a retreat for a writing situation to be memorable.  I don’t think I’ve ever had as much fun writing a song as I did when Wayne and I wrote "I Wish I Could Have Been There."  Wait, we WERE at the beach now that I think about it.  Hmmm.  We had gone to Florida for a few days with a keyboard and I’m sure we wrote other songs on that trip, but that’s the only one I really remember writing (and I’m sure it was the biggest hit from that trip!) 

 

I also don’t think I’ll ever experience autumn without thinking about writing at Janet Paschal’s home when she lived in Virginia, where we would wrap ourselves in blankets and sit out on her deck with our laptops on our laps shivering as the multi-colored leaves swirled all around us while we wrote the songs for her "Home Again" record.  "I Wish You Enough" was an expecially memorable experience.  Speaking of Janet, we wrote "When Christmas Comes To Carolina" for her Christmas record in the back suite of her bus, traveling down the road on our way to North Carolina with snow falling outside.  (That’s also when she told me that John had proposed!)

 

Twila and I started writing "Orphans of God" in the "dark" room at Brentwood-Benson – the room no one wants to use because it’s so depressing (and because the furniture in there smells body odor.)  BUT…the song itself sorta became its own moment as we passed stories back and forth and really just allowed the song to unfold in what felt to be a really natural way.  I had been so blown away by some things Stan Mitchell had said on Sunday that I couldn’t wait to get there to talk about the idea. 

 

I remember back in ’95 being in the studio with Pam Thum when she was getting ready to record "Life Is Hard" and we had the verses written, but I knew they weren’t right.  In my frustration to express what was missing I said, "it needs to be something like this…" and I proceeded to sing the entire first verse.  The look on Pam’s face was priceless and I was stricken with panic because I couldn’t remember a single word I had said.  Thank God someone in the studio was recording!!  That song ended up staying #1 for like seven weeks that year. 

 

There’ve been so many other wonderful moments and I feel incredibly blessed to have shared them with wonderful co-writers.  Writing "As Good As Goodbye Gets" with Tony in the old Benson building…writing "Why Have You Been So Good" with Sue…so may late night writing sessions with Regie in my old apartment with the big-orange-flowered wallpaper…these are wonderful moments that I cherish.

 

I’m not saying those songs written by assignment in a stuffy writers room under a deadline aren’t important or valued songs — they certainly are.  But I think as my career and my creativity constantly changes, there are definitely songs that seem to be mile markers for me that I will look back on ten, twenty or thirty years from now and remember the smell in the room, or the breeze in the air or the look on a co-writer’s face when something magical happens.