I’ve recently discovered the invaluable nature of books (who knew?). I’m not much of a reader but while I was waiting in the doctor’s office lobby (yes, I have my annual sinus infection again), I brought along Lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II (you may have noticed the quote on the main page). You know, for a lyricist, he has a lot of practical knowledge about this whole business. A passage I read today particularly moved me:
“Rhyming, phonetics, semantics — all very important. But technique and professional polish do not make a song. They improve it and their absence might ruin it, but there is an element much less tangible that is the deciding factor in a song’s life. One evening this summer I was on Arthur Godfrey’s television program. He told me that he was continually besieged by young songwriters. He said that almost everyone seemed to have written his one song and wanted to find out how to get it before the public. I told Arthur that I’d had an entirely different experience. Most young songwriters or amateur songwriters of all ages who have approached me have told me that they had at least forty songs — sometimes four hundred songs. Most of them make the point that they can rattle them off very quickly, one a day or as many as anyone would wish. “Songs just come to me,” many people tell me. If I met a man with just one song, I would be more interested in him. I believe that anyone who stated sincerely what was deep in his heart could not only write a song, but could quickly get it published because it would be sure to be a good song. What actually happens in the case of practically all amateur writers is that they are imitating other men’s songs. They are being, or trying to be, Irving Berlin or Cole Porter, or they are trying to imitate some of the songs currently on The Hit Parade. My observation about amateurs is that they are money-mad. The professional loves songs and loves songwriting. The amateurs want some quick money and think that songwriting is an easy way to get it. They want to believe that the main trick is to get to know some publisher, or a bandleader, or someone who will exploit their manuscript. But they don’t spend enough time on each manuscript. They submit songs in their first draft. They don’t go over them painstakingly as professional writers do, and they don’t in the first instance dig it up out of their own brains and hearts.
The most important ingredient of a good song is sincerity. Let the song be yours and yours alone. However important, however trivial, believe it. Mean if from the bottom of your heart, and say what is on your mind as carefully, as clearly, as beautifully as you can. Show it to no one until you are certain that you cannot make one change that would improve it. After that, however, be willing to make improvements if someone can convince you that they are needed.
This sounds like simple advice, but no one knows better than I how hard it is to follow. The basic rules are always the hardest ones to observe, even though they seem the easiest. No beginner on the golf course or the tennis courts questions the good sense of his first lesson when he is told to keep his eye on the ball. This seems such an obvious thing to do, and yet no matter how many years you play these games your chief mistake remains taking your eye off the ball. This tendancy to skip over the fundamental things and grasp the superficial is the tragedy of man’s history from the beginning of time. I do not, therefore, place undue blame on misguided songwriters. They are merely keeping up the tradition of the stupidity of the human race when, instead of writing what they honestly feel, they invent fancy rhymes and foolish jokes and tricky titles and imitative phrases and lines that merely “fill in.” I do not blame them if they spend their days trying to get to know someone who knows someone who is the brother-in-law of a publisher. I am just saying that all these things are a waste of time without a good manuscript. Get the right words and the right notes down on paper and, in some way, you song will reach the public. Publishers are looking for good songs. They often make mistakes and reject good ones and accept bad ones, but I do not believe that all the publishers will ever reject a really good song. Somebody will appreciate its quality. If a publisher doesn’t, some record company will. The people who claim that the publishing and songwriting game is a tight ring into which beginners are not permitted are usually people with carelessly written manuscripts in their briefcases. The men who write the good songs haven’t time for all this kind of talk. They are too busy writing and loving what they write before they show it to anybody else.
If I seem unfairly severe on the amateur songwriter, the source of my intolerance is my own history. When I first began writing, I too made all these same mistakes, and I am frantically anxious to prevent others from making them. I used to write songs very quickly. A Long Island commuter, I prided myself that I could often write a refrain on one trip into New York, and the verse on the way back that night. Not many of these were good songs. I was too easily satisfied with my work. I was too often trying to emulate older and better lyric writers, saying things similar to the things they were saying. It would have been all right had I been content to imitate the forms of their songs, but the substance should have been mine and it was not. I know that insincerity held me back for several years, and I know that even after I’d had a period of success, it again handicapped me and caused me to have failures. Loathing all dishonest and sloppy work for the sorrows it has caused me, I loathe it in others as I would any poison, and if I can knock it out of anyone, I will.”
Production is finally getting going on our short Conan musical now that school’s out for Mike Decamp and now that I’m pretty much done with the marching show (though Joe still has all that percussion to write! Glad I’m not him! :-D). We’re pretty much going to spend June putting it together. We’ve still got a few kinks in the script to fix (hopefully bringing Ryan Gaumont on board will help that!) and then I’ve got to finish the rest of the music. After that, we will spend a week rehearsing/recording the 10 minute soundtrack so we can give that to our choreographer to do what she does. Mike’s pretty much in charge of getting the cast together and contacting people and doing all the other hard work. If you’re interested in helping out (either cast, crew, or creatively), contact me (we just might have a part for you!).
