[quote] “It is incumbent upon the children to exert themselves to the utmost in acquiring the art of reading and writing…. Writing skills that will provide for urgent needs will be enough for some; and then it is better and more fitting that they should spend their time in studying those branches of knowledge which are of use. As for what the Supreme Pen hath previously set down, the reason is that in every art and skill, God loveth the highest perfection.” – Bahá’u’lláh (from a Tablet-translated from the Persian) [/quote]

Becoming a good songwriter is hard work… becoming a great songwriter can be excruciating. Perhaps that is one reason that so many aspiring songwriters fall short of excellence. But what if there were a way to break open the doors, shake off inhibitions, and develop your craft in a fraction of the time that it typically takes? And what if you could build your fan base at the same time? It sounds too good to be true… but perhaps it isn’t.

[quote] “… set to music the verses and the divine words so that they may be sung with soul-stirring melody in the Assemblies and gatherings, and that the hearts of the listeners may become tumultuous and rise towards the Kingdom of Abhá in supplication and prayer.” ‘Abdu’l-Bahá (Bahá’í World Faith – Selected Writings of Bahá’u’lláh and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá 1976 edition, Pg. 449) [/quote]

Doing Time…

We all know that achieving excellence takes time.. often a very long amount of  time. In his book “Outliers”, Malcolm Gladwell purports that the amount of time needed to become an expert in any field is around 10,000 hours of practice. Put into practical terms: A songwriter who spends 8 hours to write one song, one time per week will spend 24 years writing to get to those 10,000 hours. Now I’m not saying that the 10,000 hour rule is fixed – sure, some achieve excellence in less time, some take longer, and others find shortcuts to propel them forward. We want to explore the latter. I’ve never been a fan of ‘paying dues’ or ‘playing by the rules’. Those who think outside of the ‘norm’ and cut their own path tend to be the ones who make the rules everyone else follows.

[quote] “It behoveth the craftsmen of the world at each moment to offer a thousand tokens of gratitude at the Sacred Threshold, and to exert their highest endeavour and diligently pursue their professions so that their efforts may produce that which will manifest the greatest beauty and perfection before the eyes of all men.” – `Abdu’l-Bahá (“Selections from the Writings of `Abdu’l-Bahá”, sec. 127, p. 145) [/quote]

Clearly, exertion is still a necessary component, but there are ways to expedite the process. One possible shortcut I’ve run into time and time again over the last several years is that of writing a song-a-day. I know, I know… for the writers who care about crafting each and every word, those instrumentalists who toil over every note, and for those of us who are so concerned with everything being perfect before we move on, this idea is terrifying. But perhaps this is actually a solution… a steamroller that can help flatten many of the hurdles on our journey to greatness. Essentially, when writing a song a day, we act as a professional songwriter would… but long before we have the chops and skills of one. This introduces pressure into the equation… and perhaps that can make all the difference. Its a radical idea that bears some experimentation… one which could possibly shave 1000’s of hours off that 10,000 hour rule… or at least compress it into a period of a few years as opposed to two and a half decades.

Turning Up The Heat…

Lets look at the idea of pressure. We see examples of pressure working to make amazing things happen in the world around us. Coal + Pressure = Diamonds. If you want to bake something… you put it in the over for 1 hour at 350f and let it bake… but you can dramatically speed up that cooking process simply by applying pressure. Ever heard of a pressure cooker? What once took an hour, now takes minutes. The physical world around us can offer great lessons on how similar spiritual and emotional forces work on our own development.

Abdu’l-Baha has an amazing quote which both addresses frequency and to some degree the idea of pressure:
[quote] “The more difficulties one sees in the world the more perfect one becomes. The more you plough and dig the ground the more fertile it becomes. The more you cut the branches of a tree the higher and stronger it grows. The more you put the gold in the fire the purer it becomes. The more you sharpen the steel by grinding the better it cuts. Therefore, the more sorrows one sees the more perfect one becomes. That is why, in all times, the Prophets of God have had tribulations and difficulties to withstand. The more often the captain of a ship is in the tempest and difficult sailing the greater his knowledge becomes. Therefore I am happy that you have had great tribulations and difficulties. For this I am very happy — that you have had many sorrows. Strange it is that I love you and still I am happy that you have sorrows.” Abdu’l-Bahá (Star of the West, vol. 14, no. 2, p. 41.) [/quote]

The idea of being immersed in a sea of tribulation and becoming better as a result makes sense… much more than immersion in books on theories and techniques. Though study has it’s place in the process, nothing can make someone a true expert in any field but through immersion and pressure. (whatever that means for the field of work they are in) Abdu’l-Baha uses a very interesting word choice “The more often…” which seems to imply frequency. If you encountered a storm once in every thousand times you went out, you could never say “I encounter storms quite often”.. but if you encountered storms in five hundred out of a thousand times… well.. I think you get the idea.

From The Real World…

Okay.. so the idea of why putting yourselves in a high pressure situation where you act as if you were already a prolific writer seems to make sense… right? – But are there any real world examples of aspiring writers who do this? Can we cite some examples, statistics, or other data which will back up an idea which seems too hard to do?

Absolutely.

Here are a couple examples from the secular world.

Meet Jonathan Mann

Jonathan has used the strategy of writing a song-a-day to significantly speed the development of both his writing chops and his fan base. How long has he written a song-a-day for? He is now up to song #1610! Yes… almost four and a half years of writing a song-a-day. If you start from video #1 and skip forward through time you will notice the improvement in his craft. Though most of his songs are quirky and comedic in nature, the changes in his skill level can be felt. His production chops improved, his writing improved, video production skills massively improved, and notice the video view count? Yeah… his video counts fluctuate, but a few of the videos have been viewed in the millions of times.. many with well over a hundred thousand views… his song-a-day challenge has helped him build a fan base simply by working daily at improving his craft and posting the result online. Oh.. and did I mention being featured on major news and TV shows? Yeah, very cool for his career. Now imagine the type of improvement you could have, and the fans you could generate by adopting this same method but all while writing songs in a style that moves your heart. (WARNING: Some videos contain objectionable language)

Say hello to Kirby Lauryn

Kirby Lauryn is a singer songwriter from Nashville who set out to write a song-a-day for an entire year. Every day she released another amazing song on YouTube with her gorgeous voice and R&B flair… but she never was able to finish her year of posting a song-a-day to YouTube. Kirby’s songs were getting too much attention, she got so many interviews, and so many key people in the music industry heard her music that she got signed to a major publishing deal, which she announced on day 302! Unfortunately, for the listeners, all the songs she wrote and posted on YouTube have been set to private (except her announcement of the deal, which is the video we have posted above)… most likely so the songs can be shopped and placed with artists. You can check out her EP (the songs are not from the song-a-day series) here.

Introducing Danna Richards

She has embarked on making songwriting her 9-5 job by writing and releasing a song-a-day. She also happens to be a good songwriting friend of one of our interviewees! (Extra Credit if you can figure out who he is and post it in the comments below)

Next up, in part 2 and part 3 of our three part series on songwriting, we profile two Bahá’í songwriters who are both striving for excellence in their craft by employing the challenge of writing a song-a-day.

What are your thoughts? Have you tried to write a song-a-day? song-a-week? What was your experience? We want to hear from you!

Please leave your comments below.

– Photo of songwriter courtesy of Nico Sanchez
– Thanks to JB Eckl for refusing to let me skip a comma

The post Write Time: A 3 Part Series on Songwriting first appeared on 9 Star Media.