- Whilst back home in December, I spent a lot of my free time playing around with some ideas on the electric piano. I usually song-write on the guitar, so I find it refreshing to write on another instrument and often find it easier to understand, and experiment with, the chordal harmony as I have the visual of the keys. I had recently been introduced to Maggie Rodgers and Joni Mitchell and I was really enjoying their music - I was feeling quite inspired by their individual styles at the time.
- I was keen to write from some of my own experience at the time. With my time at University nearly over, the next year or so is going to be a big change for all of us and I was feeling worried about what that might mean for myself and my partner. Having been together a while, I was more scared about everything fizzling out slowly than it ending in some massive memorable fight. I stuck with this concept a little, but it kind of turned into an 'I'm only scared about losing you because I love you so much' kind of theme.
- Whilst back home, I ended up watching the BBC Dolly Parton documentary and was really taken with it - I've always enjoyed a bit of Dolly Parton, but hadn't fully appreciated just how talented a songwriter she is and just how great her songs are. I was definitely listening to a lot of her over the coming months and I was consequently feeling inspired by her whilst writing Don't Go Quietly.
- When I arrived home in January, I took the time to translate the backbone of the chorus onto the guitar and I found it worked really well (particularly given the slight country influence).
- Whilst using my boyfriend's new synth, I started playing around with some chords and a delay effect. I found I really enjoyed the rhythm of the delay and that it lended itself to lyrical content really well. I (again) spent time translating this effect onto the guitar and found that, although the verse and chorus were in two different keys, they worked really well together. I also developed a primitive bridge at the time, although I was planning to improve upon this at a later date.
- In my next 1 on 1 class, Zack suggested that the song would sound best if the chords were all open chords. The active notes make the song sound softer and more intimate and the more ambiguous nature of these chords help to make the key change less abrupt.
- I spent a few weeks trying to re-work the bridge but to no avail. Renée very kindly offered a lyrics class to myself, Bethany and a few other composers and asked if we could bring along lyrics that we were working on, so I brought along this one. We were given techniques to help us with word-clouds and association, rhyming schemes and allegory/analogy and metaphor which I found really helped the bridge to come together. I had initially thought that the melody in the bridge was what I was unhappy with, but after the lyrics session I realised it had actually been the lyrics.
- At this point, I knew I wanted to produce the song fully and had a few ideas for doing so but I was unsure about wether I could achieve what I wanted to within the timescale. I was planning to work with Matthew on a guitar part and then see if the song could hold up with just the guitar and vocal.