Words and Music

I rarely kiss and tell publicly (or even privately for that matter), but yesterday was a good day for me with regards to library submissions, and I truly want to thank my co-writers for their amazing musical interpretations of my words. A 'very romantic' newly established upper end library accepted 3 more tracks on which I am the co-writer (lyrics obviously), alongside the 3 tracks of mine they already have since they started.  Thanks to my talented co-writers things are continually getting better and better. The songs in this library are: Heart of Stone - with Robbie Hancock From This Burn - with Robbie Hancock Washing In Washing Out - with Ethan Okamura & Louise Goldberg Better Off Blue - with Steven Guiles Blanket of Love - with Steve Collom and Dave Walton This Is The End - with Michelle Lockey I met all of these co-writers through Taxi Independent A&R, and many of these tracks were originally written for the amazing songwriting group GYAWS (Get Your A...

I recently wrote an article about collaborating with professional lyricists, and how it can improve your songs and your time management, for the TAXI A&R monthly online magazine. I thought that I might share the article here also. Thank you TAXI ! Link to the actual article on TAXI's website -  Eight Reasons to Collaborate With a Lyricist Article as in TAXI Newsletter:  Eight Reasons to Collaborate With a Lyricist  I recently asked some of my co-writers why they liked working with a lyricist so much. The following eight reasons are a summary of their responses. These aren’t my ideas, they are the reasons that successful TAXI composers and songwriters gave me for preferring to collaborate, rather than write the lyrics themselves. Remember, a good lyricist also understands music, how and why it creates an emotion, how a singer sings different sounds and stresses, as  well  as being able to write words. To collaborate well we need to understand each...

A 'Taxi friend', Dave Walton, asked me last year if I'd like to write some lyrics for his daughter's wedding, to be precise the father/daughter dance song for the wedding reception.  Naturally I said yes, as I am ever the romantic and this was a wonderful gesture. The song grew and developed, and we asked Steve Collom to collaborate with us on melody and to sing the song.  Eventually the finished track was used at the wedding - so romantic ! Post wedding, we have tweaked and edited a bit, and are now ready to let the track loose on the world !  It has been purposely written to suit romantic contemporary  film & tv uses, rather than a radio friendly hit song. It's currently still non exclusive, and all licensing inquiries are welcome. Listen to Blanket Of Love on SoundCloud HERE or here...

Just about the biggest part of my songwriting education has been through TAXI, a Californian A&R company whose attitude towards its clients in simply incredible. Not only do they have extremely useful feedback on all songs submitted and $20 complete song critiques for members, but they have several facilities for non members too - all free.  This includes a well run forum and  the amazing TAXI TV . The forum is extensive and the people using it very friendly, and so willing to help new members and each other. As long as you take part and contribute, you will get as much help as you need or want.  The experienced songwriters and musicians on that forum have helped me in more ways than I can count, and continue to do so. And the icing on the cake....  TAXI TV  , which is amazing !  It's on every Monday night at midnight BST (UK & Ireland), in the USA that's 4pm PDT or 7pm EDT.  Each week there's a different topic, many are client based, wh...