Songwriters in Seattle is thrilled to welcome founding guitarist for Heart and Rock n’ Roll Hall of Fame inductee Roger Fisher as the final guest instructor for our 2020 Spring Songwriting Retreat, April 24th-26th at Pilgrim Firs in Port Orchard. Roger brings an incredible depth of musical connection that is sure to elevate the experience of all who attend.
Workshop DescriptionTitle: Songwriting With Emotional Connection
Description: How do you express your deepest feelings through your songwriting to make a meaningful connection with your audience? In this masterclass-style workshop, Roger brings his long history of musical expression to help you tap into your personal emotional self for improved songwriting and performance.
In his own words:
“Since 1965 I’ve dedicated most of my time and energy to a deep involvement with music. Early prerequisites to my involvement were: it needs to be real, based on honesty and existing emotions, and it needs to be fun. So, after all this time, I still adhere to those ideals, and it’s working.
An internationally successful run with the rock group Heart gave invaluable experiences, and pointed the way to a direction that would dictate a long-term dance with my most cherished partner…music.
Having amassed knowledge, experience, depth of involvement, and a daily regimen, I love uplifting others to the joys of a real relationship with music. Beyond Guitar is a series of blogs and videos that encourage the striving artist to dig deeper, try harder, and sustain the love of their craft.”
For registration info, schedule and session details, instructor bios, and more, please visit
/2020springretreat/
Songwriters in Seattle is excited to welcome Patrice Haan as a special guest instructor for our 2020 Spring Songwriting Retreat at Pilgrim Firs in Port Orchard, WA!
Patrice will be kicking off the retreat Friday evening with an interactive workshop on “Deep Listening” which will prepare us well for a reflective weekend of hearing ourselves and our fellow songwriters.
Description: We have two ears. They are perhaps our most innate and profound musical equipment. Imagine enhancing your musical skills at the same time as learning to listen more deeply as a daily practice. Think about how you’d most like someone to receive your words, your music. My heart opens when someone really listens to me. Can you be that attentive and open to someone else? Via a series of activities and games, we can use our ears, bodies, heads and voices – and our curiosity – to learn about listening by listening.
Bio: An intuitive songwriter, Patrice Haan’s commitment to the healing presence of listening comes from 16 years of playing harp in hospitals and cancer care facilities.
Her life in songwriting really began at 40 on a dare. The song that emerged opened a door she hadn’t known was there. Now, twenty years later, she continues to build songs and community via monthly participation in two songwriting collectives, one of which meets by Skype. Patrice is excited to be a songwriting facilitator at such gatherings as the Puget Sound Guitar Workshop, California Coast Music Camp, and Beyond Trad.
Songwriters in Seattle is delighted to Welcome Jeff Lee as a special guest instructor for our 2020 Spring Songwriting Retreat at Pilgrim Firs in Port Orchard, WA!
Jeff will be leading a workshop entitled “A Storyteller’s Toolbox for Writing Songs”
Description: Though different from other writing, lyrics are still made of words, and we can piece them together using techniques borrowed from other written forms. As songwriters, we often use the tools of the poet—imagery, meter and rhyme—but there are other ways to tell stories with words. In this class, we’ll explore some of the tools that all writers and storytellers use, like conflict, misdirection, mystery, epiphany, and point of view. We’ll see how great songwriters used those tools to pry open our emotions, and dissect how some of our favorite songs were put together. Then we’ll pick up those tools and take a swing or two ourselves. By the end of the workshop, we’ll have some shiny new toys we can pull out when we need them.
Bio: Jeff Lee is a writer of songs, fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry and personal essays. He is an instructor at the Northwest Writer’s Retreat and at the Caz Northwest Family Performing Arts Camp. His album of original songs, “Over That River Wide,” was released in 2019. He currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Puget Sound Guitar Workshop.
Songwriters in Seattle is delighted to Welcome Cyd Smith as a special guest instructor for our 2020 Spring Songwriting Retreat at Pilgrim Firs in Port Orchard, WA!
Cyd will be leading a workshop entitled “Chords, Grooves, and Hooks”
Description: Do your songs all sound the same? Do you have a lyric or a melody that you like but isn’t quite working when you perform it? If you usually start your songs with a lyric, you might find that the musical part comes as an afterthought. In this class we’ll focus on some other elements that help a song stand out: its harmonic structure, groove, and distinctive instrumental riffs or accompaniment that engage a listener and help get your song across.
We’ll start by identifying these elements in songs we admire, and then explore how we can incorporate them as we generate and craft our own songs.
Bio: Over the years, Cyd has performed with many luminaries of the national acoustic music scene, including Mary Flower, Laurie Lewis, Russ Barenberg, and Rebecca Kilgore. She has been a cornerstone of many Northwest bands in a wide range of styles from Swing to Americana to Classic Rock.
As a songwriter, Cyd is an explorer of the unexpected—lyrically, harmonically, and melodically. Northwest music critic Paul de Barros writes, “A sort of Sheila Jordan of the folk/jazz beat, Cyd weds her flutey voice and alluring turns of phrase to a run of crisp rhythms, all propelled by indomitable guitar and lyrics that look sideways at life with a sharp, smart edge.”
A passion for swing and zeal for passing on the swing torch has made Cyd a favorite teacher at music camps throughout the US. The long list of camps she has taught at include Puget Sound Guitar Workshop, California Coast Music Camp, SummerSongs West, Acoustic Alaska Guitar Camp,, and Augusta Blues & Swing Week.
If I had a nickel for every time somebody asked me this question, I’d be able to afford studio time to record all my songs! I think it’s the kind of a question that people think you’re supposed to ask a songwriter.
Recently, at a house concert in Philadelphia, when a guest asked me the same thing, I started to answer the way I usually do:
“EVERYBODY always asks that question!” I said. “It’s a difficult question to answer.” Then I stopped. I made a decision. “Do you want to know what I really think?” I asked. Because I’d met him a couple of days before (he was a neighbor of the guy hosting the concert), I knew this guy could handle the truth.
The guy said, “Yes!”
I smiled. “I think it’s a stupid question.”
He guffawed and the rest of the 25 or so attendees broke out in laughter.
“It’s not a stupid question per se,” I backpedaled a bit. “It’s just that you’re always going to get a different answer. So the question really is more about why you’re asking it. If you are a budding songwriter [I knew this guy wasn’t], the answer shouldn’t really make a difference. It won’t affect your process or make you change the way you approach your writing. And if you’re just curious about MY process, I guess that’s legitimate. But I always imagine that people that ask this question are collecting answers to the question. Are you doing that, Frank?”
He shook his head. Then he added, “But maybe I will from now on!”
We all laughed again. “Well, okay, then,” I responded. “I’ll indulge your curiosity. But I can’t promise it will be enlightening.” And then I answered the question.
My point to you all, as fellow songwriters, is that the answer to the question really doesn’t matter! How you write is how you write. How you compose is how you compose. How you eat your peas with a knife is how you eat your peas. But I digress.
Whatever your process --- and I imagine that it didn’t spring fully developed from your head like Athena from Zeus’ skull, but that you came to it over the course of days, weeks, months, even years --- honor it, trust it. And, this is most important, let it be what it is, and that may include its continued evolution — it may still change or adapt over time.
In the immortal words of Iris DeMent, “Let the mystery be.”
Now go write some songs!
P.S. In the interest of full disclosure, I know some people who only write one way (“It’s always the music first.” “They come at the same time for me.”). Good for them! I myself vary the diet. Sometimes it’s the words; sometimes it’s the lyrics; sometimes they come together. Sometimes it depends on whether I’ve been commissioned to write something, so it’s even more contextual — What do the lyrics have to be about? What sentiment are we expressing? How do we want the listener to feel regarding the tempo? But that’s a topic for another time.
