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Loren Marsters

Lyrics...



I don't remember when I read the interview.

I do remember that it was just a month or so ago.

I don't remember the name of the Tony award winning lyricist who was interviewed.

I do remember he said that before he wrote lyrics in a show, he would write the dialog of the scene that would be the the subject of the lyrics, and from that dialog write the lyrics.

When I read that it made perfect sense.

I had never tried writing lyrics that way before. I was hesitant to try it because I thought it was doing double work and it would take too much time.

Well, with this new musical I'm writing...

Guess what?

It Really Works!!!

Who'd a thunk it?!

A Tony award winning lyricist (wish I could remember the guy's name) really know what he's talking about - lol!

As a matter of fact, for me, following his example made lyrics easier to come up with and improved their flow.

You especially need that when you're converting a monolog which is the communications between a Forward Observer requesting artillery support from a Fire Control Officer in an Fire Support Coordination Center -- aka, a sandbag bunker, 3 to 5 miles from the position of the Forward Observer (yeah, definitely a "you-had-to-be-there" situation)... into lyrics.

The monolog works.

It's writing lyrics that somebody who has absolutely no understanding of what you're talking about, will understand what you're talking about, that is the big challenge.

I'm sure smart musical play lyricists have been using the "write the scene first, then covert it to lyrics" technique for years. I'm a little slow, so I just discovered it - lol!

Give me some feed back on how you write lyrics. Would love to know how others do it.

Thanks for visiting my website and reading my blog!







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