Igloo Music Songwriting Festival 2013 an “awesome weekend”

Above: some of the fabulous songwriters who took part in the 2013 Songwriting Course.

“Awesome weekend”

This September Igloo Music UK hosted a songwriting weekend, where songwriters of various genres and levels of experience came together to develop their craft and push their creativity forward. Starting on the Friday evening, the group gathered together around the fire to discuss what they wanted out of the weekend, and how they intended to use the time to develop their songwriting. Igloo teaches that goal setting is important to make sure creative people remain fulfilled and their time is productive. To end the evening, course participants shared some of their songs and songwriting ideas, and gained feedback from each other about their impressions of the material, and ideas for moving the pieces forward.

 Artful

On Saturday morning, we were privileged to have the fantastic Artful as guest speaker. As 4 times Ivor Novello award winner, having worked with artists such as Craig David and Ed Sheeran amongst others, Artful was inspirational – “there’s no right way to write a song”. He discussed his approach to songwriting, music career and early years as a young musician, sharing with us how he struggled with the expectation that he would study to become an architect with his desire to be a full time musician. Artful told us about how he worked together with a very young Craig David to push him out of his comfort zone as a club MC to create the songs the world later came to love on the Born To Do It album. Recommending stepping out of your comfort zone to create, Artful mentioned that he even picked up a ukulele recently, as trying different instruments you are not familiar with can get you thinking differently – a great tip for guitarists, pianists and other musicians who are

highly trained on their instruments. As well as creative strategies, Artful explained to the group how he uses technology to express his musical ideas, as well as traditional instruments and other artists and singers.

Many songwriters on the course were hugely inspired by what Artful had to say… You can connect with him on Twitter, Facebook and Soundcloud, and on his artist website.
@ThisIsArtful
https://www.facebook.com/artful
https://soundcloud.com/ThisIsArtful
http://artful.dj/

 Chris Wood

Session bass player for River Studios and Lovetown Records, Chris has been a professional industry player since his teens. By the age of 17 he was Billy Ocean’s musical director, and has toured the world with bands from Odyssey to The Spice Girls ever since.

Chris gave a presentation about working together with other musicians both in the studio and in live rehearsal and performance situations. By giving a demonstration about how significantly one instrument, such as the bass guitar, can change the feel of a track, course members were inspired to think in greater depth about clothing their songwriting ideas.

An interesting discussion followed about the importance of respect and effective communication when working with other musicians in any setting.

 Greg Mudd

On Sunday morning, Igloo team member Greg Mudd treated the group to a fun, interactive and thought provoking session on rhythm and harmony. The group explored various different types of rhythms, and created their own beats using various Western and African percussion, and played together in small groups. Demystifying some music theory, Greg coached the group on how to use knowledge of harmony to create chord progressions in a theoretical way. This can be a great tool for getting songwriters out of their usual habits, and trying new things. The group enjoyed creating chord progressions in small groups and playing together, and later used the content of this morning session in their Sunday collaborations.

 Song Sharing

There is something very primal about songs around a log fire of an evening, and these sessions are always fruitful, productive, encouraging and inspirational.
Songwriters shared an idea of a song each day, based on the workshops held over the weekend, and each gave feedback of their impressions, and thoughts for moving material forward. Some pieces were also work-shopped as a group with tutor support. Great feedback was given by the participants of these sessions, and huge progress was made by all who took part. Collaborations were shared and the process by which songs were created was discussed, sensitively and constructively.

A number of fantastic songs were created over this weekend, songwriting partnerships made, and new approaches for all who took part were taken away and applied, adding to the toolbox songwriting technique. Thank you to everyone who took part – it was a very enjoyable weekend for the team as well as the course participants.

Categorised in: Song Writing