by Rick Lang | Mar 3, 2022 | Lifestyle
As a young boy, I never had much self confidence or belief in myself. That was for good reason. I was a weakling, basically unhealthy with a severe asthmatic condition, not really very good at anything, including school, and things I enjoyed like sports, music etc. I was one of those kids everyone thought was unlikely to succeed in life. I heard it everywhere I went, right through my high school years, and began to believe it myself. Once that seed of doubt creeps in, it’s difficult to make go away. I would try hard but but never seemed get anywhere. My mom would do her best to pick up my spirits when I was feeling low, telling me that giving a strong effort is what counts the most to her. I think “Effort” was the only good grade I landed in school in those days.
When I was much older, I ran across a book about the life of Walt Disney, that stressed that you needed to develop a positive attitude and believe in yourself to realize your dreams and accomplish your life’s goals. Reading those pages inspired me to work even harder and set my sights higher. Walt never gave up chasing his dreams, and went on to archive great things in his lifetime revolutionizing the entertainment industry. He believed anything is possible with a positive attitude, and I started to adapt Walt’s philosophy to my own life. That’s when everything changed in my world, and my failures started turning into successes. By chance during a trip to Sedona Arizona a few years later I ran across another book entitled “The Path To Success Is Paved With Positive Thinking” by Wally Amos. Wally’s words of wisdom reinforced my new-found beliefs and inspired me even a greater level. It was like a new beginning. The door to the future opened up wide and I walked through with a confidence I never felt before!
Since then my life’s accomplishments have been far beyond anything I thought remotely possible. Through hard work, perseverance, and believing in my untapped potential I proceeded to start up my own lumber company (that just celebrated its 30th anniversary and won a business of the year award), became an innovator in the Forest Products industry, and am now an award winning songwriter, as well as a mentor to others. Having a positive attitude was the key element to these accomplishments.
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I eventually decided to write down and share my thoughts/insights on Positive Thinking, how it changed my world, hoping it might help others as well. I even conducted a seminar at the IBMA World Of Bluegrass on the subject. Here are my notes, they have become the blueprint of my life. Editors note: These notes are forthcoming.
by Rick Lang | Mar 3, 2022 | Songwriting
When I write, there are a few priorities I focus on that will have a major impact with the song. On the top of the list is “pouring emotion into your song”. I want the listener to “feel something” when they hear it.
If they do, I feel I have succeeded at some level. That emotion is transferred from the writer, to the singer, to the listener. I’m never really concerned all that much about song mechanics, perfect rhyming, being structurally correct and all that stuff. I want the song to be real and believable. That’s why I mostly write about what I know and familiar with. Real life dramas, real life experiences. Write the truth. Be conversational. Write as you speak!
One example of that was a song I wrote a few years back entitled “Looks Like Up To Me”. It’s based on a book I once ready by Mississippi author Eudora Welty. The story line is about the plight of the south after the Great Depression. Those were the hardest of times and folks were struggling just to survive. They basically had nothing, and things got so bad they could hardly get much worse. I was totally captivated and moved by what I read. That spawned the line “Been down so long, it looks like up to me”…..which became the battle cry of my song. I attempted to tell their story, pouring as much emotion and feeling into the song as I could muster.
It actually took me years to write, with several incarnations, before I felt I effectively captured the spirit of the song. Here are the lyrics, and if there was one thing I would want to impart to all writers, it would be: ‘Write what you feel, feel what you write”.
by Rick Lang | Mar 3, 2022 | Songwriting
I have always been a big fan of Christmas music since childhood, especially all the Christmas classics most of which were written in the 30’s, 40’s and 50’s. To this day millions of people play them over and over during the Holidays….and never seem to tire of them. There is a “timeless” quality to songs like “White Christmas” and “Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow”. They have become, over time, part of the fabric of our society.
About 20 years ago I thought to myself, man we need some new Christmas songs….maybe I can take a stab at writing some. I explored the existing Bluegrass Christmas song catalog, and came across very few, “Christmas Time’s A Comin'” by Tex Logan being one of the most notable. I started spending time trying to come up with new Christmas/Seasonal themes that had not been done before. It was incredibly hard! None-the-less I was determined to come up with some fresh ideas, bring something new to the table.
My very first Christmas tune was called “I Dreamed I Was There”. It was an incredible breakthrough for me personally. I kept at it, and over time wound up with a catalog of about 30 original
Christmas/Seasonal songs. I would block out a few weeks after The Holidays each year focusing on writing new Christmas songs, adding to my growing catalog. Back in 2003 I recorded and released by very first Christmas Album “The Season Of My Heart”, that featured 14 of my home-made Christmas tunes. The response was fantastic, and the album was voted one of the top 25 Holiday music releases of 2003.
I couple years ago I released my 2nd Christmas CD “That’s What I Love About Christmas”. A contrast to my earlier release, this one has the feel of some of the early Christmas Classics. We recorded ten of my new original Christmas tunes, with the help of some great Nashville area musicians and vocalists. The end result exceeded any expectation I had, the title cut winning an award for the IMEA Christmas song of the year.
If you are a songwriter and a fan of Christmas music, you might consider giving it a try yourself. The world needs new Christmas songs to keep the music fresh, and help us to celebrate the Holiday traditions we hold dear. If you do, here are a couple thoughts I’d like to share on the subject.
- Listen to your favorite Christmas songs-music (any genre) to draw ideas from, both lyrically and musically.
- Try to find topics/themes that have not been covered before, or put a new spin on an old song idea.
- Think back to your childhood and remember how much fun it was the first time you saw snow fall, caught snow flakes on your tongue, built a snowman, made snow angels.
- Come up with some original music for your song that has a “seasonal feel” to it. Create an appropriate setting for the lyric.
- Try to find a story to tell, that works well in a winter setting.
- Try to capture the “Spirit” of the Holidays and the “wonders” of the season in your song.
I’ll leave you with the lyrics to a reasonably new Christmas tune I wrote entitled “Home-Made Christmas”. I had been thinking back to my childhood days and the excitement my brothers, sisters and I shared as we looked forward to our upcoming Christmas season. I remembered times when our family was pretty destitute and didn’t have the money to buy nice gifts for each other. That never discouraged us, we all made home-made things for each other with whatever we could find. Some of our most memorable Christmas’ were the ones where we exchanged our home-made gifts….because they were made with love.
by Rick Lang | Mar 3, 2022 | Songwriting
Ever since I got the songwriting bug back in the mid 1980’s, writing Gospel music has been very important to me. I’ve always been a man of Faith, and became fascinated by some of the Bluegrass Gospel songs I’d hear on recordings and at festivals back in those days. Bands like Doyle Lawson and the Bluegrass Cardinals, among others, were putting out some great stuff and were a big influence on my early writing. It was that Southern Gospel sound that really did it for me, and inspired me to write in that style.
My approach to writing Spiritual Songs was to try and come with new ideas/song concepts/musical settings that didn’t sound like every other Gospel song I’d heard before. Needed to be original and innovative to a certain degree. It took a great deal of patience and exploration to create my own unique style of writing Gospel….establish my own identity…..but the hard work paid off.
By 1988 I was pitching some of my songs to a few of my favorite Bluegrass bands, and caught a break when the Lonesome River Band recorded a bluesy Gospel number I wrote entitled “Listen To The Word Of God”. Dan Tyminski sang lead, and guest artist Alison Krauss played fiddle on that cut. Definitely a highlight moment for me as a songwriter. That album “Carrying The Tradition” went on to be awarded IBMA album of the year.
As my catalog of Gospel number grew over time, I decided I’d like to record a Gospel album of my own, featuring songs that no one had recorded yet. It would be an opportunity to express my own Faith through the songs I’d written, and spread the Holy Word of God to the rest of the world.
Jesse Brock and John Miller agreed to produce the recording and we were fortunate to attract a cast of wonderful musicians and vocalists that included Russell Moore, Dale Ann Bradley, Jeff Parker, Barry Scott, and Junior Sisk among several others. The end result exceeded any expectation I had, and helped land my first record deal with Rural Rhythm Records who were pretty hot at the time. Titled “Look To The Light”, the album went on to be nominated for IBMA Gospel Event Of The Year as well as a GMA Dove Award. The album received a great deal of radio airplay, including SIRIUS XM, and folks all across the country wrote and e-mailed me heartwarming notes about how they were “moved” by listening to this collection of spiritual songs. That was very gratifying for me personally.
Another highlight in my career as a songwriter was the release of my 2nd Gospel album Gonna Sing, Gonna Shout in the fall of 2018 on the newly established Billy Blue Records label. Like all my releases the songs on the CD are ones I either wrote or co-wrote with some of the top writers in Bluegrass. The title track was awarded 2019 IBMA Gospel Recording Of The Year and the entire album received a Grammy Award nomination for Best Roots Gospel Album.
As a songwriter this was one of the most rewarding experiences of my life.
Attending the Grammy Awards as a nominee is something I never thought possible and is something I will treasure always.
In recent years I’ve done more collaborating with other writers all over the country, and ironically many of the resulting songs have been Gospel tunes. I can’t help but feel I was meant to write Gospel music, that it is my calling. Have been blessed with cuts by some of my favorite artists including: IIIrd Tyme Out “Just Call On Him”, Larry Stephenson “Best Laid Plans”, Sideline “When The Son Rose Up That Morning”, Daryl Mosely “Do What The Good Book Says” and “He’s With Me”, Rick Faris “See You On The Other Side”
God willing, I hope to record another Gospel album as a follow up to “Gonna Sing, Gonna Shout” someday. As my mom would say: ” If it was meant to be, it will happen”.
Don’t know what the future holds, but will keep writing Gospel music as long as I can hold a pen in my hand.
