Rachel Baiman at Festival Mozaic in San Luis Obispo, California (photo by Heather Gray)
Hello from the friendly skies. I’m writing this column on a plane from Portland to Denver. I’m headed to Lyons, Colorado, to teach at the Planet Bluegrass Song School for a week leading up to our performance at Rocky Mountain Folks Festival. In preparation for this week, I’ve been thinking a lot about how to teach this mysterious craft we call songwriting, and I thought I’d share some thoughts here.
A lot of writers keep consistent writing practices (or so I’m told on my podcasts), such as morning pages, evening journaling, or a specific word count a day. Some songwriters work through different exercises to sharpen their descriptive skills and to be fully open and ready to catch ideas as soon as they stumble upon them.
For me, writing has always been a largely emotional and extremely inconsistent practice. In fact, I have a personal rule that if I have an idea for a song, and I can’t remember it by the time I go to work on it, the idea wasn’t good enough in the first place. If something really grabs me I’ll think about it for days or even weeks before I have time to fully flesh it out into a song. The only thing I’ve ever really done to “learn” how to write songs is listen to different songwriters constantly and try to figure out, and then imitate, what it is that I love about my favorites.
In a recent interview at Pickathon, my interviewer, Dan, asked me if I had ever felt imposter syndrome, and what I did to tackle that. Perhaps because I started out as an instrumentalist, and had a regular practice routine with that, I’ve been able to channel that type of stress and imposter syndrome into aspects of musicianship outside of writing. I don’t think I will ever stop feeling imposter syndrome as an instrumentalist, but writing is what I have always done to escape from that, so it’s a completely safe zone for me emotionally. After all, how can one really be better or worse at writing their own song? It’s a pure and singular expression, which may or may not resonate with others. But there are no wrong notes or playing out of time in songwriting.
For all of these reasons, and maybe also some kind of protectionist mindset, I usually don’t push myself to write when I’m feeling blank. As a result, I will often go weeks or even months at a time without attempting to write a song, and then come into a flurry of brain activity during which I write 3-4 songs in the space of a week.
I like operating this way because I feel emotionally attached to almost everything I write. Even if I don’t end up using a song or thinking it’s terrific, I usually learn something about what I’m feeling. Free therapy! And, much like in therapy, I think the best work gets done at the edges of our emotional and spiritual comfort zones. If you want to write something new and interesting, something that allows people to feel and grow, you’re going to have to make yourself uncomfortable first.
There’s always room to edit and improve on a song idea, and I don’t think one should have any fears about cutting, adding, and adjusting in a non-emotional headspace. But you can’t edit down, distill, and fine-tune if there’s nothing of real substance on the table in the first place. Even if it’s just one line that makes it from that emotional place to the finished song, that line will be the one that lets people feel your vulnerability and connect with the music.
For me, writing songs was when I moved from the realm of craft to the realm of art in music. I stopped thinking about better or worse, achievement, practice schedules, etc. Some people are artists with their instruments, but for me, the instrument always has to be in service of the song. I think the more you can escape from stress, comparison, and should-do’s, the better the writing will emerge. In summary: Write bravely, write honestly, and edit mercilessly!
