A Quote by Stella Mozgawa

I've tended to write lyrics alone. The emotion of the melody comes first. But what stimulates us are usually these dreamy minor chords. We all feel we're an emotional band as far as writing, but the specific emotions tend to be of a melancholic, or of an almost sinister-yet-beautiful nature. I never think of our songs as being about boy-girl relationships or ultra-female. The music comes from a universal place.
I let the music set the tone of the lyrics.I allowed myself to write more about relationships and emotions, in a girly way almost.
Believe it or not, people went so far as to suggest that I might not be able to write songs anymore because now I am married. I tried to explain again that there are other things to write about besides boy meets girl, girl meets boy, boy breaks up with girl, girl is sad.
Ever since I released my first album, I've tried not to use minor chords as the main element in songs. The way I sing is too melancholic.
I think emotion is just anything that is emotional, you know, people can feel with music. Music is already so emotional, like the strings, the chords, and the notes and the melodies and stuff. And then you throw on a topic that everyone can relate to. That's gonna be real music.
I didn't want the lyrics to be about specific things in my life, I wanted them to be about generalised experiences I'd had. So when I'm writing about relationships or somebody leaving you or something, a lot of lyrics are partly about failed relationships I'd had, but they were also about my Dad, and being abandoned as a kid.
I write the music because I can't really write lyrics. But I can write chords like Robin's never heard of. So I provide the music for them to add the lyrics to.
So take a new approach as to how you feel emotions. It's not about the right emotion or the wrong emotion; it's about honoring the way that you're feeling. We tend to think that being sensitive is a weakness, but it really gives us an ability to be compassionate and to appreciate so many things in the world.
At first, I was using my sister Susan's lyrics, as I could not write myself, only the music. And then one day, she and I had a fight, and she threatened to take away the lyrics from all the songs that I put the lyrics to, so it was that day that I began writing my first lyric to the music.
I saw that something changed in terms of the way I approach writing. I don't know. Before, everything was just sort of pieced together; and more and more nowadays I'll have complete songs - chords, lyrics, a melody - and we'll apply to those songs what we feel is required. That has happened much more on Humbug album than on any of the others.
When I'm writing with John Leventhal, the music that he's written mostly comes first. And I'll write the lyrics and the melody.
I never write a tune before the lyrics. I get the lyrics and then I write around them. Some people write music and the lyrics come along and they say, 'Oh yeah, I've got something to fit that.' If that's the way people write songs, I feel like you might as well just go to the supermarket.
When I write songs, I like to write lyrics first, and I think that's different from a lot of singer-songwriters. But I heard Sammy Cahn was asked what comes first, the lyrics or the music, and he said, 'The paycheck.'
I don't know why, but there's a certain element of panic in writing lyrics that I'm not sure I enjoy. I don't write lyrics first, ever. I've never done that. So, in a sense, the lyrics are a bit of an afterthought - it's music first.
I have always struggled with expressing emotion, I used to think I was a very hard person but music has shown me I'm a big softy! Writing songs to me really is like writing a diary, it's very private and very personal. My most emotional songs have been written alone in a locked room, I'm able to express myself there.
Lyrics are what I tend to tear hair out over and they're where I tend to feel weak musically, if I'm being very honest. It is not something I feel like I know anything about; I would not consider myself a writer. I just want to sing, I just want to sing a melody, I just want to feel a melody, and be part of the song, and everything else is not so important.
When I write, it is always the melody that comes first, and it just happens to be the case that the most beautiful tunes are sad, and the lyrics follow the mood of the melody.
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