2022

2021

Song Stage: WIP
Artist: Chelsey Scheffe
Written: April 2019

This is the love letter I needed to hear. It’s close to my heart and I very much intend to finish and release it at some point. Lyrics need a small bit of smithing and the music isn’t figured out but I’m drawn to the simplicity/intimacy of it.

Song stage: Rough idea
Artist: Chelsey Scheffe
Written: January 2019

Whenever I begin a song on guitar, I find myself going in interesting directions. That’s what happened here. I was just letting go and having fun. I put down the guitar line and started singing over it. No idea what I’m singing about but that’s what came out. I hear a bit of Sylvan Esso and Deep Sea Diver in this and I’m not mad at it.

Song Stage: Rough Idea REcorded
Artist: Kings Kaleidoscope
Recorded: December 2018

This song was so powerful to me. I wanted to express the message in my own voice, from my own soul. Didn’t finish it but that’s alright with me. I love the vocal ideas I came up with and may pull them to use elsewhere. Just wait, there’s more after the pause. I was super uncomfortable using the f word in this song and I hate listening to myself sing it but the feeling gets diluted without it. It’s one reason I’ll never finish and put out a cover of this song though.

SONG STAGE: wip
ARTIST: CHELSEY SCHEFFE
WRITTEN: august 2018

This song began with a loose structure and rough sounds. It was called 8.23.18 because that’s when I created the project file. It has since developed into “Losing”, as song about losing and finding one’s identity. I had struggled with what the lyrical content should be for this song but somehow it emerged through the stream of consciousness garble I began with. That’s how it often happens.

Song stage: Rough idea recorded
Artist: Chelsey Scheffe
Written: November 2017
 

I wrote this song stream of consciousness in my phone one day walking home from work. It is perhaps more truthful than I had initially intended. Not necessarily objectively truthful, but truthful to my feelings at the time. I feel some sense of obligation to finish this one because of that truthfulness. 

Song stage: Partially recorded rough
ARtist: Chelsey Scheffe
Written: November 2017

This is a song for my husband. It’s about our arduous journey through dating and it’s a bit of an honest confession of my failings as a wife. It’s a plea not to give up, neither of us. When I wrote this, we had just come back from a music festival in Phoenix where we saw Haim and The Killers among others. I was inspired by the massive sound of the venue and by Haim’s rad lyrical style and pacing.

Song stage: Fully recorded draft
Artist: Hozier
Recorded: september 2017

I couldn’t get this one out of my head. The music video moved me. I intend to polish this one further but haven’t sat down to do it yet. All verses and choruses are roughed in but I only recorded one chorus and copied it across the song. I’d like to record the others to intensify as the song progresses. Drums are also me just hitting things like the floor and my leg.

Song stage: Partially recorded rough
Artist: Rose Cousins
Recorded: November 2016

I almost can’t make heads or tails of the meter in this song and it sounds so much more beautiful on piano. A friend sent me the original and I don’t think I did it justice. It’s so cathartic and tender. But I don’t always make music to create something perfect. It’s just another one of those songs I needed to get out of my system.

Artist: Bob Kauflin, Sovereign Grace, DCC band (our church)
Recorded: Septermber 2016
Performed: October 2016

I used to serve regularly on a band for our church, Downtown Cornerstone where I led on electric guitar and my husband worked on arrangements and played drums. This song is normally done in a major key but I had an idea for a minor voicing. The first recording is my initial idea and the second is from when we played in on Sunday. We only did it only once, perhaps for good reason but it makes me smile so hard.

Song stage: partially Recorded rough
artist: sonnymoon
Recorded: October 2016

I started with one synth line and a couple of vocal tracks. Then Tyler came over and snuck in some other synth and bass lines while I was away from the computer. I like what he did with it having not heard the original. It gives it a new flavor. I haven’t added backing and auxiliary vocals yet which is why the intro is so empty.

song stage: Fully recorded rough
artist: little dragon
recorded: September 2016

I cannot get enough Little Dragon. This song gripped me when I heard it and as I often do when a song gets its hooks in me, I dive into covering it. I watched Lianne La Havas cover it and loved how it translated to guitar so I borrowed that technique and made it my own. I don’t feel I quite got there with the vocals at the height of the song. Also, I found this voice memo treat of my husband reacting to this cover(!).

Song stage: Voice memo
Artist: Chelsey Scheffe
Written: April 2016

I was clearly sick when recording this voice memo. I believe I developed the melody and lyrics earlier than 2016 but recorded a more complete song structure at that time. I’d really like to finish this one. 

Song stage: Voice memo vocal idea
Recorded: April 2016

A long lost voice memo buried among many others but there’s something here I could do more with. Will I?

song stage: Rough live take
artist: Feist
Recorded: January 2016

Feist is a longtime favorite of mine. I recorded this in my friend Kelly’s living room. I think we were preparing to play some covers at a house show and recorded this just for fun, certainly no polished. Kelly sings the melody and I’m harmonizing and playing guitar.

Song stage: Voice memo recording
Artist: Chelsey Scheffe
Written: October 2015

I like pieces of this but have not sat down to work on it since recording this. I might still like to at some point, or take pieces for a new song.

Song stage: Voice memo recording
Artist: Chelsey Scheffe
Written: October 2015

The cry of a vulnerable heart. I almost didn’t share this one for that reason. I can imagine crafting this into a reprise thick with strings and vocals alone.

song stage: Vox only
Author: cold play
recorded: october 2014

I was captivated when I heard this song so I wanted to try recording it myself. I loved how the multiple harmonies blended so well that they sound mechanical. I added no effects, just recorded it on my built-in computer mic. I don’t intend to do anything further with this song though I won’t say ‘never’.

Song stage: finished
Artist: Keaton Henson
recorded: May 2013

It’s funny how you can measure your growth when you’ve put things down like on paper or in recordings. I was so so proud of this when I finished it and I think I had reason to be. I’m not embarrassed by it, I can just see where I’ve grown. Keaton Henson’s version is hauntingly beautiful and I think his version possesses a depth of experience that I had yet to encounter at this stage in my life. I’ve come through a lot since then.

Song stage: Rough vox recorded
Artist: James Blake
Recorded: February 2013

James Blake’s voice is incredible and is able to do things I wish I could. So in order to learn, I just copy, lol. This song in particular impressed me vocally so I took a stab at it. I never added instrumentation and am not sure that I plan to do anything further with this.

Song stage: Finished
Artist: Little Dragon
Recorded: April 2012

At the time loved how this turned out. Several years later, I think I’ve come along way with my vocals and would love to update but this is still a solid performance with some fun cello ideas.

Song stage: Finished
Artist: Lykke Li
Recorded: March 2011

I had a short period of obsession with Lykke Li. Maybe you’re sensing a pattern. Something in this song spoke to a longing in me to escape to a time, place, space that was uncomplicated, filled with love and free of judgement. That’s why I covered it, to make it my own. I was trying to sound like her even though nobody can or ever will again, ha. There are a few surprises for those who last to the end.

Song stage: Fully recorded rough
Artist: Chelsey Scheffe
Recorded: January 2011

I got a ukulele. I started with a line and added layers, like I always do. I can’t just leave a track sitting there all by itself, it needs friends—harmonies, syncopated melodies, more, more, more.
 

Song Stage: Finished
Artist: Chelsey Scheffe
Recorded: September 2009

Just out of high school, I remember sitting in my back yard on a sunny summer day, playing songs out on the deck. I had and still have a dream of composing songs for films or writing an instrumental album. I studied cello from 5th grade through high school so sometimes I would sit down and see what I could write with just a cello.