creativity

Oh boy, it’s that time again – I’ve finished up with my main group of songs in production and it’s time to start new songs from scratch. There’s a longstanding debate whether creativity can be forced or can only be allowed to flow naturally when it’s ready. I guess I subscribe to a creative philosophy somewhere in the middle, in that I can definitely shut it down – turn it off, or maybe distract it, if you will. But when I “allow” myself to be creative and am open to receiving creative inspiration I generally don’t have a problem finding it. I don’t generally find myself with the proverbial “writer’s block” for any substantial period of time. I can get stuck, but can work myself out of it over time without too much struggle.

I should qualify this as applying only to music, however, as lyrics are always a struggle for me. Always have been and likely always will be. I absolutely can’t force lyrics or process my way to poetic ideas. So I generally seek out lyric writing partners to do the heavy lifting. That being said, I think I’m pretty good at editing lyrics and adding the right touches to finalize them – it’s the starting from scratch part that’s really tough for me. On the rare occasion though – maybe once or twice per year – a set of lyrics will come to me, almost all at once. I don’t know how or why, but they fly through my head and I have to write them down before I forget. Of course, I’m usually in the car at the time, so rushing home to get lyrics down on paper can be a challenge. It happened again this morning!