June VOCAL Meeting

After our formal yearly elections, the June 9 VOCAL meeting was an animated discussion about writing, creating the discipline and time for writing, and considering songwriting and creativity exercises.

I brought in a songwriting exercises handout from Joel Mabus”s website.

http://www.joelmabus.com/songwriting_exercises.htm

This was intended to spur discussion, and it succeeded. I also shared with the members  some thoughts I had considered since our recent workshop with Gretchen Peters. It has been my feeling for a long time that people who “make it” in the business of songwriting have a strong commitment to becoming  great at it.  But one of the things that has become very clear for me is there is a daily discipline of writing. And it’s not abut writing a whole song everyday, but it is about writing something!  I have a poet friend who made a commitment for a year in his life to write 100 words everyday. The material he came up with was engaging, insightful and moving.

So the group’s discussion was spirited and inspirational. It was one of those meetings I watch once it’s over. The members continue to interact and taking time to leave. I trust this means the meeting was engaging. It certainly was for me.