Songwriters on Process

Deep Talk About the Songwriting Process.

In-depth interviews with songwriters about their songwriting process. That's All. No talk of band drama, band names, or tour stories. Treating songwriters as writers, plain and simple. By Ben Opipari, English Lit Ph.D.

Recent Episodes

Kevin Drew (Broken Social Scene)
May 14, 2026

Kevin Drew (Broken Social Scene)

"We should see how many disco records were made in the winter," Kevin Drew of Broken Social Scene said. And with that, we ventured into the intersection of songwriting and meteorology: how weather patterns and temperature aff...
Jena Malone
May 6, 2026

Jena Malone

Jena Malone had me at the poet Edna St. Vincent Millay. When the actor/songwriter started our discussion talking about Millay and the profound effect poetry has on her songwriting process, I swooned. There’s a theme here: I’v...
Maya Hawke
April 29, 2026

Maya Hawke

All you need to know about Maya Hawke's dedication to wordcraft is summed up in this memory: "The day I fell in love with my husband was the day we got into a fight about free verse poetry versus formal poetry." (Hawke's husb...
Lolo Zouaï
April 27, 2026

Lolo Zouaï

As a bilingual artist, Lolo Zouaï uses both English and French on her new album Reverie . Sometimes it's because the meaning of a word in one language is more precise for the song, while other times the sound of the word fits...
Donovan Woods
April 21, 2026

Donovan Woods

Donovan Woods is the master of the pull quote when it comes to the songwriting process. His words are wise counsel for any songwriter. To wit: "A good song asks questions rather than provides wisdom," and "When I have writer'...
Sasha Spielberg (aka Buzzy Lee)
April 15, 2026

Sasha Spielberg (aka Buzzy Lee)

I wasn't surprised when Sasha Spielberg--an actor, visual artist, and musician who records as Buzzy Lee --told me that she once cried listening to the score to E.T. , one of her father's most famous movies. I was surprised, h...