JUST DIVINE
I hate the word “just.” It’s just so, um… just so ugly. And usually, just so unnecessary.
It’s the lyricist in me that hates “just.” Because when I think of it being sung, there isn’t anything pretty or satisfying in the sounds. The short “u” vowel is boring and dull. The “j” sound which begins the word is mushy and indistinct. And the “st” to end the word is complicated, with the two consonants “s” and “t” combined. Go ahead, say it out loud. Ugly, isn’t it? Now, sing it. Pick your prettiest, most perfectly-placed note for your own voice and sing, “Just—” Simply awful.
When I’m writing a lyric and I come up with a line that includes the word, “just,” I go back and challenge myself to re-write the lyric without the word. Because it’s not only the ugly sound of the word, it’s the meaning. Or rather, the lack of meaning. It creeps into our sentences as a filler word, maybe for emphasis (“it’s just ugly”) or for attitude (“she’s just a writer”). For some reason I don’t mind the word if it is being used as an adjective to describe an act of justice. But when otherwise used, it’s a warning sign to me that maybe I don’t know exactly what I’m trying to say. I remind myself of the meaning I’m intending to write, and then rewrite the lyric or line of dialog with a more exact word to convey a more exact meaning.
Sometimes, you don’t succeed in replacing the offending word. Even if you’re one of the greats. Oscar Hammerstein, in Lyrics (a book which includes his extensive essay on lyric writing), declares that some words have lost their value due to overuse, and he gives the example of the word, “divine.” Hammerstein used the word, “divine” in the last lines of the song, “All The Things You Are,” but he didn’t like the word when he wrote it. He didn’t like the word when he presented it to the song’s composer, Jerome Kern, and Kern didn’t like it, either. The last two lines of the song are: “Some day I’ll know that moment divine, When all the things you are are mine.” Hammerstein loved the final line, but to use the final line he had to have an “-ine” rhyme to set it up. He tried to replace the word, but couldn’t:
“’Some day I’ll know that moment…’ What? Sign, line, fine, shine? Nothing served as well as the unwanted “divine.” I never could find a way out. The song written in 1937 shows signs of being a long-lived standard ballad – but I shall never be happy with that word!”
* LYRICS by Oscar Hammerstein II, Copyright 1949, 1985 by Estate of Oscar Hammerstein II, Hal Leonard Books
I’ve been there, too. The big turning point song for the character of Margaret Reed in Meet Your Mountain is called “Just Me.” There’s that stupid word, not only in the song, but right there in the title! This was one of the few times where Eric and I worked music-first, and I was writing a lyric to fit an existing melody from a song we had written for the BMI-Lehman Engel Musical Theater Workshop several years earlier. The melody was hauntingly lovely, and Eric suggested it suited Margaret’s refined character. He was right.
I wrote a lyric for Margaret at the moment when she is feeling lost and sorry for herself as she finds, for the first time in her life, she has been left without anyone to help her. Her husband is gone. Her mother is gone. She has several children depending on her, and they are facing hardships of unbelievable proportions. All she has is herself (“…just me”). By the end of the song, though, she is determined to triumph and has made the realization that “… perhaps all I need is me. Just me. Just me.”) In the title phrase of the melody, I only had two syllables to work with. I couldn’t write the lyric as “only me.” I thought long and hard about the word, but ultimately decided I liked the ugly rawness of the word “just;” it contrasted with the lush beauty of the music, and it suited Margaret’s predicament in the story. It’s a good thing I ended up liking the word because the structure of the melody included repeating it twice at the end of the song!
For me, though, this song from Meet Your Mountain is the exception that proves my own personal rule. I will still work towards never again using the word “just” in a lyric.
I have done it, but just once.