Here’s a fresh tune for these times from my songwriting side, which has been energized since I signed on to a two-decade-old annual project called February Album Writing Month (FAWM.org). There’s more below about this remarkable effort - aimed at getting participants to write 14 songs in 28 days (yes, FOURTEEN!) - including a video explainer by its founder, Burr Settles, a machine learning researcher focused on language learning at DuoLingo and, of course, on music. I hope to interview him soon.

My new song, Save Dreams for Sleeping, is still in beta mode. I’ve been trying various chord and melody approaches and instruments. But given what’s going on in the early weeks of the Trump Vance Musk administration I don’t want to hold off.

Below you can listen to another topical song by me and find links to some other off-the-news songs from #FAWM2025 and my favorite #fastfolk musician, Jesse Welles.

Insert - 1/29/26 - I used Suno to envision what this song can sound like with a bigger ensemble. I’m okay with AI-generated music for this purpose for those of us who don’t have budgets, time or other resources to pull together a band in a studio - although I WILL be recording with an ensemble later this winter.

Insert - 8/3/ 25 - Here’s the final version (chords, melody) but definitely not the final recording!

End insert

Save Dreams for Sleeping

© 2025, Andy Revkin, Written Feb. 4, 2025, updated August 3, 2025

We all hold a dream somewhere deep in our minds,

Where everything’s fair and everyone’s kind.

Flowers all blooming, no smoke in the skies.

No wars in the headlines, no tears in your eyes.

But save dreams for sleeping. It’s time to get real.

Hard workers are suffering while billionaires steal.

Young women in trouble can’t find caring hands.

House builders born elsewhere get bundled in vans.

I’m not saying it’s easy. All good things take time.

Those trying to divide us are good at their crimes.

But if we stop dreaming, dive into the fray.

A more perfect union is coming our way.

Our country needs mending, but how to begin?

With problems so tangled, no start and no end?

Begin by protecting those facing the fire.

Reach out by connecting through common desires.

One day at a time, the trust you create

Will carry us further than fighting and hate.

One stitch at a time the fabric you weave,

'Will grow ever stronger than you can believe.

So save dreams for sleeping. It’s time to get real.

Hard workers are suffering while billionaires steal.

Young women in trouble can’t find caring hands.

House builders born elsewhere get bundled in vans.

I’m not saying it’s easy. All good things take time.

Those trying to divide us are good at their crime.

But if we stop dreaming, dive into the fray

A more perfect union is coming our way.

Let me know what you think! Here’s the initial rough take from February 4.

Good news from 2044?

Here’s the other new tune from me, spurred by a FAWM prompt to write a song about a time macine. I travel to the presidential election year of 2044 and muse on what it might be like of Sasha Obama and, yes, Barron Trump, were the candidates. (I doubt either will run but 2044 is the first year Barron Trump would be eligible.)

It’s called “Good News from 2044?” and is also still a work in progress, as you can clearly hear! The lyrics etc. are here. This is a 60-second snippet. The full song is on YouTube.

The world needs more “Fast Folk”

Most of my songs are not straight off the news. I am not remotely like the amazing songwriting machine Jesse Welles, who seems to pump out several topical tunes a week and has hand built a significant following.

But songwriting, for me, is an extension of my wider philosophy of using all possible skills and media when pursuing some goal. Given the state of the world, it’s been gratifying to get into this mode, which I call “fast folk,” drawing on a movement that began in and around New York City (and a couple other cities) from the early 1980s into the early 2000s. I see Welles as reviving this form, as I noted around the election.

In 1999, I wrote a New York Times feature about the Fast Folk movement centered on a core leader, Jack Hardy. Here’s my gift paywall-free link. ''The whole idea was to do it fast,'' Hardy explained to me. ''You could hear a song at an open mic or songwriters' meeting and two weeks later it was being played on the radio in Philadelphia or Chicago. It was urgent, exciting. It was in your face.''

Writers met each week in Hardy’s Greenwich Village walkup to test drive their latest compositions for peers. It was far more an acid bath than a soothing circle. Some heralded alumni include Suzanne Vega, Shawn Colvin. Steve Forbert, John Gorka, Lucy Kaplansky, and Christine Lavin.

The effort resulted in Fast Folk Musical Magazine and a series of recordings that ended up released by Smithsonian Folkways.

I hung out at Hardy’s sessions off and on, tossing in a song or two on occasion in the late 90s. But my tunes were a bit too literal and conventional to get big thumbs-up responses.

The more of this the better, and that’s why the annual FAWM monthlong songwriting slam is so great. There are thousands of participants, and the songs range across every possible genre and theme. Explore away!

Here’s Burr Settles describing this year’s FAWM push:

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