We were lucky to catch up with Suanna Lynn recently and have shared our conversation below.

Suanna, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Can you open up about a risk you’ve taken – what it was like taking that risk, why you took the risk and how it turned out?

When I decided to move to Nashville from Chicago, I knew it was going to be a big risk. I was leaving a huge group of friends and really encouraging community, my family was just a state over, and I had a secure job in public relations and marketing and I was thriving. But something was missing. I didn’t have my people as it related to writing music. I of course had other musician friends, but the passion I had for writing my own music started to take over everything I thought about and I knew I needed an entire community of people who were as obsessed with original music as I was. I was writing alone in my apartment in Chicago and I was a good writer. But I knew I’d never be a great writer unless I challenged myself and made music with people who were much better than me.

Enter Nashville.

I started researching getting down to Nashville and went down to visit a cousin to see if it was a city I could find myself liking living in. While I walked around the city, I had so many, what I call God winks, where complete strangers told me I should move to this city and that God was waiting to do something here. It felt crazy, but in my gut it felt so right and I truly felt like I was following my peace – as scary and completed haphazard as it felt to uproot with no promises of success.

I ultimately found another job in marketing that could pay for the dream by day so by night I could network, write, and perform. I found it relatively easy to network and find other people who wanted to write and collaborate. Nashville is a city of dreamers and people who naturally want to make music, so in my experience if you are vulnerable and open to learning and writing with others, you can find the success you’re looking for. Now, my success has looked different than I thought – but I always remember my dream wasn’t to necessarily tour or be on stadium stages, but to write and release the best music I can that reflects who I am and my values – and I’m doing that! So, in my opinion the risk was worth everything!

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

At the end of the day I am a businesses-minded creative. That means while I find myself more in the creative space, I am always thinking strategically on how I can go about my craft with an entrepreneurial spirit. I am a singer-songwriter, and I am also an owner of a consulting company that focuses on content development with brands, service, and product launches. People can get confused sometimes and ask me, “wait, are you a songwriter or are you a marketer?” To which I always say both. I mean, at the end of the day, marketing is just songwriting for business – in both cases you are trying to get your audience to feel something so they move toward your product, service, or art.

In my consulting world, I work with small business owners who are incredibly talented, but might not have communication at the forefront of their strengths. I help make sense of their brand and services through helping them establish a mission & vision statement to anchor the brand, and then writing website copy that clearly defines the difference they make in their industry, and why they are the best option for their audience. From there, I work with them on sales materials and ensuring their entire team is united in messaging; offering design work, training, and talking point creation for the team. Once we have united their teams, and their website reflects clearly their services/products and what sets them a part in the market, we move to external marketing through what makes the most sense: social advertising, email marketing etc.

On the music side of things, I focus my writing mostly for TV & movies. While I still create singles and songs that can stand alone and are reflections of personal stories, I find the most joy in writing music that complements other work forms; namely through screenwriting and production. There is something exciting about working with TV creators and writing a vibe through music they are looking to enhance the scene they already have in their head. As many versions of artists that can be in the room brings a different depth to the music. This also allows me to be strategic; rather than writing just to write, I write with a specific need in mind – it’s a challenge that I think makes me more creative in the writing and recording process.

Over the past eight years in Nashville I am so grateful for the doors that have been opened to me and the people who have coached me and believed in my over the years; but I’m also proud of myself for harnessing these opportunities to learn and to become the best creative I can be. I moved down here as someone who didn’t know the basics of SEO or marketing analysis, and I didn’t know the first thing about writing music for TV. And now, I successfully work with clients and bring life to their incredible ideas, as well as work directly with decision makers who TV sets. If you had told me eight years ago when I decided to move down to Nashville that I would be where I was, I would never have believed you. But I am grateful and I have my eyes wide open as there is ALWAYS more to be learning.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

When I first move down to Nashville, my goal was a publishing deal. I couldn’t think of anything better than being paid to go into room after room of various artists and work with them to bring songs to life that they then take on the road. In 2016 when I first got to town that was more feasible. Writers got publishing deals, and artists got record deals. It was pretty black and white. I did all the networking and the writers rounds I could to meet touring artists to write with. I found my group of people pretty quickly and found myself growing in my writing, and the amount of artists who were working towards the same goals.

Then 2020 hit…

Many of the touring artists became realtors etc. because we all had to make ends meet and be realistic about the unknown in front of us. I also had a gig at the Grand Ole Opry that had been canceled and I felt so many things I had worked towards were being taken away. I knew it was going to be a time to pivot even though I didn’t have the answers yet of how I was supposed to do that.

Coming out of the pandemic, not only was life different for the whole world and industry, but life was also beautiful different for me. I went into the pandemic single and came out engaged and knowing we wanted to start a family after the wedding. My marketing & corporate career had grown, my music contacts had shrunk as so many people pivoted in different ways, and I was moving into mamahood in the near future. I knew I needed to make a shift in the amount of myself I was giving to the corporate world to make space for my family as well as the creation of music. I knew I needed more time in my day to focus on myself and my goals, and that my mind needed less stress and more space for creating.

I also needed to re-learn the music industry. After the pandemic, publishing houses were no longer signing “writers” they were signing artists who had huge followings through the dawn and explosion of TikTok and who didn’t want to be just writers but wanted to be artists as well. The industry didn’t reflect what I wanted anymore and I found myself needing to adjust my goals and daily schedule to reflect this new post-pandemic world.

So I did that. I walked away from an incredible opportunity at a healthcare company as head of the digital marketing team, to figure out a new way to utilize my business-minded gifts that gave me more time to myself in the day, and to work for myself, pursuing new ways to make music relevant. At the time, I didn’t know what that would be, but I walked into the unknown believing something was there waiting for me.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

My creative journey has changed in the last eight years, but I think my underlying values of a strong desire to collaborate and to make music that makes people really feel something has never changed. While the people I collaborate with and the business goal has shifted from publishing to sync licensing, I’ve always been driven by working as ethically and creatively as possible; learning from and inspiring others along the way.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://suannalynnmusic.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/suannalynnreal
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/suannalynnmusic
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/suanna-corbeil-van-norstrand-39023125/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@suannalynn
• Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/user-334610473