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charlene · 06-05-2023, 10:02 AM

Writing: a life's work

Most of Lightfoot's songs were written over months, sometimes years, and he devoted decades of his life to the practice. In a 2010 interview, Lightfoot assigned a numerical value to his songwriting process, telling the Montrealer that it was "15 per cent inspiration and 85 per cent perspiration. I will stand by that — it's hard work. Writing is a solitary process, and it can be exciting and draining at the same time. I wrote songs under contract for 33 years, and now I can relax a little and focus on our performances."

In another 2010 interview, Lightfoot described recording 20 albums under contract as "pretty rough work… That caused a lot of the bumpiness too, because it caused me to be isolated and cut myself off from my people and my kids, so I could work on the songs. I wanted to do it because by that time I was supporting a band, was supporting a crew, and had acquired two or three children. But I don't regret any of it."

Lightfoot was under contract and writing was his job. I have always appreciated his matter-of-fact honesty about spending 33 years and 20 albums doing that work and the effort that he put into it, that it was thrilling, isolating and exhausting. It was also labour. He couldn't afford to be too high-and-mighty to turn up his nose at People magazine or to make a trip to the paint store to find what he was looking for in "Bitter Green" (just a guess on my part).

But in that work, in these songs, we see how beauty — or the illusion of it — can be coaxed from violence and tragedy, the mundane, the everyday and the unexpected. For 65 years, he showed us how beauty belongs to all of us, not just the classically educated or the affluent and cultured. Art is for everybody in the landscape of Gordon Lightfoot's greatest hits.

06-05-2023, 10:02 AM	#83
charlene Moderator Join Date: May 2000 Posts: 16,001	Re: R.I.P Gord Writing: a life's work Most of Lightfoot's songs were written over months, sometimes years, and he devoted decades of his life to the practice. In a 2010 interview, Lightfoot assigned a numerical value to his songwriting process, telling the Montrealer that it was "15 per cent inspiration and 85 per cent perspiration. I will stand by that — it's hard work. Writing is a solitary process, and it can be exciting and draining at the same time. I wrote songs under contract for 33 years, and now I can relax a little and focus on our performances." In another 2010 interview, Lightfoot described recording 20 albums under contract as "pretty rough work… That caused a lot of the bumpiness too, because it caused me to be isolated and cut myself off from my people and my kids, so I could work on the songs. I wanted to do it because by that time I was supporting a band, was supporting a crew, and had acquired two or three children. But I don't regret any of it." Lightfoot was under contract and writing was his job. I have always appreciated his matter-of-fact honesty about spending 33 years and 20 albums doing that work and the effort that he put into it, that it was thrilling, isolating and exhausting. It was also labour. He couldn't afford to be too high-and-mighty to turn up his nose at People magazine or to make a trip to the paint store to find what he was looking for in "Bitter Green" (just a guess on my part). But in that work, in these songs, we see how beauty — or the illusion of it — can be coaxed from violence and tragedy, the mundane, the everyday and the unexpected. For 65 years, he showed us how beauty belongs to all of us, not just the classically educated or the affluent and cultured. Art is for everybody in the landscape of Gordon Lightfoot's greatest hits.