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REVIEW OF SONG WRITING WORKSHOP

I went out to the Black Board tonight, and all this week for a free songwriting workshop.

The workshop was put on by Tom Rockwell, business manager at Trout’s Nightclub, and the proprietor of the Blackboard stage and basement where the workshop was held.  Rockwell (as he is known by all) is always on the move making sure everything is going right, to him everybody is important and everything that is going on in the place is meaningful. I am but a rank amateur at music but I love writing songs as a hobby, for fun and I tell you my skills were modified 10 fold by this exiting 3 day workshop.  Some of the finest country music song writers in the world came in and helped out, including Red Simpson.

Rockwell did an outstanding job and was there filming and or recording the class the whole time. We each took turns in the “hot seat” where we got real world stage experience in front of the class and interested on-lookers.  I admit I had some bad stage freight, but everybody made me feel right at home and by the end of the third night I was fairly confident, lots of encouragement… unfortunately I was just too tired to perform my tunes. I did get some good performance early in the week though, so I came out of it feeling pretty good about my stage experience. I learned that song writing is a lot about writing and rewriting lyrics over and over until you get the product you desire and then working out the music with other musicians. Some of the Blackboard Playboys were there with high degree of musical expertise and were very helpful in this process.. This was like an inspirational work shop for song writing! A fun, and highly recommended, experience.  That’s-a-foe-show---

Watch the Trout’s’ Blackboard calendar for future free workshops