I Might Be Getting Back Into Music!

The last song I wrote was sometime in the 2010's. I honestly don't remember and I didn't keep records. For the last few years of my songwriting pursuit, I participated in FAWM (February Album Writing Month), in which participants are challenged to write 14 songs in 28 days. I sorely needed that challenge, because I was rapidly running out of songwriting steam. 

In the three or four years I participated, I estimate that I came up with maybe six or seven decent songs (out of 42-56 of them). Embarrassingly, I no longer remember if it was three years or four. By the time it all came to a close for me, I wrote one called "The Last Song", because I knew I was done for good. I quit due to a combination of no good ideas and waning interest. Plus, my husband had begun to lose interest in recording, too, and an unrecorded song is worthless. The last of my FAWM songs we recorded was done half-heartedly and never finished. The second to the last of my recorded FAWM songs ended up with a rough (lo-fi) demo only:

Well, as things go, my husband is looking to get back into music. His dream is for us to do one last album. Let me just say at the outset that I'm really not interested in doing that. But I agree that a joint project could be good for us, so I'll give it a go.

The truth about any creative pursuit is that the muscles have to be constantly exercised or they wither away. It's the same for writing prose, which is why my best (only?) advice for new writers is to write, write, write. So, it's been so long since I've sat down to write a song that it's gonna be hard. Songwriting, while it's still "writing", is a whole different animal from what I've been doing the last (almost) decade.

As luck would have it, we've dredged up one of my non-recorded FAWM songs to do first. I was given a choice of four, but I really only like one of them. I'm a pretty harsh grader of my own work. 

The true test will come when I try to sing it. While I've known it to be true that singing the high notes is more difficult as we age, I learned that it's because our vocal cords lose elasticity and our lung capacity decreases. (Also, smoking doesn't help.) There are exercises one can do to not sound like 83-year-old Paul McCartney struggling to sing Let It Be. I won't torture either of us by posting the video. And hydration is important. I suggested to my husband that we just do the song in a lower key, but he insists I can do it. 

This may all amount to nothing, but I'm semi-willing to try. Who knows? It's possible I could attempt to write something new. But everything always sounds great in theory. I no longer have callouses on my fingers, and I'm not sure I can tolerate the pain of redeveloping some. Just like me, my fingertips have grown soft. And I can't write an a capella song.

Stay tuned. No one will be more surprised than me if this thing actually happens.