The Hello and welcome to episode

a jaker on songwriting. This is Brian here with my long time cohort Simon and joining us today as a twice Grammy nominated Nashville based singer-songwriter whose music has been recorded and performed by the likes of Willie Nelson Neil Diamond, Elton John, Bet Midler, and

Roberto Flack to name but a few.

We're delighted to welcome the wonderful Beth Nielsen Chapman to the show.

Lovely to have Beth on the podcast. She's an excellent writer and a fascinating person

with a great outlook on creativity and we're sure you'll get a lot out of our chat with her.

We'll get to that in just a few minutes, first as is customary a brief bio.

Beth was born in Arlington Texas in 1958 her family moved around a lot when she was a child

living on an assortment of military bases on account of her father's job in the US Air Force.

I think they were stationed in Germany at one point which was also where our former

guest Michelle Endagir cello who was also an army brat spent some time as a youngster.

Yeah I think she said that didn't she?

Mm-hmm. Our guest took up the guitar in around the age of 11 or 12,

teaching herself to play by ear. She began composing her own songs more or less straight

away, influenced greatly by the folk artists of the period, and then the singer-songwriter

boom of the early 70s. She signed her first publishing deal in her late teens and was briefly

signed to Capital for whom she recorded her first solo album hearing it first in 1980.

By this time she was living in Mobile, Alabama and performing covers several nights a week in a hotel

lounge. On one such evening the Beach Boys Bruce Johnston happened to drop by and impressed by what he heard,

insisted Beth should relocate to one of the country's music industry hotbeds to further her career.

She and her family Julie Upped sticks and moved to Nashville in 1985 which remains her home and

was where she really began to flourish as a songwriter and performer.

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