Creating words that beg for music -- Young songWriters Project

Jon Gailmor
By Jon Gailmor

My songwriting history doesn’t even vaguely resemble that of Paul Simon, Smokey Robinson or Carole King. Would that it did. My first complete lyrics were “I wanna take a bath with Cath” composed in kindergarten, where we were on a first-name basis with our teachers and were encouraged to express our feelings. I was quite the child prodigy, except for the fact my next lyrics didn’t take shape until I was 23, out of college and hitchhiking through Europe.

I don’t “crank ‘em out” like many composers do. Some pieces come more easily than others; every one has an element of struggle, not unlike the birth of any offspring. Sweat and gritted teeth can often beget something beautiful, but only if it emanates from the heart.

I learned that lesson early on from a couple of unlikely, unknowing mentors: the producer and the manager of “Carlson and Gailmor,” in New York City. For our long-awaited record deal, I submitted a song about fruitless hitchhiking in Germany.

The consensus among the suits was that to sell, it “needed a girl in it.” The lyrics were appropriately altered but were then so ludicrous that after a while even the execs agreed to restore the original words.

That dehumanizing, “big-time” experience of having to hold my heart in abeyance to try to make a buck was life-changing.

Ironically my musical synopsis of that recording saga, “Gotta Have a Hook” (a later release), contained one of my slickest choruses:

Gotta have a hook
To have a hit
Doesn’t matter if you don’t feel it
Grab ‘em with a hook
They gotta hum
On the can, in the bath, behind the wheel
It may leave some with a sleepless night
But it can’t be wrong if the suckers bite
They’ll thank us all in due time.

My main concern as a fledgling songwriter was, “How are listeners going to like the words?” I had other questions: “What about writing songs for 5- to 8-year-olds?” And “can fellow baby boomers relate to this one?”

These kinds of questions pre-occupied me and clogged my creativity. And much of the music, frankly, was hard to stomach; it felt — and sounded — insincere and forced. Perhaps because it was.

So I decided to try writing about what truly moved me without worrying about the audience. I discovered that honest writing unearths threads connect us all. A profoundly emotional experience, a hilarious moment, an instance of indescribable fury — chances are most folks have been there. Songs from the gut are the ones we remember.

Yes, it’s quite a risk to lay your innards out there, but taking artistic chances is what sets us apart and keeps our adrenaline flowing.

My music comes from the world around me, too, and how I view it. And, like it or not, songwriters are often given suggestions. In my mind, though, “you ought to write a song about that,” is a conversation-closer. I usually just nod.

But I have to listen; every so often an intriguing topic is behind that innocent idea. A friend of mine once asked me if I would ever consider a song about a child of a gay father.

That caught my attention. The last thing I wanted, though, was to sound condescending or patronizing, so I sent the lyrics to a few gay friends and relatives for them to look at before I inflicted the song on the public. Objective, brutally frank feedback is essential.

The chicken or egg question holds true in songwriting: Which comes first, the words or the music? Songwriters have to find out what works best for them.

At first, I created the words and music simultaneously, but I soon found that stretching a lyric to fit a melody or chord progression took its toll on the words. And changing a note or two for the sake of compatibility with a phrase was detrimental to the tune.

Lately, I’ve been starting with a poem. When the words feel whole to me, I search for the tune that fits best. Along the way, I might tweak a lyric or two, so that the combination gels better, or I might change an occasional note to goose a vital word.

The last part of my process is to hum the melody and make sure it stands alone. Like any great marriage, each partner should be strong and the pair, powerful.
In my songwriting workshops and residencies, I stress the importance of word quality and the difference between reciting poetry and singing lyrics.

Your first step is putting down what you want to say. Then become the audience: Read it aloud. How does it sound?

Choose vivid words that are easily visualized, combinations that you’ve never heard before, nouns used as adjectives and vice versa to make the words more memorable. The magic of lyrical surprise can’t be overstated.

Make sure the words are friendly to the mouth, that they are easily sung. Crooning a tune locks you into a rhythm, so you might as well use words that cascade easily over the teeth and tongue and through the lips.

Poetry recitation, on the other hand, allows for strategic pauses, both for dramatic effect and to make even the nastiest consonants pronounceable.

Creating songs is exhilarating and fulfilling; it also saves me an awful lot of money on therapy. As I age, my pieces become more personal and carry an urgency for me to launch them into the world while I’m still in it.

Two lyrical snippets may serve best to explain why I write songs. The first I wrote in 1983, the second, a couple of years ago:

Singing is my love and my living
Distracting folks from all their sorrow, while we’re together
Trying to remind souls who can’t remember
How to feel and not to fear what’s going on beneath their skin

Say it now, say it now, anytime, anyhow
Grab the moment, while you got it, let ‘em hear it, say it now
How you’re feeling, just set it free
Don’t wait till it’s a eulogy
Right now, say it now, say it now.

Jon Gailmor has performed in Europe, Central America and throughout the United States. He has six albums and has an extensive school workshop and residencey program. For more, go to www.jongailmor.com.