Hello, my fellow creators of song! I am thrilled to be with you this year to guide you on your journey through storytelling using melody and lyric. We are going to start out just like Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz…right at the beginning on that first yellow brick! No matter where you are in your craft you will be perfect in this class. Also, don’t worry if you don’t play an instrument. When it comes down to pairing up writers for co-writing, I’ll make sure you are with a writer that is stronger in melody if your strengths are in lyric, and vice versa.
Our days will start out with some exercises to get the old imagination fired up and put you in the mood to write! Following these 10-minute exercises I will give insights into my writing process and the hard and fast rules of song construction. This is when you can ask all kinds of questions about songwriting.
After we get through the instruction part, I would like to offer a chance for you to have one of your songs critiqued. They can be partial songs—maybe something you’ve been working on and need a little help getting over a hurdle—or they can be complete. If you don’t have a song for a critique, that’s okay too. These opportunities are great teachable moments and meant to be helpful, not hurtful. So, for these critique sessions, do not bring a song you’ve written that you think is done and you are satisfied with. Bring a song that has some issues, maybe one you think almost hit the mark but missed somehow. Depending on the size of the class, we may be doing a couple of critiques a day.
We will be writing a song! After all the teaching parts are done, I will split you up into writing teams and coach you all as you take off writing. This process is always a miracle, like a flower budding and blossoming before your very eyes. By the end of the workshop it is my hope that you will have a song or two to add to your catalog.
Here’s what you will need:
- A notebook and writing utensil
- An instrument if you play one
- Some song ideas if you have them
- A song you might want critiqued.
I look forward to sharing some time with you
Instructor Bio
Donna Ulisse is a key figure in the bluegrass, folk and acoustic music scene as a singer and songwriter. Her single “It Could Have Been the Mandolin” from the album Hard Cry Moon topped the Bluegrass Unlimited chart at #1 for two months in a row in 2016, and the album topped the Roots Music Report chart at #1. In 2019 she signed with the new record label Billy Blue Records which is home to some of bluegrass music’s brightest stars. Her twelfth album, Time for Love, released in November of 2019, is her second album produced by bluegrass legend Doyle Lawson. It debuted at number 3 on the Billboard bluegrass chart.
She was a featured guest on RFD-TV’s Simply Bluegrass show hosted by Ricky Skaggs, which featured the biggest names in the genre. She also did a month-long stint in 2016 as host of “Bluegrass Ridge,” a video television show on the Heartland TV Network, which has several of her videos in regular rotation.
Donna’s past albums have charted prominently in the Bluegrass Unlimited charts, The Folk DJ National chart, The Americana Music charts and Billboard bluegrass chart, while her 2012 Christmas album All The Way To Bethlehem was called “a masterpiece” by Kyle Cantrell, host of Bluegrass Junction on SiriusXM Satellite Radio. Edward Morris, writer for CMT.com dubs her “one of the most commanding voices in bluegrass music.”
As a songwriter, Donna has had her songs recorded by Claire Lynch, Darin and Brooke Aldridge, Doyle Lawson, Ralph Stanley II, the Larry Stephenson Band, and Volume Five, to name a few, and one of her songs appeared on the Del McCoury Band’s 2014 Grammy-winning album Streets of Baltimore. In 2016 she was named IBMA Songwriter of the Year and in 2017 her song “I Am A Drifter” (recorded by Volume Five) earned her the IBMA Song of the Year award. She was named the SPBGMA Songwriter of the Year in 2018 and 2022, and the SPBGMA Female Vocalist of the Year in 2022.
As a teacher, Donna also authored the book The Songwriter in Me: Snapshots of My Creative Process, and is the founder of Lil House Songwriting Workshops offering aspiring songwriters the opportunity to write with her and other pro writers in order to improve their skills. She also keeps a busy touring schedule playing festivals and concert venues with her band.