about
Annelise
Annelise LeCheminant is the founder and host of FiftySongs. She is also Singer/Songwriter, Independent Recording Artist, Certified Singing Success/Brett Manning Associate, Certified Loog Guitar Educator & Songwriting Coach.
Annelise started her musical journey on the violin at the age of 4. Throughout her life she also studied piano, voice & guitar. Post college she performed for three years in a professional recording choir touring the Western United States & Israel. Having developed some vocal problems she was searching for someone to help her. She eventually met Brett Manning who could hear the problem and had a solution. So, she quit her job doing graphic illustration and two weeks later was living in a hotel in Nashville. She then spent seven years writing, recording, performing, studying & rubbing shoulders with some of the best musicians in the world including 4 continuous years of coaching with Brett. She co-produced three albums with Producer Matt Wilder, two of original music and one Christmas album. She toured as an independent artist for 11 years writing her own music and doing all of her own marketing, graphic design, booking, promoting and gear schlepping. She was also involved in producing various showcases in Nashville giving other artists opportunities to perform.
Annelise performed at the 2002 Winter Olympic Festival in Salt Lake City, opened for Lee Greenwood in New Hampshire, sang the National Anthem at Nashville’s Boy Scouts of America fundraiser, performed on the Gibson stage at the Sundance Film Festival and has done shows and house concerts throughout the United States and in Italy. She has also had appearances on the morning talk show "Good Things Utah" and Park City TV. In 2008 she moved to Los Angeles where she had the opportunity to sing in a backing choir for The Kinks. In 2011 she returned to Nashville to do her certification training at Brett Manning Studios and finished in early 2012.
With three albums under her belt she knows her way around the studio and has a deep passion for recording and the creative process which she enjoys passing along to her students. She has also spent considerable time learning the ropes of marketing via social media.
Annelise lives and teaches in the San Francisco/Bay Area, CA. Her husband and two beautiful children are the loves of her life. She enjoys art, photography, family bike rides, traveling, farmers markets and their sweet labs Saida & Gabby.
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President of Artist Accelerator, is a twice GRAMMY nominated music educator (non self-nominated), award-winning producer/songwriter, and author. Shane is a founding instructor for Berklee Online, where he has taught lyric-writing and songwriting to thousands of students since 2003.
Shane is a featured songwriter and instructor for the Taylor Swift Education Center at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum where he received their TOP TEN HITMAKER award for 2014. He co-developed their current Words & Music, and Songwriting 101 outreach programs, which have enabled over 250,000 (and counting!) American students to learn to write songs. Shane has served on the Hall of Fame's museum expansion advisory board and has facilitated other artistic community programs, such as Poetry in Motion, co-sponsored by the Nashville Arts Commission and the NCAA Women's Final Four.
In 2017 Shane received the Trajectory Award from Music Business College at Anáhuac University (the Mexican Harvard) for his international leadership in the evolution of the music industry in the digital era. Chowan University named him the 2013 Music Industry Professional of the Year by, and in 2005 Shane earned the Tennessee-Songwriter-Association-International’s highest honor, the Hallman Award, for outstanding contributions to the songwriting community.
As a producer and composer, Shane has scored several independent film projects, including Fortune Cookie (featured at both the Sundance and Hollywood Film Festivals), Family Alliance, and American Mobster. Shane is currently the featured composer for Fjor Films and writes for Warner/Chappell Production Music.
Shane is recognized internationally as a groundbreaking songwriting lecturer and music production panelist. He is a featured contributor to iSing magazine, Success for Your Songs, and has been a guest on a myriad of blogs and podcasts. Shane is author of the best selling The Singer-Songwriter's Guide to Recording in the Home Studio.
Shane’s current projects include developing two songwriting applications for the Mac OS platform and producing and co-hosting the songwriting podcast Studio Soundtrack available on iTunes.
Shane loves to play the Sicilian opening in chess and can solve a Rubik's cube in under 3 minutes.
about
Tom Worth
Hi - I’m Tom Worth…the Pro Songwriting Coach. I’ve been a professional and successful songwriter out of Nashville for almost 20 years.
So let’s just get the 2 questions you’re probably thinking of out of the way ;)
1. Have I written any songs you may know?
2. If I’m a Professional Songwriter...why do I teach?
Good questions! The answer to the first is…probably.
I’ve had over 70 cuts (meaning bigger artists have recorded songs I’ve written). None of them are huge hits, but 2 of my songs were on an album that reached #5 on the Billboard Country Chart. Another was on a top 20 Billboard Christian Album.
My songs have also been used in TV commercials, TV shows like Jane By Design, Forming The Band, and Road Rules. So although you may not know my songs…you probably have heard them!
2nd question: Yes it’s true – I’m living my dream as a pro songwriter. So why on earth am I teaching? That one’s simple…because I love helping singers/songwriters to follow and reach their dreams.
I didn’t know this until I was hired by Refinement Records to coach their artists to be better songwriters. I loved it! After leaving Refinement I was soon hired by the T3 Talent Agency in S. Carolina to be head of their songwriting department and develop a curriculum. I was coaching all ages, all genres, and again…I loved it.
That’s when I decided to cut back on songwriting and focus on teaching. I still write with and produce artists, but I’m more selective about it.
I started down this road years ago with the dream of being a professional songwriter. Since then in addition to my 70 cuts, I have had 2 Publishing Deals, and have played on the Grand Ol’ Opry Stage.
about
Matt Wilder
For over 30 years I have been a songwriter, guitarist, keyboardist, bass player, harmony singer, drum programmer, arranger, engineer, producer, mixer, mastering engineer, and music educator. I am surrounded by the greatest songwriters, musicians, studios, engineers and overall talent pool on earth. They are all resources at my disposal (depending on budgets and desired products) and I count many of these amazing artists as personal friends. It is a joy to work in Nashville and Franklin, TN.
My goal is always to do the best quality work for everyone I work with regardless of their budget. To always exceed my clients expectations, and whenever possible, to enlighten my clients and students as to the tremendous creative possibilities that exist today, and encourage them to be fearlessly creative. I am equally at home doing pristine acoustic recordings, or doing full on pulsing mix automated pop. I use some of the most cutting edge music software, but my favorite tool is a 55 year old vintage Mic (my personal U-47).
For me, songwriting and mixing are intertwined elements. And remixing is such a powerful tool that it more often than not leads to “recomposing”. But most of all I try to help all my clients define their own personal style, sound and strengths, so that they best express the heart of who they really are.
about
Gary Lunn
Gary Lunn has been a Nashville studio musician for more than 40 years. He is currently bassist for Dolly Parton. His style is somewhat R&B/Motown with an intense, long-standing love for the sounds of 80's fretless tracks. He has done recordings for everyone from Idina Menzel, Jewel, Nicole Nordeman, DC Talk, Michael W. Smith, The Cathedrals, CeCe Winans and Great Choirs of America to Billy Ray Cyrus, Toby Keith and Montgomery Gentry. His experience includes working for record labels, publishing companies, and independent artists as a bassist, producer, programmer, arranger, session leader, engineer and writer. He is the bass player for Nashville's acclaimed "Smoking Section" band created out of the best of the best professional session players. He is also involved with live worship recordings, conferences, and video productions for Integrity Music, Morningstar Ministries, Daryl Evans, Kevin Prosch, Max Lucado, International House of Prayer, Lindell Cooley, Christ Church Choir, and Paul Baloche.
He has made TV appearances on The Today Show, The Tonight Show, The View, Austin City Limits, Prime Time Country, The Peter Cetera TV Special, American Bandstand, Live at the PBR, TBN, Gaither Homecoming, The Happy Goodman’s Anniversary Special, God TV, and More Than the Music. He has performed live with artists such as Amy Grant, Rich Mullins, Peter Cetera, Michael McDonald, Phil Driscoll, Vince Gill, Billy Ray Cyrus, Montgomery-Gentry, Wild Horses, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Ray Stevens, Kathy Mattea, Dolly Parton, The Bill Gaither Trio, The Gaither Vocal Band, Israel Houghton, The Martins, Don Potter, Andre Crouch, Jason Upton, Annelise LeCheminant and many others. Gary was an original member of the Grammy nominated group, Whiteheart. He lives in Nashville, Tennessee with June, his wife of seventeen years, and their four children.
Click below to see a non-comprehensive list of songs he has played on.