Skip to main content

Scott Alarik

Help Scott spread the word

Saturday, June 23, 2012

1:00 PM to 4:00 PM

Portland, ME

The Roots of Songwriting, discussion with live and archival music.

Guitar Grave

441 Congress Street Portland, ME

Songs were always created by writers who sang, but the idea of the singer-songwriter is fairly new. How did it evolve? Traveling the ancient tributaries of tradition, folksinger, songwriter, and author Scott Alarik explores the origins of songwriting: ballads that became the foundation for all our storytelling; the way songs were used in people’s daily lives; and the beginnings of professional songwriting, from madrigals to broadsides to the popular songs of Robert Burns and Stephen Foster. Then Alarik takes us into the faster currents of the music industry, to see how it changed songwriting and led to the birth of the modern singer-songwriter. Along the way, he’ll examine what makes a song last, how lyrics are different than poems, how tools like imagery, alliteration and metaphor evolved, and what the greatest songwriters say about the songwriting process. Alarik uses live and archival recorded music, and a lifetime of stories, to create a vibrant, free-form conversation.

Sponsored by Maine Songwriters Association. $20 for public and regular MSA members, $15 for full and lifetime members.

Map this location

export this event to my calendar