But this fall, Blackmon will hit the classroom at Vanderbilt University to teach his popular Nashville Number System class for the fourth year at Vanderbilt University again this fall semester. (Class starts August 22 and will take place on Thursday evenings from7:00PM-9:00PM. You can enroll in MUSC 104, Nashville Number System For Songwriters and Performers for $230 by visiting http://blair.vanderbilt.edu/precollege-adult/).
Roughstock recently chatted with Blackmon about the class, his songwriting success and how an introduction to Gary Allan shaped his life and career in country music.
Where did the idea come from to start teaching a class at Vanderbilt?
I met the Dean – Mark Wait – at Leadership Music. He saw me working with some people on songwriting day, and he asked me if I’d be interested in teaching a class. He was familiar with the DVD I put out about songwriting. He asked me, ‘What do you think songwriters need?’ I said, ‘Well, I think most songwriters need to know music theory and to know how those three chords work with the truth, musically, and also how to use the Nashville numbers system so they can communicate with musicians in the studio.
Do you have to attend Vanderbilt to enroll in the program?
It’s open to pre-college. I’ve had students as young as 11 up to college/Vanderbilt students and adults. It’s open to anybody. We do it in the piano lab, so we use guitar and piano to learn how music works. We also listen to songs and learn the different song forms. I’ll play five or six songs from different genres in class, and then the next week, everybody has to bring in their different examples. So they learn by not only listening in class, but also by having to dig through their musical collections to kind of find what we’re studying.
Give us some background on your career that led you to Nashville?
I started in California, and I wrote songs out there for a couple of years. I was really drawn to the music of Dwight Yoakam, Buck Owens, Merle Haggard and Gram Parsons, which is all California country. I ended up moving here after the Rodney King riots in L.A. I knew I needed to be here if I was going to do it for a living. So I’ve been here 20 years. I was here 10 years before I had my first hit … that was a George Strait No. 1 – “She’ll Leave You With a Smile.” I just love songs. This is the place to be, so this is home. I love it here.
Who is your dream cut that you haven’t had yet?
I don’t know … I’ve kind of had some that I’ve loved. Maybe a Dwight Yoakam cut or an Emmylou Harris cut … something like that. There are so many new acts that I love, too. There are a lot of people I’d love to have cuts with. I’m always thrilled with any cut.
Talk about your history with Gary Allan. You guys go way back and you’ve had 19 cuts with him, correct?
Yeah! We had played some of the same clubs out in California, but hadn’t met out there. When he came to town, his producer knew me and knew both of our backgrounds. He said, ‘If you met each other, y’all would be best friends!’ I met him when he came here to do a showcase for Decca. He had already cut his first record, and we became pals. I’d go out to California to write with him or he’d have me out on the road, very early on when he was doing waterparks and fairs. We just had a blast. We came up in the business together, and he was always such a generous pal. Anything he was doing, he always had me come along. We ended up being roommates.
He had his house and his family out on the West Coast for a while, so he needed a crash pad here in town. We got a place together. He was a great roommate because he was only in town about six nights a month! We loved a lot of the same music and had a lot of the same values about what country music could be or is in our eyes. We just kind of grew together in music and the business. We just had a lot of fun. I will never forget the first time I was on Gary’s tour bus … we were doing a run, and I remember getting up one morning. I had the whole front lounge to myself. Everybody else was asleep. I put Steve Earl’s “Guitar Town” on my headphones, and I’m just looking out the windows as we’re rolling down the highway going, ‘This is it! This is what I’ve dreamed about getting to do.’
Other than signing up for your class at Vanderbilt, what advice would you give someone new to town looking to break into the music business, either as a songwriter or an artist?
As a songwriter, I’d definitely direct somebody toward NSAI (Nashville Songwriters Association International). They’ve got a lot of great programs that have helped people out. It’s all about the songwriters. I’d tell them about my DVD – The Craft of Writing Hit Songs (available through Amazon.com). I’d tell them to go to writers nights, and I’d tell them to listen to as much music as they could. I would say to soak up as much music as one could and be open to trying anything. I recently heard a quote from Cowboy Jack Clement, who recently passed away. He had a sign over his desk that said: Write the best song that you can write every day, and write the worst song you can every day. I think what that meant was just write … let it come out and edit it later. We get caught up in thinking, ‘Oh, that’s no good.’ I’ve spent many days writing something and then tearing it up. I think sometimes you’ve just got to be willing to be not very good [laughs]. It’s OK! It’s not always going to be great.
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