songwriting

Every Moment Matters

May 31, 2016 — Leave a comment

Pierce Pettis sang, “everything matters if anything matters at all,” on his album Everything Matters. That line has always stuck with me, and it influenced my song for Week 21 of #songaweek2016. With bass and percussion by Nathan Bloom, making it an official Cabin of Love song!

Time to wash the clothes
time to scrub the sink
time to give the little seedlings
a nice long drink
time to feed the chickens
time to walk the dog
time to listen to the children
time to write for the blog

Every day of our lives doesn’t break new ground
every hour in a day won’t blow your mind
every minute of ours doesn’t make a mark
but every moment matters

Time to go to work
time to eat a snack
time to wash the dirty dishes
time to put them back
time to read a book
time to run a few miles
time to play a little music
time to rest a little while

Three hands sweeping round a face
grabbing hold of everything we’ve done
Where do they carry it?
How should we know?
It’s a mystery where we’re going
but how we love to run.

 

Every Single Star

April 26, 2016 — 4 Comments

Stars are glowing mysteries. Science and wonder collide in those incomprehensibly giant and mind-bogglingly ancient balls of fire that appear to little you and little me as tiny points of light.

They are countless. There are more stars than humans who have ever lived. A quick Google search tells me there are maybe “1 billion trillion” or “100 octillion” stars in the observable universe.

So it seems both fitting and misguided to me that we call people who have set themselves apart, people who dazzle us from dizzying heights, stars. If you can somehow distinguish yourself from the masses around you, maybe you too can rise and become a star.

Why are stars so remarkable when there are so very many of them, each shining its light out all through the universe? For all of human existence, we’ve been staring up at stars on clear nights, lost in wonder, drawn far beyond ourselves or deep within ourselves, like our parents and grandparents and distant ancestors long before us.

But you are remarkable too. And so am I. And our neighbors, and coworkers, and everybody who calls and tries to sell us something, and all the old people sitting in the assisted living place down the street. Every politician, every middle-schooler, every complaining customer and annoying coworker, every single life.

So be you, you bright star. Shine on.

And rest in peace, Prince.

The song I wrote for week 16 of #songaweek2016 has something to do with the above thoughts, but it’s still not all untangled for me. See what you can make of it:

 

Pretty Baby

April 21, 2016 — 2 Comments

I wasn’t planning on having children. Actually, I was planning on not having children. Until my now-firstborn, now-twelve-year-old, first made herself known. That extra pink line on the plastic strip might as well have been an angel, and I would have benefited from the routine angelic greeting, “do not be afraid.” I admit I cried myself to sleep that night, but it seems I always take a night to freak out before changing my plans in any major way. Sometimes even the sweetest surprises are first met with salty tears.

And now, we are two-thirds of the way to that tiny baby’s high school graduation.

Week 15 of #songaweek2016 included an extra challenge, to write a song in the form of a recipe. I already felt like writing a song about my daughter, so I found a way to squeeze it into recipe form too.

Take a smidgen of him and a dash of me
Bake for nine months at ninety-eight point six degrees
Then when my body feels like it’s about to break
It’s time to open up and meet my babycake

Pretty baby pretty baby with her daddy’s eyes
Pretty baby pretty baby mama’s sweetest surprise

Give liberal breastfuls of milk to my sugar and spice
Try not to scream the first time she bites
Blend up some squash and put it on a teaspoon
Pretend it’s on a mission and she’s the moon

Pretty baby pretty baby with her daddy’s eyes
Pretty baby pretty baby mama’s sweetest surprise

In a medium class combine her with twenty kids
Sift through all her papers and art projects
Roll out chores and charts so she gets her work done
But ditch the cookie cutters, let her make her own fun

Pretty baby pretty baby with her daddy’s eyes
Pretty baby pretty baby mama’s sweetest surprise

Sometimes my little sweet gets a little saucy
Sometimes she flames up like bananas foster
Then I let her settle

Let her sweetness age, let her take her time
Gotta wait patiently for the finest wine
Then however she decides to pour herself out
She’ll outsparkle all I’ve dreamed about

Pretty baby pretty baby with her daddy’s eyes
Pretty baby pretty baby mama’s sweetest surprise

 

When the Music

April 12, 2016 — 2 Comments

For week 14 of #songaweek2016, an extra challenge was thrown out to anyone who wanted to try it – use three particular words in the song. Those who wanted to participate sent a word of their choice to one person, who then wrote all those words on a sheet of paper, cut it up, put the words in a hat, and chose three at random. And the winning words were:

Valparaiso
Socks
Moxy

I wrote this song very much stream-of-consciousness with those three words in mind. Except the last verse, which was inspired by a motorcycle ride and a weekend road trip with my love. Who, by the way, came up with some pretty fine bass and guitar additions, as well as pulling together a tasty drum track from our Studio One software.

As always, there is lots of great listening for you at the songaweek2016 website, and you might especially enjoy hearing all the different songs that came out of the 3-word challenge in Week 14. I haven’t finished listening through the list yet but from what I can tell so far, challenge-accepters were Jen Bluhm, Phil Cowan, Anielle Reid, Deborah Kelly, and James Tristan Redding. So fun to hear the different directions people took it.

For all I know he’s in Valparaiso
kissing some other girl
for all he cares I could be standing there
it wouldn’t even faze him

That’s when the music comes to me
That’s how the music sets me free

Would you eat it with a fox in socks?
Take a brave new bite
Chase it down with moxy on the rocks
It’s a bold concoction

That’s when the music comes to you
That’s how the music feels brand new

Honey take me back to Loveland
on your motorcycle
With the Badlands in our mirrors
we’re alright for now

That’s when the music comes alive
That’s how the music feels inside

 

 

A Song A Week!

January 19, 2016 — 5 Comments

I am excited to announce that I have joined the Song a Week 2016 challenge. As you might guess, this means I and a number of other songwriters will attempt to write a new song every week. I’ve never tried something like this before, and I know it’s going to be a good exercise in fighting my perfectionist tendencies – a song a week means I’m sure to put out some stuff I’m less than proud of, some that bores me, some I will probably even regret or look back on in embarrassment at some point!

But I think I can count on doing some good work too, since I’ll be exercising those writing muscles regularly!

Here’s to a year of hard work and a batch of 50-some new songs! (I joined a week late so I’m not sure how many weeks that actually boils down to).

And here’s the first song I submitted:

Another one is already written, recorded and in the midst of editing work for this week! Starting strong 🙂

Lastly, here are a couple songs I recorded recently but forgot to post on the blog: