A couple of weekends back, I had the pleasure to accompany my friend and musical compadré, RYKKA to the Swiss Eurovision Finals. It was very exciting for me to see my good friend up there on stage looking like a million bucks and singing for Switzerland. She composed the song "The Last of Our Kind" specifically for the Eurovision Song Contest, and it won for Switzerland. You can see her fabulous performance "here." Rykka (Christina Rieder) and I have been friends for a long time, we met almost a decade ago at a music conference around 5am singing together in a circle of music makers of all kinds, instruments jamming along spontaneously on the penthouse floor of a hotel filled with music industry people from all over. We were friends from the moment our voices melded!! Little did I know that our future lives would parallel each other as she too would be spending her time between Canada (B.C) and Switzerland (Zurich.)

Some of you may be wondering why I am writing about Rykka's performance and not my own? That is a fair question, seeing as I am also a Singer and Song-writer. I have, in the past auditioned for Ireland's Eurovision (did not make it, obviously) and a couple of years ago, I auditioned for Canada's Got Talent. A few years back, I even auditioned for Cirque De Soleil. So I have been down those "audtition" roads and am clearly not cut out for such things. People ask me if I get nervous, well the most nervous I have ever been is during the auditioning process. I can sing for a crowd made up of hundreds, even thousands, but when four people are there, judging me, I clam up. Anyway, more RYKKA!!! My friend has been VERY busy since winning for Switzerland, but she managed to answer a few questions I had... So here they are!

1) What are your hobbies?

R: Whenever I am not making music, I am making something. If it's not one thing, it's another. I Love to make costumes, if it's like Christmas holidays, I Love to bake. I'm in Love with making! Haha.

2) How do you find happiness?

R: I think that being in nature is a great way to find happiness. My favourite place is in the mountains, or in the forest near my house. I relate happiness to being centered and at peace. A few nights ago, I couldn't sleep because my head was buzzing and I pictured myself floating over a blue lake. It totally worked and I could clear my mind and I fell asleep.

3) What was the name of the first song you ever wrote and what was the chorus?

R: When I was 16 my boyfriend was 21 haha...my parents were cool with it actually. But anyway, he was so lazy. I wrote a song called Runaway for him, telling him that he is missing out on life by just sleeping and being lazy all the time.

4) What would you do if you saw someone litter?

R: When I see someone litter I'm like "Hello! It's 2016 not the '80's!" Who didn't get the memo? I just can't get into the mind frame of not caring about abruptly littering. Here in Switzerland people are really good about recycling, when I see someone throw a plastic bottle in the garbage, I freak out haha.

5) What is one of the most important things for you to do to prepare for Stockholm?(Stockholm is where the Eurovsion final will take place)

R: I'm mentally preparing myself. I'm also working to make my voice stronger. I'm taking voice lessons for the first time in years and really fine tuning them.

Of course we could go on and on with more questions, and perhaps after Stockholm we will do an update. IN the meantime, keep your eyes and ears open for my girl here, you will be hearing more, for sure!

Thanks for reading,

Love

Lindsay

There are over a billion scraps of paper, hiding in various corners, under couch cushions, in drawers and jeans pockets, showing in plain sight on dresser tops, change bowls and dash boards. These various little notes may contain a prophetic lyric that could change your world, or they could stay crumpled forever; these are the poetic scraps that we song-writers collect over the course of our life-times. "You never knows" just sitting there, folded waiting for the perfect melody.

Who knows if some of these notes will ever be read again, or used. How many notebooks can one person have anyway? There are notebooks in every corner of my house, and scraps of paper with dreams and ideas in most of the bags I own, perhaps they are there for when lyrics come no more. Maybe the act of writing, is in and of itself the only point. To use or not to use, might not be the question at all, but rather to write to write and to write some more.

In times of technology, like today, an Iphone is very handy, when the combination of pen, paper and or napkin can not be found. Again, my notes section is filled to the brim with lyrical sentiments, and the recording device has at least a hundred started musical ideas. Some days when I am on a train to the next performance I just listen to the songs, erasing ones that have no real effect on me. So many ideas deleted without another moment of thought. On the rare occasion that I find something that I deem true and worthy, I will sit with it and my guitar and work it out. Mostly though, I sit with my guitar and a brand new song is born. from scratch, with no help from torn up pieces of paper or half ideas kept hidden in a tiny machine.

One of the most common of questions for a song-writer is "What comes first, the melody or the lyrics?" or "How do you write a song?" Most would agree that when a song comes, it usually comes in one long whoosh, from a magical place unknown. To be sure, there is no absolute way to compose a piece of music, there is no perfect equation that will work every time. Some songs come in moments, and some take hours, months even, to "complete." I put complete in quotes because every song can be changed up a bit. Perhaps one time you start out with the first verse, sometimes it feels better to start out with the Chorus. One band will add a catchy keyboard riff in the middle 8 (or bridge) and another might replace the keys with mandolin, changing the sound entirely. Of course we song-writer's do have certain styles, but again nothing is 100%, so where I usually add a bridge (or middle 8) in a song, I do not always find the perfect spot for one. And that is okay.

Some years ago, I had the rarity of meeting Bono of the band "U2" in Ireland, at a hotel in the middle of nowhere, where he was attending a friends wedding. We talked about music, I had only just written and recorded my very first song and conveniently had it with me, to share. He was very kind and gave me a moment of his time and a few words of advice (which I had asked for.) One thing that always stuck with me was that the bridge of a song should stand out apart from the song and that it should actually be the best part of the song, even better than the chorus. So yeah, I really like to add one, but I always have his words in the back of my mind. If I can not find something extra-ordinary, I will not add one at all.

Which brings me to my next point... Co-Writing a song can also be an amazing experience. I highly recommend getting out there and finding someone to write with. Two heads are better then one in most cases, so if the opportunity comes up to do this, I encourage you to do it! Brock Zeman and I wrote this song "Ships" together and it could be the most universally liked song that I have ever performed. It was a great writing session with Brock and way easier than I had ever thought it would be.

We lost a troubadour singer & song-writer on the weekend, Ron Hynes from Newfoundland, Canada. He was also called "Man of a Thousand Songs." And what a writer indeed. I remember playing on the same stage as Ron, at The Newfoundland Folk Festival, as part of a song-writers circle...I mean how lucky could a girl be, sharing a stage with a legend like himself. It was sad news for many people out there, who have all lived lives to the soundtrack of Ron's music. Most would know him for "Sonny's Dream." It had been months since I wrote a full song, some might say writer's block, but I am not so sure... In any case, I will leave you all with my new song, a tribute to Ron. "The Likes of You." Ron, I thank you.

Eurovision, Rykka and Me

Birth of a Song

BLOG