“Belmont taught me how to network. [I also learned while at Belmont how] to never get in a place in the music industry where you are comfortable because that means you stopped doing new things and stopped pushing yourself.”
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“I wanted to get better [at writing songs], I wanted to hone in on that process and so that’s why I went to college for it. I didn’t want to try and put out a record that I knew wouldn’t be something that I would be proud of in five years. So I went to school and I waited and worked on it, and while that’s sort of frowned upon by a lot of people—getting an institutional music education—I personally can’t say enough good things about it. Mostly because it taught me what I don’t want to do, rather than what I want to do. It showed me the things I wanted to stay away from. Many of those programs try to force a formula down your throat because it’s a money-making game, which is basically what Music Row is. I learned it all and then I basically threw it away, and started making the music I wanted to make.”
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Interviewer: You majored in songwriting at Belmont. Was it always your intention to be a musician?
Mackenzie Scott: I was never in it with the idea that I would write for other people. More people are enrolled at Belmont with that major—the intent to be songwriters, especially country writers on Music Row. It’s a very lucrative industry. I was in classes with a lot of them, and there was just the few of us there that actually wanted to be musicians. . . . I don’t think the program was cut out for us. [Laughs] But I learned a lot about what I didn’t want to do, the things I don’t want to write, and the people that I don’t want to work with, and it’s important to know those things. I learned to stick up for myself when being criticized.
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Interviewer: As a songwriter that deals with painful truths and raw emotion, was it strange going into an environment like a classroom where things can be cold and clinical?
Mackenzie Scott: It was strange but unsurprising. I think it was important for me to see that side of the industry—it certainly informed me of that out of which I did not wish to make a career.
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“The college professors were pretty cruel, I’m not gonna lie. The curriculum was very much aligned with the Music Row ideology: very commercial, very pop country, very straightforward. There wasn’t much room for experimentation or the type of music that I write. I got a lot of negative feedback just because I would write something a little bit abstract or obscure. I definitely cried a couple of times in class in front of classmates.”
—Interview #1 source, Interview #2 source, Interview #3 source, Interview #4 source, Interview #5 source