After the fact, my wife was errrr….puzzled by my decision to enter a lyric contest held quarterly by American Songwriter Magazine. “You don’t need a contest, people who matter to you know you can write a song. You don’t need some strangers at a magazine judging you.” But I found their ads irresistible. A beautiful wood carved Ovation guitar. A paid weekend in Nashville. And some fun studio recording time. And I remembered and missed the affirming feeling of encouragement from the Long Island Songwriter’s Circle so long ago.
I paid my $15 and waited. Every time my inbox filled with an email from American Songwriter Magazine, my heart jumped a bit, but alas it was only their weekly newsletter. Finally about 6 weeks later, the header announced the contest winners.
Now not to be a sore loser, but I noticed looking over the list of winners, none of which were me, that all winners and honorable mentions were predominately male. So I did a little study.
I have a man’s name, so I doubt I was outcast because of my gender. Yet…today when I saw an ad pop up on Facebook to enter the next lyric contest, I felt a need to warn other female songwriters, as the screen shot above shows.
To be fair, 2017 was a FAIR year for women songwriters in this contest! (not shown)
And on another note, because I’m not waiting for the approval of any contest judges, I wrote a quick one day song last Saturday, which you can view on my instagram https://www.instagram.com/tv/B-5XqsyhS00/?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet or click photo below. “She’s Never Been To Paris”
