Songwriting students showcase work in Saturday concert

Release Date: 11/18/2002. Expired: 11/23/2002

The students of Luke Reed’s Words and Music: The Art of Songwriting class at The Renaissance Center will present their creations in a free concert at 7 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 23, in the center’s Performance Hall. The students will be joined on stage by singer-songwriter Shawn Camp.

The students to perform are Neal Street of Dickson and William Effler of Lyles.

Street has been writing songs for the past 40 years. Raised on Yellow Creek, he has lived and worked in the Dickson area all his life. “Neal has a natural ability to write songs that deal with everyday life that remind the listener of early Johnny Cash, Luke the Drifter, and Townes Van Zandt,” said Reed.

Effler, also known as “T Texas Billy,” worked in country music shows around his home in Townsend, Tenn., before a brief stint in a traveling medicine show. After retiring from a military career, he settled in Lyles. “Although he has only been writing for a short time, Bill displays a gift for writing witty, tongue-in-cheek songs with sing-along melodies,” according to Reed.

Under the tutelage of Reed, a professional songwriter for 14 years, the two students have learned a “little methodology,” but Reed said his goal is “more to encourage them to use (songwriting) to express their feelings and what they see going on.”

While Reed’s day job has him teaching agriscience and greenhouse management at both high schools in Dickson County, his songwriting passion has led to his works being recorded by George Strait, Randy Travis, David Ball and Gary Allen, among others.

Reed says his class is not necessarily about writing a commercially viable song that will scorch the radio airwaves, but more about getting people to write from the heart.

“I encourage the idea that the songwriter makes his own rules,” Reed says. “There’s an old motto in this business: You can make hundreds of dollars a year in songwriting.”

The showcase will give the students the opportunity to perform their songs the way they want them performed.

Shawn Camp was born Arkansas, but a small farm 10 miles outside of Perryville (the county seat of Perry County) was home for a young boy just beginning to find his way into the world, by way of a crooked little path called music.

His mother was a beauty shop operator who at one time had her beauty shop in the basement of the house they lived in, and she cooked southern food as fine as anybody's Granny could. His dad was an ironworker, building bridges, skyscrapers, and nuclear reactor smokestacks across the country. The family moved around quite a bit during Shawn’s youth, so Shawn was always the new kid in school. With no brothers or sisters to play with, Shawn found a constant friend in his guitar, which he started playing at age 5.

Both of his parents loved music and both could sing and play guitar. And they had a great collection of records that Shawn soaked up like a sponge. Influenced by the greats of Country, Bluegrass, Rock-n-Roll, Blues, Ragtime, gospel and every other thing he has logged into his musical soul, Shawn’s music just sounds like him.

A gifted musician, Shawn plays fiddle, guitar, and mandolin, actually he plays a bit of almost everything musical. He’s also a terrific singer.

He moved to Nashville in January of 1987 and worked as a fiddle player with the Osborne Brothers bluegrass band. The first show he worked with them was on the stage of The Grand Ole Opry.

“I’d never been so nervous in my life, my fiddle bow was shaking so bad I could hardly play,” Shawn said. He worked with them for a short stint and then started working with country acts as a sideman in the bands of such artists as Jerry Reed, Alan Jackson, Suzy Boggus, Shelby Lynne and Trisha Yearwood, helping put together Trisha’s first touring band to go on the road as an opening act for Garth Brooks in ’91. Shawn left Trisha’s band in the fall of that year and started to work on learning how to craft a song. Shortly thereafter, he landed a deal on Warner Brothers/Reprise Records and embarked on a solo career.

He recorded two albums for Warner/Reprise in ’93 and ’94. The second one was never released even though the first produced two top 30 singles. He co-wrote two songs on Garth Brooks’ “Sevens” CD, including Two Pina Coladas, which was a number one song for 3 weeks. He also co-wrote the 1999 Brooks and Dunn hit How Long Gone. Other artists who have recorded his songs include John Anderson, Mark Chesnutt, Diamond Rio, Randy Travis, Kenny Chesney, Tracy Byrd, Gary Allan and many more.

For more information on Saturday night’s free performance or on Reed’s songwriting class, contact Elaine Sherrill, senior director of music, at (615)740-5545. The Renaissance Center is an arts and technology education and performing arts center at 855 Highway 46 South in Dickson, just 35 miles west of Nashville on Interstate 40 at exit 172.

Visit the Events - Concerts and Recitals page for more about musical performances.

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