The Story behind “Love, Loretta” and the Writing Process

Background

Happy Music Monday! Here’s the story behind “Love, Loretta”
(iTunes Link, Google Link, Spotify Link) At our Relief Society meeting (Church women’s group) this past fall, we had a service auction where we donated a service and bid on other people’s services. I donated an original composition/recording to be written for a loved one. A good friend of ours, Loretta, bid on my auction item. She and her husband had spent hours recently helping us move and clean our old house. I was very happy that she got my service item, so I could pay her back!! After the R.S. meeting I asked her what she had in mind for the song and she said that she would love to have something special for her parents who are getting older now and struggling with their health.

Loretta’s Parents

When Loretta and I met to discuss the song, we talked for over an hour about her childhood, parents and family. She grew up in a small town in Arizona, and her family owned a ranch. Her Mother was always very musical and still is, which is something Loretta loves about her. She talked about how she would play the piano beautifully and the whole family would hang around and sing. Her parents danced together a lot and even tried to teach the kids how to partner dance. Sometimes the siblings would try to throw each other in the air, attempting some fancy dance step and that usually led to tears and injuries!

Her Dad taught all of the kids how to brand cows, rope…all the cowboy stuff. He was very patient as he taught them and always supportive of any activities they did. Her parents experienced heartache in life and went through some tough times, but always stayed strong in the gospel of Jesus Christ. Her Father now has alzheimer’s, so he can’t remember names and a lot of things, it’s progressed pretty far…but miraculously enough, he still says “I love You” to his wife. Amazing.

After I met with Loretta, it got kind of busy around here! We were settling in to the new house and had multiple weeks of visitors (which was awesome!) and holidays etc. So when I finally sat down to write the song…it was over a month later. I looked at the notes I had written, which were all messy, jumbled and disjointed and attempted to organize them into a coherent song. Here are the steps I took:

The Writing Process

Summarize the notes and stories: I began by summarizing some of the stories and thoughts she had given me into categories and grouping similar thoughts together.

Figure out the main emotion(s) you want to convey: I then wrote down what I thought were the main emotions I wanted to convey through this song. I decided admiration and gratitude were the main emotions for this song.

Decide on the style of the song: The style of the song needed to clearly be some form of Country. I don’t think of myself as a country singer, (although I probably sound more country than I realize!) so I tried to lean that direction the best I could.

Write imperfect, general Lyrics for each section: I then wrote a general paragraph for each verse and for the chorus. I didn’t worry about structure, rhyming and perfection at this point, just a few sentences that would later turn into the verses and chorus. I gave her Mother the first verse, Dad the second and both the 3rd. The chorus should always be the main idea of a song, so I tried to capture that in the chorus. I wanted the song to be simple, so I didn’t write a bridge.

Decide on the key signature, chord progressions & melody for the verses: Once I had a general idea for the feeling, style and words of the song, I sat down and began to work on the key, chord progression and melody. I played around on the piano until I felt I had a good handle on the chords and melody for the verses. I like to work on the verses before the chorus, because I can then get a feel for what might be a nice contrast when I do begin to write the chorus. It’s important for the chorus to stand apart from the verses.

Write the chorus melody and chord progression – For the Chorus I switched up the chords a bit (staying in the same key of course) and wrote a melody that I felt stood out and was different enough from the verses.

Write the sheet music/accompaniment – Once I had the basic chord structure, lyrics and melody outlined, I figured out the piano accompaniment patterns and notes I would use and wrote them in my free sheet music notation program, MuseScore.

Record the song – I then recorded the song; piano and drums first then the vocals. I record using a cakewalk program called Sonar Professional.

The writing process is quite fluid. It’s a very creative process. It also takes patience since it often takes multiple attempts and revisions before I have something I’m happy with. Intuition has a lot to do with it, but there are many rules that can be learned as well. Having a strong musical foundation and knowledge about theory, singing, song writing etc is super helpful.  

Stay tuned for next week when I will share a free sheet music download of Love, Loretta!

Talk to ya later! Marilee