I Never Thought I'd Link To A Story By Suzanne Vega

I've always loved her music and her artistry, but since this is primarily a blog about country music, country radio and my humble opinions, I have to say that sending you to her New York Times OpEd is the last thing that I would have ever predicted. However, take my word: this is very relevant and thought-provoking.

"So what is a melody for? I used to think of a melody as a kind of serving tray for the lyrics and the story within the song.... Melody is its own idea, like sculpture. You don’t look at a piece of sculpture to see what is resting on top of it. A great melody has its own design, a beautiful combination of intervals and rhythms usually expressing the emotion of the song. Somehow a melody is connected, like the sense of smell, to memory, so when you hear a song it connects you in a flood of emotions to the time and place of that song. I am sure there are reasons in the brain for this, but as a songwriter I don’t need to know how the brain does it, only that it does."