Jan,

They are all getting attention. Rene and Sheleigh are here next week writing with Walt Aldrich, the hit writer who got Frankie signed to Sony. I mentor all these groups and that is how the music business is really done.

Everybody has this idea that they can write a song in their living room and get a demo and then it gets to publishers and then they get it cut, and so on and so on. Not exactly. It is all the "Who knows YOU" part of the business.

And you have to operate on the same playing field the industry operates on. The music business is comprised of people who interact and write together on a regular basis. Rene decided he wanted to step out of the normal NSAI "we'll meet once a month and critique songs" stuff. There is so much more nessasary than that.

I had had success with groups in California, Cincinatti, and Wisconsin, with regular writing groups. So they formed what they call the "Chili Peppers" group. (Named for the chili peppers christmas lights Rene has in his house.) They got together once a week and wrote songs. That built their songs and each one of them as writers. Clayton doesn't play an instrument so they had a couple of guitar players, a precussionist (for groove) and Shelaigh and Nate for vocals.

Since they started they have written about 50 songs, have done about 15 demos (sharing the costs) and have been bringing those to Nashville. Rene has the doors open with Sony music and others so he is getting songs heard by the biggest business people in Nashville. Now they are writing with hit writers. That will get them even higher level songs and in moer doors.

That is how all this works. Frankie did the same thing with me and then Walt took it to the next step, Sony, who took it the next step with Warner Brothers. He is working in the studio with Jason Aldeen's producer and working on his CD.

That is the way the music business works.

MAB