Elliott Smith was probably one of the songwriter/singer who was bestowed with divine gift of music. He is popular among the masses for his Academy Award nominated song "Miss Misery" which is part of the soundtrack for the movie "Good Will Hunting". Although he died young but his music has endured the waves of time. This post is inspired by his interview posted on youtube. In the interview he is asked general questions about his music and song writing tips for budding musicians. Although his answers sound rather simple but they do carry a certain hidden weight within them.
The first question is about his method to write & compose music for a song. He simply states that there isn't any methodical approach he uses. In his own words "It's just the divine force, and if you don't block it up it'll come out and surprise you". So does it mean we all have the ability to surprise ourselves if we just allow ourselves to be free? The answer of course is yes! I don't remember author of a quote but quote goes something like "the biggest obstacle in our way is us". Our mind is capable of dissecting an emotion or a situation into thousand possible consequences. These consequences wane down the actual emotion or the situation to the point of oblivion. In the end the whole exercise of contemplating results in thinking about possible failures. More often than not these failure tend to overshadow everything else. But if we just let this "divine force" (you can give it different names God, gut, instincts, prayer etc) guide us and block all the possible failures, we may end up surprising ourselves everyday. I know, it is easy to say "be natural" but the effort requires every ounce of truth and self-trust within ourselves.
The other question I am going to talk about deals with advice for songwriting students. To quote "It's just easy if you quit thinking about what other people want to hear......if you just keeping finding new things.....things you personally like about music and put it into the blender and see what comes out". He further adds "if you like it then there must be something good about it because you liked it!" This deals with truth and trust from within you. These two have to come from within you as these are intrinsic to your own character. We may try to run away from these but they are always lurking behind our blanket of self-mistrust. Too often we let the cacophony of doubts drown the sound of self-confidence. We are too eager to trust the self-mistrust! But letting our self-confidence feels like a gigantic burden to carry during the life. It often takes something new and difficult to shake us out of self-mistrust. So something new (or in other words a change) is the key to the release of our own self. The more often I can feel or do something new the more I would give myself chance to release me. I don't know what will come out but if I do like it I'll be happy, right?
If you're interested in watching this video (it is a bit blurry though)...........
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