Music Makes its Way into Everything

Monica Escobar Allen

I’ve been writing songs since I was a kid. Not playing an instrument, mind you, just singing and making up lyrics and singing some more. Although I did take guitar lessons later in life, I married a dude who can actually play. Phew!

Sometimes I solve creative briefs with songwriting. Sometimes, I just make up songs for me. Either way, it’s something inside me that I have to get out.

Demos in varying stages…possibly induced by whiskey, or Colt 45??? What? When have I … Colt 45? When was this picture taken?

Ayla July (demo)
Monica Escobar Allen, Ryan Allen, Donny Dykowsky

  • A lullaby my husband and I wrote and recorded two weeks before our baby was born…and who ended up being born in August.

We Can Run (demo)
Monica Escobar Allen, Donny Dykowsky

  • I imagined this being a good demo for a teen angst scene.

Whitney's Rain (demo)
Monica Escobar Allen, Ryan Allen, Donny Dykowsky

  • I wrote this about the time I met my husband for a Medeski, Martin & Wood show at The Whitney Museum during a crazy storm.

It (demo)
Monica Escobar Allen, Donny Dykowsky

  • I don’t really know what this is about, but it was sparked from the four haunting piano notes I couldn’t get out of my head.

Thompkins Square Park (demo)
Monica Escobar Allen, Ryan Allen

  • Voice memo recording, working it out. I wrote this while sitting on a bench in Thompkins Square Park. I first recorded it as a rock song and then reimagined it, many years later. It still needs a lot of work. One day…we’ll get back in the studio with it…