Friday, February 15, 2019

Fantasy Cycles: A new song is born

I'm recovering from surgery on Tuesday for a detached retina and I seem to be doing well. So, I wrote some lyrics to the "Kate Bush" chords that had been sitting around for a while, as often happens. Typically, I make the musical framework by playing around with chords and beats and developing things that sound good to my ears. At that point, I usually write melodies and lyrics by waiting for a lightning bolt to strike me. Sometimes it all just comes to me like a special delivery from the Muse and at other times it's a torturous process or, worse, nothing happens at all. Yesterday, I had an idea to conduct a creative experiment going ar it a bit differently. I had recorded a spontaneous humming melody in one take by jamming with myself. It came out nicely (other than being a little flat in spots) and I decided to write lyrics to match the hummed melody exactly, meaning I would have to write lines with one syllable to match each note I'd hummed. Additionally, I decided I would write whatever came into my mind without worrying about how artistic the words were or if they even made sense. Once I got started it emerged as a song about kids riding bicycles. I found the result amusing. Perhaps this gives you a glimpse of how my songwriting happens. I get to go back to normal posture tomorrow although I will stay away from serious exercise until getting permission from the surgeon.

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