We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Matt Burke a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Matt, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. How did you learn to do what you do? Knowing what you know now, what could you have done to speed up your learning process? What skills do you think were most essential? What obstacles stood in the way of learning more?
I started writing songs early on with my first band in 7th grade and I was immediately hooked.
Throughout my life I’ve been in bands that wrote original music, and I was always the primary songwriter.: lyrics and melody have always come fairly naturally to me.
But I didn’t really know what I was doing when it came to the craft of songwriting. I basically had to wait for divine inspiration to strike before I picked up my guitar and wrote something: I had no real process in place for writing songs.
Because of this, I only had 11 songs I really believed in when I moved up to Nashville in 2019. I was able to connect quickly with some cowriters in town just before the pandemic hit in 2020, and I am SO GRATEFUL for that because I ended up spending the entirety of the pandemic writing.
I wrote 77 songs in 2020 – seven times the number of songs in my entire catalog when I moved up to Tennessee a year prior.
I believe the best way to learn something is to DO it. And once I moved to Nashville and threw myself into the songwriting scene, I quickly figured out a workflow that worked for me as a songwriter and became so much more productive… and inspired!
Matt, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I am a Nashville-based singer songwriter – I moved up to Tennessee three years ago from central Florida.
I was in several rock bands growing up and started playing acoustic covers at local bars when I was in college. After college, I moved to Chicago and got heavily involved in the cover band scene. I performed solo and with various bands in Chicago for several years before starting my original project – The Matt Burke Band – in 2011.
I moved back to Florida in 2014 to develop The Matt Burke Band. We gigged hard for a couple of years and released an EP in 2018, all while I played WAY TOO MANY solo cover gigs at beach bars and seafood restaurants.
My time back in Florida taught me two things:
1. I really love writing songs
2. I really hate playing background music to the backs of people’s heads
With these motivations in mind, I moved to Nashville in 2019 to study the craft of songwriting and begin releasing new material as a solo artist.
Since 2019 I have released a steady stream of singles across streaming platforms and my music has been compared to Sturgill Simpson, Zach Brown, and Chris Stapleton. In 2021, my original song “Coffee, Whiskey, & Weed” won the Songtown Americana Song of The Year award and many of my unreleased songs are currently being shopped around Nashville for pitch and synch opportunities.
I have written over 200 songs since moving to Nashville, and I have no intention of slowing down anytime soon. I perform regularly in and around Nashville, as well as the central-Florida and Chicagoland areas.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
For me, it’s CONNECTION.
This industry is HARD – there is so much REJECTION you have to deal with on a daily basis, it’s a financial struggle to release music independently, and it really can be a a long, slow grind.
The only thing that makes it all worthwhile, in my option, are those moments of connection that come from being a songwriter and performer.
Every time I play a show and lock eyes with someone in the crowd who is totally in the moment and feeling it – that’s why I do what I do.
Every DM I get about how my songs have touched someone or made them FEEL something – that’s why I do what I do.
Every time someone buys something from my merch store or downloads my new song, every shared video, every dollar in my tipjar…. these moments of connection are priceless, and without them, working in the entertainment industry wouldn’t be worth it to me.
Is there mission driving your creative journey?
I think it’s the connection piece again, really…
At this point, I know my music connects with people – I watch it happen every time I perform, and I have seen my fanbase steadily grow and become more engaged over the years.
What I truly want is a bigger megaphone – I want to be able to reach more people so I can connect with more people.
Everything I do now is motivated by trying to get my music in as many ears as possible. Show me a world where I get to spend my days writing and recording and my evenings performing to engaged, enthusiastic crowds, and I will show you a happy man.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.MattBurkeMusic.com
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/mattburkemusic
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/mattburkemusic
- Youtube: www.youtube.com/mattburkemusic
- Other: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/3db8mSsTRaydVX3lYhBEdw?si=VWAflPRyS3i98XdO5Ont1g
Image Credits
Annelise Sarah, Monika Baranko