Songwriters in Seattle

Author: Chris Klimecky

  • In Memoriam: Ann Gates Fiser

    Ann Gates Fiser
    Ann Gates Fiser

    We at Songwriters in Seattle are sad to hear of the passing of our friend, creative colleague, and community partner, Ann Gates Fiser. Ann joined SiS in 2013 – her warm heart and enthusiasm for music and community was infectious. She was a dedicated member of our Board of Directors for many years, often calling into our monthly meeting even when she was too sick to take part in person. Building community was important to her, and if you ever attended one of her events at The Den, where she hosted both a showcase and open mic each month, you know how much she loved being a part of it.

    Ann was a creative force, not only as a musician, but also as a visual artist, running an art studio in Kirkland with her husband, Rob. She wrote music, recorded, performed, painted murals, illustrated children’s books, and more. Her SiS Board of directors byline read:

    Ann is a singer-songwriter who plays the guitar and keyboards. She cut her musical teeth playing in Austin, Dallas/Ft Worth, and Vail, CO bars, hotels, and restaurants playing pop, top 40, country, and show tunes, and always in the background writing and singing her own songs. Finally burning out with the bar scene she quit music altogether and started a whole new career as a mural artist. She could not stay away from music for long and returned in 2013 with a commitment to play the music she loves which includes, of course, her own original songs. Her lyric topics are wide ranging and her music genre is somewhat eclectic. Learn more about Ann at anngatesfisermusic.com and fiserartstudio.com.

    Ann will be missed by all in Songwriters in Seattle and our northwest creative community at large. In many ways she embodied the ideal intersection of welcoming community and creative spirit – we are honored and thankful to have been a part of her journey.

  • Songwriting: Your First 50

    I remember very little about the first song I wrote…I was in sixth grade, and I know it was a cheesy breakup song in A minor about my first “girlfriend” in fifth grade. I don’t think any recordings of “The Love We Shared” exist (mercifully), and it wasn’t until a year later, when my older brother started writing some lyrics with a little more meaning and purpose, that I started down the serious road of songwriting and recording.

    Over the years, I progressed from 4-track demos to college studios, to professional studios, to producing in my home studio, writing and recording going hand in hand – refining a sound and showing real evidence that improvement was happening. It wasn’t until I had written and recorded between 50-60 songs that I really felt I could output at a consistent quality level. None of those “First 50” songs were ever released and they hide in my archives only for my personal nostalgia.

    This gets to the heart of my point: songwriting takes time and repeated, focused effort. No single song is precious, especially in your First 50. I know the feeling, “Whoa, I wrote a song and it’s really cool, and I need to copyright it and show everyone!” It’s hard not to be precious about your baby – your special creation! But if you can put that feeling aside and write your next 5 and then see how you feel about that previous one. Then write 10 more and see if you still feel the same way. I still “throw out” about one in ten that I thought was completely great when I wrote it and demo recorded it. When I “bulk write,” like for February Album Writing Month, where my approach is to sketch lots of new ideas, only ~2 of 10 survive. Sometimes there’s a re-write opportunity or smaller edits that can take a song to the next level, but sometimes you just have to let them go! After you’ve written your songs (or while you’re in the process of writing), I can’t recommend recording them highly enough. If you make that part of your songwriting/editing process, it helps tremendously not only in refining your vision of the song, but you can actually step back and analyze it a bit. You can critique yourself a lot better. You can experiment with different grooves and approaches, then leave it for a little bit, move on to other songs, and come back with fresh ears. Over time, you are also strengthened and motivated by the real progress and growth you will clearly hear. Be patient – it takes years.

    While Songwriters in Seattle offers specific classes to help move your songwriting forward as well as critique sessions and opportunities to share new songs with audiences (another great way to hear your song in a new light and get instant feedback), what we hope to help you achieve is far greater than any single event. We offer a framework for you to be motivated and supported to write more songs! This is the best way to improve your songwriting! Songwriters in Seattle is a friendly audience with like-minded people – it is a tremendous opportunity to experiment, share new ideas, then go back to the drawing board and try again. I wish I had an organization like this to accelerate my first 50!

    Now, the more experienced songwriters who may be reading this could probably even expand the idea to the first 100 or more, and I couldn’t disagree – there is always room to improve. Personally, while I am proud of my earlier released albums with songs that are now permanently in the public ear, I really only continue to play a few songs from them. Not only do newer songs represent where I am now as an artist, but from my current perspective, they are just better songs. At some point, there is bound to be argument about “better” being highly subjective, but ultimately you are your best judge and as long as you can create some distance (through time and recording), you will find you are a pretty good judge. You will almost always be biased toward your new songs, no doubt about it, but I think that also represents growth as an artist and songwriter. If nothing else, I use that as a motivating factor – I know I will love my next song, it’s going to be that much better, so I want to get on with writing it! I hope you can get to that point, too, if you’re not already there.

    I am far from prolific, but I make it a goal to show something new at every SiS monthly networking meeting. Professionals who are songwriting full time are writing every day – many who are in the licensing business are producing and posting something finished for their catalogs every day! Think about how that would add up and create a body of work. That is how you get to be a better songwriter. If you’re a beginner (still within your first 50), don’t worry about your copyrights (to be frank: nobody cares) and making each song perfect – it’s not going to be and that’s okay. No need to be self-deprecating about it, either, you can be proud of it – it is cool and no doubt some people will like it! Learn what you can from it and move on. Write another song. And another – get in the habit of consistently writing and recording. It’s a great habit and I bet you will find more fulfillment in creating a body of work than in trying to create singular masterpieces. I look forward to hearing your next 50!

  • “Mooncakes” on NPR’s Marketplace

    Songwriters in Seattle had a really cool and unexpected bit of national media attention Monday with our song, “A Black Market For Mooncakes” being part of a segment on NPR’s Marketplace. I’ve been asked a lot about how it happened, all the way back to the origin story of the song, so I thought I’d give you the lowdown on how it went down. First, here are the links to the NPR piece itself, as they have the text of what was read on air along with the whole song posted here:

    NPR Marketplace segment on Mooncakes song

    You can hear the entire audio of the Marketplace segment on their posted podcast here (our “Final Word” bit starts around 25:15):

    9/12/11 Marketplace segment audio

    So what’s the connection to Marketplace in the first place? Back in Sept. of 2010 my friend Skye Hansen posted a link to a Marketplace article by NPR Marketplace China correspondent Rob Schmitz called “A Black Market For Mooncakes” on her Facebook wall. I had only seen the headline come across my screen and it struck me as unique and poetic – so off the cuff I immediately commented on the post, “Sounds like a song title…” (completely in jest, of course). What Skye commented back was magical:

    “There’s a black market for mooncakes
    That appears in the dead of night
    It’s right next to that store with the fallingstar jam
    And other unearthly delights!”

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    As I was at once surprised and blown away, I definitely wanted to make this into a real song. So I did try in vain for a few weeks to see if I could do anything with it, to no avail. Thus the Songwriters in Seattle “mashup” event where I brought what I thought could be a decent seed for a group collaboration. After some discussion about Rob’s article and the potential themes of China’s repression, underground rebellion, people coming together despite restriction to celebrate their passions, and the poetic symbol of the cosmic eatery, it was agreed that we’d give it a shot. (Note: Rob’s article wasn’t really about any of those things – it was more what we were inspired to think about based on the seed idea). With the throwing out of my portion of the attempted lyrics and some tweeking of Skye’s original chorus, we went to work.

    As you can imagine, 10 songwriters in a room trying to write the same song was…challenging. Lyrics and associated chords were written (and crossed out) with big black markers on large sheets of paper and stuck to the walls. There was much chaotic guitar playing and random singing. Some were frustrated, some thought it was going nowhere – or at least nowhere worthwhile. But after 3 hours or so, we had something – it wasn’t much, but we had something and it was actually pretty good. With me standing up at the sheets on the wall and trying to direct everyone to verses and choruses that would make a reasonable finished structure with what we had (only one verse of lyrics in addition to what we started with plus the chords to the two sections), we hit record on Jessica Lynne’s iPhone and ran through it best we could:

    (Warning – this is super rough, with beer bottles clanking as they fall over, yelling directions, and other such fumbling to get through)
    [audio:https://songwritersinseattle.com/audio/BlackMarket_SiSmash.mp3]

    Now fast forward a few months…based on that recording I obviously had some work to do to make the song into a listenable finished piece, but it finally came together. Recording was fun as this is not anywhere near a typical style for me. Breaking out the nylon string guitar for a flamenco solo and faking castanets with spoons from the kid’s toy percussion set were especially unusual. And then singing along with Jessica Lynne and David Rix to make us sound like a much larger group was a real kick. Overall, I am very happy with how the song and recording turned out. I feel it represents the collaborative talents and aspirations of Songwriters in Seattle very well.

    Many thanks again to David whose great idea and, more importantly, his action it was to send the recording to the original author of the Marketplace article which inspired the song, Rob Schmitz, and got the next part of the story started. Rob’s response:

    “All I can say is: Wow. I knew I had hit upon something when I reported the
    mooncakes story, but I never in my wildest dreams thought it was worthy of
    moving a group of musicians to song. Well done. I¹m honored my bizarre
    little story inspired your group to write and perform this piece.”

    Rob forwarded it to his producers in LA and next thing you know, David and I are working out the details with Marketplace Producer Fiona Ng to get the song on the air and linked on their website. Some vague details about what we should expect and when…then a few days later…boom! “I thought it was kinda catchy…” – Marketplace host, Kai Ryssdal. How cool is that? Thanks to Rob and Fiona for making it all happen.

    There you have it! This is yet another great example of the amazing things that can happen when we work together!

  • Home Recording: Choosing a DAW

    One of the toughest first steps that anyone wanting to get into home recording has to go through is picking which Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) to use. As the DAW is the heart of any home studio, it’s also one of the most important steps. The good news is that all modern DAWs are going to sound good…once you get them to work and know how to use them. And therein lies the varying degrees of bad news. Some are easier to work with (both hardware and software-wise) and some are harder.

    So how do you choose? Everyone has heard of ProTools, as it’s the professional studio standard – but it’s also pretty expensive (for more than the entry level system) and complex. I’m not saying it’s a bad choice, of course, it’s just that it’s a good idea to not just assume you have to go in that direction – there are lots of options. This blog post over at Discmakers is a good place to start, at least to introduce you to some of your choices:

    Discmakers – Choosing Your DAW

    It’s not a completely comprehensive list – be sure to read the comments section to find even more suggestions readers have. Personally I use one not on the list: Tracktion 2, which is Mackie’s software (currently unavailable and unsupported). Why? Because not only does it have a super intuitive software interface, but it came bundled with Mackie’s great hardware interface and mastering software. Point is, I did my research, picked a system that fit my needs and budget, and I’ve been happy ever since. Not that there aren’t trade offs – my system has plenty of quirks and limitations I’ve learned to workaround that may be non-starters for you.

    So go take a look, do your research, and I’d love to hear your comments on DAWs you’re thinking about using or maybe you have strong feelings about the one you already use. They all have positives and negatives – what have you learned about different DAWs?

  • Welcome to the New SongwritersInSeattle.com!

    Hello Everyone!

    This has been a long time in coming, but I am very proud to finally unveil my latest labor of love for Songwriters in Seattle: Welcome to our new home on the web at songwritersinseattle.com! Not only do we have a new look and tons of new content, but there is a whole new vision which accompanies this re-launch. We have shifted from a static “landing spot” for users to look at once and move on, to a dynamic community-building forum for all things related to our musical endeavors! This website will be an ever-growing resource for musicians as well as a place to contribute ideas, links, and discussion about our creative community and larger music industry.

    As you may be able to tell, I’m excited! I’ve put this together for you and will continue to contribute toward it’s growth, but I can’t (and don’t want to) do it alone. Anyone and everyone is invited to help generate “article” content. This could include commentary, reviews, links, stories…you name it – as long as it’s not just about you. If you want to advertise, we have a lovely sponsorship program. 🙂 Otherwise, offer something meaningful to the community and the community will give back appropriately. Often your best promotional tool is to be a trusted, consistent, and useful resource to others. This is part of the power of this new website.

    Maybe you already have a blog or you like to post articles on Facebook? Copy them here for additional visibility. Maybe you think of an “article” as a major writing endeavor – not necessary. Often the shorter the better. A link to a great article elsewhere with a few lines of your commentary is a good primer if you’re uncomfortable with longer form writing. At the same time, I don’t want to discourage in-depth articles. I know members of SiS who are great at detailed music reviews, helpful tips, and have deeper thoughts on the state of the music biz. These types of articles would be fantastic for songwritersinseattle.com and you’ll get the additional visibility for your work that you deserve! If an article really is exceptionally long, we’ll break it into parts for multiple releases, getting it even more attention.

    So, imagine the possibilities, then write to info@songwritersinseattle.com and request to get started. I’m really excited to see what we can do out here and watch our continued momentum skyrocket.

    Thank you, enjoy the new website and again, welcome!
    Chris