Evolution of a Song Title
Realizing when a generic title can turn into a more powerful statement
As an environmentalist, I understand the power and beauty of evolution. It’s elegant. It’s life changing. It makes a stronger or better adapted species.
A song title is a key component to any musical message. It needs to hit the right nerve. If possible, it needs to evolve into a stronger species.
Let me give you an example from my own revelations.
Embryo Stage (Song for Donziger)
As you can see from the journal entry above, I changed the title of a song multiple times until it hit the right tone. Part of the evolution was organic and part of it was learned.
In 2021, the media highlighted the unusual house arrest of an environmental lawyer, Steven Donziger. He represented a community in Ecuador that fought to sue the multinational polluters of their tropical forest lands. A judgement by an Ecuadorian court awarded billions of dollars in damages to the victims. Chevron chose to remove their assets from the country and take legal action against Donziger, on fraud and racketeering charges.
I’ve worked in the rainforest. I’ve spoken with indigenous communities. I’ve checked logging operations for violations. I know this game. I set out to write a song to highlight the plight of Donziger’s heavy-handed legal problems.
Juvenile Stage (Song for Nueva Loja or Lago Agrio)
The more I dove into the details of the Donziger’s trial, the more I gravitated to Ecuador. Donziger is a secondary victim; the people of Lago Agrio were the primary victims. I changed focus from the current issue to dig deeper into the reality of living with tainted soils, increased cancer rates and a decade of evasive court maneuvers by the oil companies.
Donziger became a side note. The Amazon ecosystem and the interrupted lives of villagers became the song story. I searched Google maps to locate the impacted area and found the area of Nueva Loja, the original base camp for Texaco drilling in the 1960s. Chevron bought out the oil field in 2001 with promises to clean up the spills.
The Lago Agrio oilfield is where billions of gallons of toxic wastewater was dumped in rivers and surrounding streams for decades. This was the message I wanted to get out.
Mature Stage (La Miseria de Lago Agrio)
I was ready to record “Song for Lago Agrio” until I listened to a video from a YouTuber, Holistic Songwriting. As a songwriting newbie, I watch a lot of songwriting videos to try and catch bits and pieces of useful information.
The YouTuber said to never use “Song for …” in the title. It’s weak, find something stronger. I had already gone through a few variations from Donziger to Nueva Loja to Lago Agrio, so I thought I’d exhausted all the title options.
As a songwriter I pay attention when something sticks in my head for days. It’s a sign. It’s an irritant. It means that something needs to change. My song title was not hitting the mark yet. It was functional, not emotional.
The YouTuber also spoke about finding the emotional value of a title so that it connects with a listener. Using the old and worn “Song for …” format was too generic and bland. I searched for more meaning in the lyrics.
Of course, the words Lago Agrio are Spanish. Nothing else in the song is in Spanish. I write songs in English, that is my message language. I know how to connect in English. But the song is about the people of Lago Agrio, so I wanted to reach them too, in some small way.
The last line of the song goes: In the land of Lago Agrio, the misery still flows.
That summed up the message and the anguish. So I changed the title to “La Miseria de Lago Agrio.” The title found its rightful home in the place where the pain is still present.
Everyone, whether English or Spanish speaking, can better understand that.
Coda
Evolution is a constant. It’s a slow process that turns minor adaptations into life-saving transformations.
A song evolves from title to tune. It’s always in flux. It’s not a static procedure. Let it grow in any direction. It’s adapted into stronger versions by other performers and arrangers that allow it to survive way beyond its intended timeframe.
[Note: the song “La Miseria de Lago Agrio” is scheduled for release in April.]