>>New Target and Pay Per Lesson release - Lyric Collaboration Project – And Winter Glows

[sandysue]

I think they've already got a room Michele, it's mine. Maybe they can go live with Daryl, and share his mood light.

[michelew]

I'm thinkin' sub-zero temperatures won't be very conducive to the cricket's game of horizontal folk dancing. Actually I've no idea how crickets get jiggy, do a little something, something, but they're likely to need more than a mood light to bring back the magic.

I'm detecting a tangent.... Can anyone so PIRATES ahoy!?!

[sandysue]

Michele, you're making me laugh, I have tears running down my face right now. You know we wouldn't dare pirate Neil's thread. :S We could be banned from the site, or worse yet, have to write lyrics for the rest of our lives. We are just lightening up the mood a little. Right? So carry on mate.

Sandy

[michelew]

Good point.

I wouldn't dare mess with the Master's thread. He might make us do hard scary drills. "Drop and give me 200 double barre presses, then 400 pinky hinge barres." My fingers are aching just thinking about it.

I'll behave.

[sandysue]

michelew wrote:

I'll behave. [/quote]

(taken with a grain of salt of course)

[fjeanmur]

Hey Sandy, David, Daryl and Michele!

Thanks for weighing in on my take on the project. I think we all should pat ourselves on the back for getting something up on the site because I think we all would agree that it was a challenge. My question now is, what did we learn from it? I learned that a week ago I would have thought it impossible for me to ever attempt to write lyrics. What I came up may fall within the trite and schmaltz (Is that what you called it, Michele?) category, but I got it done more or less fitting the music.

So, what mistakes did we make, what did we learn from them and how could we do it better if given the chance?

I learned that there has to be a better way to make sure that the words fit the music;
I learned that I have to work on a larger computer screen so I can see all the text at the same time;
I learned that while it was painstaking work, it was really enjoyable because I came up with something (even if I didn't get to be a pirate!).

So what are everyone's thoughts?

[davidrfinn99165]

That's really interesting Jean. I was pleasantly surprised to come up wth something, anything at all, and then there was the small matter of overcoming personal barriers before hitting the submit button.

My main lesson was the importance of the collaboration in giving a start to creativity - Neil had already done the heavy lifitng in terms of the melody and accompaniment. His suggestion for an opening phrase " And everybody knows' showed to me that the real difficulty is making a start... later decisions such as how to finish, how much to edit, how many verses and choruses etc are all a question of personal workstyle but only come in if you have that spark in the first place, which the collaboration provided, and particularly the first line - the rest flows from there.

So now I understand why so many successful songwriters work in partnerships, and also why they carry notebooks round with them to jot down phrases and ideas which could be used as the trigger for a song.

I also now want to write a song about a pirate.. but without being in on the beginning of the conversation i have no idea why...

[daryl]

I've learned that writing lyrics is very difficult and that to get good at it one has to practice practice practice.

[fjeanmur]

davidrfinn99165 wrote:

That's really interesting Jean. I was pleasantly surprised to come up wth something, anything at all, and then there was the small matter of overcoming personal barriers before hitting the submit button.

My main lesson was the importance of the collaboration in giving a start to creativity - Neil had already done the heavy lifitng in terms of the melody and accompaniment. His suggestion for an opening phrase " And everybody knows' showed to me that the real difficulty is making a start... later decisions such as how to finish, how much to edit, how many verses and choruses etc are all a question of personal workstyle but only come in if you have that spark in the first place, which the collaboration provided, and particularly the first line - the rest flows from there.

So now I understand why so many successful songwriters work in partnerships, and also why they carry notebooks round with them to jot down phrases and ideas which could be used as the trigger for a song.

I also now want to write a song about a pirate.. but without being in on the beginning of the conversation i have no idea why...

I think Neil's giving us a start made all the difference because I wouldn't have had an idea where to begin not being that familiar with the melody. But then listening to the melody so many times resulted I an "ear worm" (right , Michele?) and then I was hearing it I my sleep. But I understand the problem with hitting the "send" button and might not have done it if Michele had not virtually held my hand.

Oh, and as far as writing a song about pirates . . . Well, it's a long story.

[sandysue]

HI Jean, Michele, David, Daryl and everyone else


I just looked at the music to this song, and listened to the melody a few times again It looks like it's in the key of A. I'm thinking that it might be easiest to just create the most simple fingerpicking pattern to this melody by using the chords provided, alternate the base to those chords, and then insert the melody into the fingerpicking pattern. Its already done for us actually. Neil has it on GPro. Then we can start humming the melody and see if any of our lyrics fit the melody pattern.

I've never written a song before so I could be all wet, but that's what I thought anyway. We can always learn the more complicated instrumental part later once we get our song written. Tell me what you think.

By the way, you guys are already honorary members of the pirate club. You're honorary as long as you don't get ornery. Michele is the captain even though she is professing to BEHAVE these days.