Music West 1997 : Next Level Report

SOCAN’S COMPOSE YOURSELF SERIES: EXPRESS YOURSELF WITH RANDY SHARP

written by Eiko Kawano

When Randy Sharp was a teenager, he got a ride into Los Angeles with some friends. With songs he had written in hand, he started knocking on music publishers’ doors. He was turned away. In the following years, he was turned away again and again, and began thinking that the songs he had written were awful. He kept writing. Since then, his songs have been sung by such performers as Anne Murray, Reba McEntire, and Kenny Rogers. On Sunday, he spoke at SOCAN’s Compose Yourself Series. Sharp said wouldn’t assume to tell anybody how to write songs, but he was able to share how he made his years of effort pay off.

Sharp called "free-form mumbling" one of the best ways to get ideas. He said he’ll take a hand recorder on a long drive and basically talk to himself. He also plays on instruments he’s not proficient with, to trick his fingers into finding new chord changes and sounds. He said that the elements of a song could best be provoked by free-form, advising songwriters to quit thinking about writing a song and let things emerge.

Recently Linda Ronstadt cut one of his songs that was written five years ago and nobody wanted. Sharp said that sometimes a song won’t be right for an artist or the current music scene, but can become a success years later. He said that this was one aspect of songwriting that has kept him encouraged over the years. He is the kind of writer that is still working on material he wrote ten years ago. Sharp said he’ll go over and over a song until it feels just right. He’ll spend an hour getting the perfect rhyme; using it creatively, setting it up differently. He does not take songwriting lightly and rarely writes songs that do not get re-worked.

Sharp said that the main point of songwriting should be to invoke an emotional response in the listener. He said that mistakes other songwriters often make is to put their experiences specific to themselves into their work while forgetting to draw on emotions people will recognize. He advised a writer to try to become the person they’re trying to move. He said: "It’s a pretty magical thing if you pull that off".

After years of paying his dues, Randy Sharp’s commitment to the integrity of his songwriting certainly seems to have been worthwhile. Yet success to him has never been the point. He respects songwriters who take chances, who let their work be more than hit records; who are in the business of songwriting because they love writing songs.