Thursday evenings from 6:30-8:45 pm at Story Parlor
10/19, 10/26, 11/2, 11/9, 11/16, 11/23, 11/30
Early bird $275 | Register by September 15, 2026 (discount applied at checkout)
Regular Price $299 | Effective September 16, 2026
Space is LIMITED to ensure an intimate experience. We recommend signing up early!
Refund and other policies can be found here.
Songs are like baby plants – they need certain things in order to grow! Write your first songs in a safe, nurturing environment. Learn to develop lyric and melody ideas, tap into beginner's mind, and deal with the inner critic.
This workshop covers
Creating the ideal environmental conditions for a song to grow
Identifying song seeds and nurturing them through divergent & convergent thinking
Catching' ideas when they strike, and developing fragments into lyric couplets and melody ideas.
Verses, choruses, and bridges – and when to throw structure out the window
Tapping into beginner's mind and dealing with the inner critic
Exploring the emotional arc of your song and how melodies can support lyrics
Identifying your songs' purposes and the life your songs might want to live (from singing to your pets and plants to singing on stage and recording songs!)
Who this is for:
Anybody who have a lingering feeling that they probably could write a song, but isn't sure how to start.
Writers in other mediums who want to explore something new and fun -- there's nothing like songwriting to work on economy of language!
Anybody who wants to develop their songwriting muscles so that when inspiration strikes, they are ready to take it from fragment to full song.
Songwriters with more experience who are feeling stuck and want to explore beginner's mind as a way into their songwriting.
You'll come away with:
A strong sense of how to 'catch' an idea, develop an idea into lyrics and melody, and allow your mind to stay open during the songwriting process
Lyric couplets that are ready to be sung and placed into a song
Melody ideas that you can continue developing to fit the mood of your song
Tools for dealing with the inner critic + exploring creative play and beginner's mind
Songwriting exercises that you can do anywhere
Note: You do not have to play an instrument. This workshop is open to anyone who is able to carry a tune.
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Certified Artward & Inward Facilitator, former Middle School teacher, and lover of songs.
Hannah Kaminer is an Asheville-based alt-country/indie artist known for her poignant songwriting, clear voice, and often comedic stage presence. Kaminer writes gut-punch lyrics about love, loss, and home, painting portraits of small town Appalachian life while wrestling with themes like gentrification and overdevelopment, bait-and-switch religion, and dysfunctional relationships. She finds hope in potlucks and bonfires, hospitality towards strangers, and the trees and rivers that will outlast us all.
She has released three studio albums: Acre by Acre (2015), Heavy Magnolias (2018), and Heavy on the Vine (2024) which she produced with her full band, Hannah & The Wistfuls.
