Backstory
In January 2026, I had been country dancing for only a couple of months. One night, a friend and I were on our way to The Westerner in West Valley City, Utah, when a thought came to me: dancing is floor play. I said it out loud. A moment later, another phrase followed: “Floor Play Comes Before the Foreplay.”
I told my friend that one too, and immediately felt it was the name of a song I needed to write. The problem was that I had no musical background. I didn’t know how to write a song, produce one, or even where to begin. I decided that when I got home, I would find out how to make it real.
I started by telling ChatGPT what had happened. It introduced me to music tools, including Suno, and I began learning how they worked. We talked through the kind of song I wanted: country music made for dancing, with a story rooted in the dance hall. I wanted The Westerner in the lyrics.
I spent more than 40 hours working on the lyrics until they said what I wanted them to say. I used ChatGPT to help me with the mechanics of writing lyrics. Producing the recording was another challenge. I was new to Suno, and getting the melody, drums, and feel to match the song in my head was frustrating. I made more than 1,000 iterations before choosing the version I released.
Friends have raised a fair concern with me: if AI helps create music, what happens to the human artists who make their living from it? I’ve taken that seriously. I don’t charge bands or singers to perform my songs live or share their performances on social media, provided they credit my work.
I want my work to help musicians, not harm them. I eventually want to work with human vocalists and production teams to record my songs. AI gave me a way to begin creating music when I didn’t know how, but eventually I want to make music the old fashioned way.
“Floor Play Comes Before the Foreplay” began as a passing thought on the way to a dance hall. It became my first released song on February 12, 2026.
