TGIF! This Friday we shine the Songwriting Scene spotlight on two talented gals (and regular blog readers!)…check them out!
Erin Friedman
Cottonwood, CA
Have a listen
Songwriting start: I wrote my first song at age 12 – copied it out longhand on Holly Hobby stationery and mailed it off to a publishing company I found in the Yellow Pages. Never heard from them….surprise! I’ve written a boatload of songs since then and my approach is a little more professional now.
Songwriting habits: I always keep pen and paper handy and at the end of most days, my pockets are filled with bit of songs – lines, words, images. I do most of my songwriting while on my daily walks. The lyrics usually come one small piece at a time. Sometimes a three-mile walk will yield two or three lines of a song, but plenty of days, I get nothing at all. Once I have a good portion of a lyric written down, I’ll work late into the night with guitar or piano and find the music that makes it all come together.
Songwriting love: I love going from a kernel of an idea to a finished song and sharing it with an audience – it’s a little bit magical.
Songwriting influences: I grew up listening to the folk singers my parents liked — Joan Baez, Pete Seeger, Simon and Garfunkel, John Denver – and those influences show themselves in my songs. At our house, we also listened to a lot Broadway musical soundtracks. I think musical theater writers really know how to have fun with words, and I try to inject some of that playfulness into my songs.
Bev Grant
Brooklyn, NY
Have a listen
Songwriting start: I had been a musician as a kid, in a sister trio with my two older sisters – The Miller Sisters, playing guitar since I was 10 years old. In the mid 60’s I got involved in the anti-war and women’s movement and started playing guitar again. I went to Cuba in 1969 and was there for three months in the company of many wonderful Latin American singer/songwriters and creators of what became known as Nueva Cancion.I started a folk rock band in 1972 with four guys who were better musicians than I was and who were happy to sing and play my feminist songs, and they, in turn, taught me how to be a musician. I wrote reggae and salsa songs about struggles in Haiti, El Salvador, and anti-apartheid songs which we played at Arican National Congress (ANC) events. I wrote about unemployment and gentrification, love and death and birth as well. Somehow, it’s all connected.
Songwriting voice: It took me a while to actually find my voice in songwriting, and discover that the more personal I could make a song, the more effective it was in reaching folks with the message I was trying to convey.
Songwriting love: I think what I love most about songwriting is the gratification I get when people can relate to and are inspired by what I write.
Songwriting inspiration: Most of the time I get my inspiration from reading the New York Times, which I read every day, including the sports page, where I have found some really interesting stories that are socially relevant. And, of course, I am inspired by personal experience which gets deeper as time goes on and perspective grows.
