Sunday 11 April 2010

Who says we never look happy? - photo courtesy of Sue Richards

Regular rehearsals now, preparing for our return concert at Hunton Village Hall on May 8th. We are trying out some new material to add to some old favourites for the concert. Once the concert is over we will be starting recording the new songs for the new CD which we intend to have ready for October to coincide with our concert at St George's on the 16th. No pressure!

Once a CD is finished I always think I will never be able to write anything new ever again and that I've used up every piece of inspiration. Then when I'm least expecting it, an idea pops up and there's a germ of a new song that nags away until I have some words and music more or less sorted out. I find the next stage is to record a demo of the song to see how it hangs together. That gets chopped and rearranged to get the overall structure sounding right- verses, chorus, fills etc. The words then get changed once I try and sing them and find out that they don't scan properly or there's nowhere to take a breath! When the demo is reasonably settled it gets sent to the rest of the band and hopefully to rehearsal where it gets refined again in performance.

Usually the music comes first and then the hard work, for me, is writing the words. So it is a surprise to me that I've just finished a new song that, at the moment, runs to sixteen verses - usually I have trouble getting two or three verses together. The rest of the band haven't heard it yet so a lot of it may end up on the cutting room floor before it gets to the CD.

Regards - John

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