00:02You just won Songwriter of the Year, and you're actually going to now be able to take that passion translated...
00:09Song show.
00:13I was going to do that.
00:16I mean Christian.
00:21Translated to a television show.
00:23So talk about being able to sort of share some of your wisdom and your experience through this show.
00:27Yeah, you know, I grew up loving country music and songs specifically.
00:32Didn't know growing up in a small town in Texas that writing songs was a job.
00:37And didn't know that a lot of the songs I loved were written by other people besides the singers.
00:42And a lot of people still don't know that.
00:44You know, my parents don't understand how it works.
00:45They're always asking me, did you sell a song today?
00:48And what's cool about this show Songland that is coming May 28th is it really sort of exposes that.
00:55It's about songwriting and it's unknown songwriters coming forth and they have the opportunity to play these songs for huge artists like John Legend, Jones Brothers, Kelsey Ballerini, and Megan Trainor.
01:08There's a ton of incredible talent that did this show and really gave it a huge platform because them buying into it is going to make other people interested.
01:19Why did John Legend come on a show like this?
01:21Well, to find the next hit and really just showing the way it works.
01:25So songwriters, I'll give you a quick, just, it's not that quick clearly because I've been talking so long about it.
01:31But basically songwriters come forth, they play a song that no one's ever heard, something they wrote.
01:36And then myself, Esther Dean, and Ryan Tedder sit with an artist, and I'll use John Legend as an example.
01:42And we then give them our opinion about what they can do to the song to make it more John Legend.
01:49And that's really what I do every day as a publisher and as a collaborator, as a producer.
01:54I listen to songs and say, look, this chorus might need to be a verse or we might need to lose that second verse or we might need to make this ballad a tempo.
02:02And so we give them that information and then they go back and rework the song and they come back and they get to play it again.
02:08And then John Legend records one of the songs and it comes out with the show.
02:11So you get to see sort of from the beginning to how it gets to the artists and how they made it sound like them.
02:18So it's the most amazing thing that I've ever been a part of.
02:22And just to give songwriters a spotlight has been, you know, a dream come true.
02:26So it's occurring to me, especially in the last several years, artists, you're collaborating a lot with artists.
02:33And I'm wondering if you can just speak into a little bit, artists are really trusting you to help them find themselves in a lot of ways.
02:41Can you speak into that a little bit?
02:42Yeah, you know, I was an artist.
02:44That's the funniest thing about this new way we title people with record deals as artists and not songwriters as artists.
02:50And that's sort of become the lingo.
02:51There are artists and there are songwriters.
02:53But we are certainly all artists and that's just the way we define between the two.
02:58But I was an artist in the 90s on Curve Records and I went through the whole radio tour and I had three failed singles and worked really, really hard chasing that for a long time.
03:07And I think that is a big piece of the trust that comes along with it because regardless of if you have a hit or not, that going on a radio tour, you know, playing to crowds that don't know you, trying to win people over one person at a time, that has a change in country.
03:23It is still a grassroots, you know, genre and people fall in love and then they stay in love.
03:29And so I think that, you know, starting with Casey Musgraves and Old Dominion a few years ago and Sam Hunt, those three things happened around the same time and I was working with all of them simultaneously and they all took off around the same time.
03:43And I think just the fact that I had these relationships and friendships with these people before they became big stars is part of the trust.
03:51It's a dream to be in the room before they take off because it's really hard to jump in, you know, in the middle of a career and for them still to trust you, you know.
04:00I don't know if that answers the question, but maybe it's just because I'm fabulous.
04:03She said you were fabulous as well, Michael.
04:10My husband, y'all can offer a question to him too.
04:15Hey, Jane, this is Kristen.
04:17You know, there was a study that just came out this weekend before the ACM where it talks about the lack of women on country radio.
04:24And it not only talks about artists, but songwriters too.
04:28And there were no women in the category that you were in.
04:32But, you know, we know that they were great.
04:35Absolutely.
04:36So is there something you can do or is there something that the songwriter community can do to kind of encourage more female songwriters?
04:43Well, first of all, that is, it's a question that's come up a lot.
04:47But it's such an important question because how has this happened?
04:50I really don't know.
04:51I mean, you look back on the stuff I grew up with and females dominated.
04:56And when I was really influenced in my 20s, that was the era of the top five artists were females.
05:03Now, the songwriters were still mostly men, but there were, you know, some female songwriters.
05:08It feels so funny that a lot of times people will say at a publishing company,
05:11if a girl goes to a publishing company and plays them songs, that the publisher might say, well, we already have a girl.
05:19It's so confusing to me.
05:23And I don't really know what I can do personally other than just continue to champion these incredible artists,
05:30these incredible songwriters.
05:31We just saw Nicole Gallion win Song of the Year for Tequila.
05:35Nicole Gallion, who very well should have been nominated for Songwriter of the Year,
05:38and I'm not sure why that oversight happened, and it was not lost on me.
05:42But I was really glad to see her when I felt like that was, you know, sort of the validation of saying,
05:47look, we're here, and we are writing the songs that compete with all these boys.
05:51And, you know, they make a difference.
05:53They tell the stories in a different and, I think, mostly better way to, you know,
05:57not to make it about gender, but girls just have a way of cutting to the truth.
06:02I enjoy writing the females the most because they're just so honest.
06:08And, you know, I've written with some of the best and have relationships with Natalie Hemby and Brandon Clark,
06:14Casey Musgraves, and Nicole Gallion.
06:16These are all, like, my best friends.
06:18So I don't know why that happens.
06:19And, you know, it always comes back to the story that females don't test on the radio.
06:25I hear that over and over.
06:26I don't understand what it means because I know what I want to listen to on the radio,
06:31and it's an equal amount of females and males.
06:33Well, I personally want to hear more females.
06:36So I don't know what I can do.
06:38I hope that I am, you know, trying to turn that tide.
06:41And, of course, Casey Musgraves has sort of held that flag and been such an insane ambassador this year for our genre.
06:48And I think that's made a lot of people pay attention.
06:52I don't know how many songs we've heard if we were on shows by.
06:56I know there's been at least one.
06:57Sixteen.
06:57Tell us what it's like to be sitting there interviewing like that and watching your song.
07:04It's amazing.
07:05I never, ever get tired of that.
07:07You know, Miranda just sang a piece of mom's broken heart.
07:09It was like I'd never heard it.
07:10And my mom's in the audience, and she inspired the song, which tells me a lot about my mom.
07:14No, it really is just one of those things.
07:18I feel like a kid, and those things happen.
07:20And I look around, and I look at Michael, and I look at, we're sitting with Luke Laird and Beth Laird and Lori McKenna,
07:25and I'm like, how is this happening?
07:27How is this happening?
07:29And Luke and Barry Dean and Lori just got to see George Strait sing their song, Biden Country Music.
07:35And, yeah, I can't say enough about how I feel about that.
07:39It's the best feeling in the world.
07:40I have chills talking about it.
07:41And, believe me, I'm so hot in this jacket, the fact that I have chills is telling me.
07:48Well, how about winning?
07:51You haven't.
07:51Yeah.
07:52Well, I win at life so much, so.
07:55No, seriously, that was an honor.
07:58The people I was nominated with, although there weren't any females in the category, and I do think that was an oversight,
08:04those are all my closest friends.
08:07And we all hang out all the time and write songs and do family stuff.
08:13You know, Josh Osborne is godparents to my children, and he actually married Michael and I.
08:18He was the officiant.
08:20And so we all just have this incredible community and family of friends.
08:25And so, I mean, you know, I won, and I can give them a hard time about that.
08:30Like, afterwards, they were trying to take a picture, and all the guys were standing there, and they were like,
08:34hey, just a shame.
08:35And I was like, everybody, they want a picture of the winner.
08:37Please move.
08:38No, but we are that close.
08:40Like, we can, you know, and last year, Red Akins won.
08:42It's the same sort of thing.
08:43We're all happy for each other.
08:45Yeah, but I'm glad I won.
08:46I feel really honored to be in that group and to win.
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