Trisha Yearwood Reveals the Remark from a Man at 19 That Discouraged Her from Songwriting
By Website Content Manager
The country singer is set to debut her first album featuring songs she co-wrote, scheduled for release in July.
Over four decades ago, a passing remark put a pause on Trisha Yearwood’s songwriting dreams — but now, she’s reclaiming that creative voice.
At 60, the country music icon is preparing to release The Mirror in July, her first album featuring songs she co-wrote.
During an interview on the TODAY show on Friday, May 16, Yearwood shared that she’d stayed away from songwriting for years due to a comment made when she was in college. “Some guy,” she said, once dismissed her writing abilities.
“Bless his heart — he probably doesn’t even remember saying it,” Yearwood recalled. “I was 19 and handed him a bunch of poetry. I was in college, and everyone in Nashville was writing songs.” The Belmont University alum continued, “He looked at it and said, ‘You’re a good singer, but you’re not really a writer.’ And I believed it for the next 40 years.”
Speaking with hosts Jenna Bush Hager and Erin Andrews, the “She’s in Love with the Boy” singer shared that creating an album wasn’t originally part of the plan — but as she continued writing, her confidence grew.
“I never really set out to make a record,” Yearwood explained. “But the more I wrote, the more I started believing in what I could do.”
Encouragement from those around her helped push the project forward. “People close to me said, ‘You should turn this into an album,’ and here we are. It’s surreal,” she said. “For the past 30 years, I could always distance myself from deeply personal lyrics by saying, ‘I didn’t write it, so it’s not really about me.’ But now, every song holds a little piece of who I am.”
She added, “I’ve always believed I could make a song my own just through the way I performed it. But writing the songs myself brings a deeper level of connection — it adds another dimension to the music.”
The Mirror is scheduled to drop on July 18. So far, Yearwood has shared two singles from the album: “The Wall or the Way Over” and “Bringing the Angels.”
On May 9, she gave fans a sneak peek of “Bringing the Angels” via Instagram, revealing that she co-wrote the song alongside her sister Beth Bernard, Bridgette Tatum, and Leslie Satcher.
In the post’s caption, she proudly noted, “They told me I wasn’t a songwriter, so I went ahead and co-wrote an entire album.”