Fresh Content

Show date:  Nov. 04, 2024

Neel, Phil, and Nancy

Nancy Blue has about 50 songs completed, many of which are similar to “jazz standards”. One person described her song “Darn Good Things” as like a classic Holiday song (not lyrics but melody and chords). But now it’s a new time – she began the jazz focus in 2012, now she’s on to making an album with soul/disco/funk/pop grooves. She’s a late bloomer and hopes to inspire folks over 50 who haven’t begun to be a musician, painter, business owner, dancer, etc to do that thing NOW and not listen to anyone saying they can’t begin to do art, or be creative, or own a business, because of their chronological age.

Nancy shared the process behind her song Bumble Bee. Download the lyrics to follow along.

We talked about:

  • Our songwriting challenge for 2024 to write a holiday song. Please send us your answers to the challenge by November 18!
  • How Nancy’s flautist performed his part to emulate the movement of a bumble bee
  • Learning music theory by studying piano, and then with a jazz guitarist who was taught by Charles Mingus
  • How difficult it is to arrange jazz music electronically
  • If you want to introduce jazz into your songwriting, study some jazz standards
  • How’s it’s perfectly fine to be an amateur musician and/or songwriter and not a superstar
  • Ways to “find your people

Show date:  Oct. 27, 2024

Neel & Phil

For our first host response to our Songwriting Challenge 2024 to write a holiday song, Neel shared the process behind his song Forest for the Trees.

Download the lyric/chord sheet to follow along.

We talked about:

Show date:  Oct. 21, 2024

Neel, Phil, and Greg

Greg Wyard’s new song “Don’t Get Involved” is available on all streaming platforms, beginning September 13th, 2024. Inspired by tense moments we all face in daily life —like a heated confrontation on the subway or an episode of road rage —”Don’t Get Involved” explores the dilemma of staying calm versus reacting. With a backdrop of laid-back acoustic guitar, cajon, and strings, the track contrasts soothing melodies with sharp, insightful lyrics. Fans of Paul McCartney, Neil Finn, and Passenger will love its folk-pop feel. Part of a full album set for release in early 2025, this song offers a surprisingly optimistic take on conflict and self-restraint.

Structurally, it bucks the trend of traditional pop-songwriting in that it has no chorus, instead opting for a repeated line “Oh no, don’t get involved!”

Download the lyrics to follow along. We talked about:

  • Our songwriting challenge for 2024 to write a holiday song. Please send us your answers to the challenge by November 18!
  • Writing walk-downs in your chord progressions
  • Playing around with unconventional song structures
  • Writing your song around a single central hook
  • Getting real players playing real instruments on your record
  • Arranging your song as a crescendo
  • Hoping technology doesn’t get in the way when you’re recording at home

Show date:  Oct. 15, 2024

Neel, Phil, and Amanda

Amanda Sum is a performer and creator who dances between music and theatre. Her latest EP, does it make me naive if i’ve never been part of something where i’ve meant more to them than they did to me?, was released in June 2024, accompanied by a short film featuring 13 directors, which is due later this year. Her 2022 music video Different Than Before garnered a JUNO nomination and won the SXSW Music Video Jury Award.

As Theatre Replacement’s COLLIDER Artist, Amanda created New Age Attitudes: Live in Concert, which premiered in 2023 and will continue to tour in 2025. Amanda is currently working on her next full-length record, and is developing its accompanying experimental theatre show.

We talked to Amanda about her new project and writing really short songs in a suite. Download the lyrics to follow along, and be sure to check out the tout suite on Bandcamp.

We talked about:

  • Our songwriting challenge for 2024 to write a holiday song. Please send us your answers to the challenge by November 18!
  • How Amanda’s EP evolved from a medley of songs into a suite
  • Saying more (or enough) with less: “Just because it’s 15 seconds doesn’t mean it’s not a song.”
  • How this kind of idea lets you throw out traditional song structures
  • Considerations Amanda took for also performing the entire suite live
  • How recording this project almost broke Amanda’s brain
  • The challenges of digitally distributing this kind of project

Show date:  Oct. 08, 2024

Neel, Phil, and Avery

Returning recently from Europe, where she performed, and earned her master’s degree in music from Berklee College of Music in Valencia, Spain, Canadian Billboard-charting recording artist and alternative Soul singer Avery Raquel has entertained audiences professionally for over a decade.

She’s released 4 solo albums and two EPs now to critical acclaim. Her last self-titled release debuted on the Canadian iTunes Top 200 RnB/Soul album chart at #5. Five tracks from that album were finalists in the John Lennon Songwriting Competition in 2022 and 2023 in 4 different categories, with one winning the Grand Prize in the Pop category. Her latest single from her new EP ‘Scratching At The Surface’ was a recent finalist in the same competition.

Relatable, yet personal, Avery’s writing is a soulful fun mix of RnB/Soul, Funk, and Pop, with a flavour of her Jazz and Blues experiences.

Avery talked about writing songs after learning she has Synesthesia, an umbrella term for the intersection of senses. She shared her master’s thesis song, Guests. Download the lyrics to follow along.

We talked about:

  • Our songwriting challenge for 2024 to write a holiday song. Please send us your answers to the challenge by November 18!
  • Congratulations to our recent guest Jade Turner for winning the Vince Fontaine Indigenous Song Award from SOCAN for her track This Song Sucks
  • How Avery uses her chromathesia condition (a type of synesthesia in which sound involuntarily evokes an experience of color, shape, and movement) to decide upon chord choices
  • How everybody who experiences Synethesia (Synesthetes) experiences it differently  – like for Avery, major seventh chords always invoke sunset orange and minor seventh chords are dark blue
  • Personifying emotions and incorporating I, You, He, and She in your song
  • Writing a song like a jazz standard with a nursery rhyme quality
  • Famous musicians who also have Synesthesia
  • Talking about music (is like dancing about architecture)