Phillip Swann
Encyclopedia
Phil Swann is an American singer, songwriter, composer, record producer, arranger, songwriting teacher and author. His songs have been heard in television, film, on the theatrical stage, and have been recorded by numerous recording artists including: Clay Aiken
, Lee Ann Womack
, Blake Shelton
, Neal McCoy
, Rodney Atkins
, Kristin Garner
and Lee Greenwood
.
At age 14, Swann began playing piano and singing in local churches, American Legions and civic organizations in-and-around the Tri-State area (West Virginia, Ohio and Kentucky). When he was 16, Swann was cast in the long running professional summer stock musical, The Hatfields and McCoys, in Beckley, West Virginia. Upon returning for his senior year of high school, Swann enrolled part-time at Marshall University where he studied theatre and speech in the evenings. He subsequently participated in the college’s theatrical productions and concerts. After graduating from Milton High School, Swann moved to New York City to attend the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. In New York, Swann continued playing piano and singing as a way of supporting himself while in acting school. He performed with bands, played on recording sessions and worked as a solo performer in piano bars throughout the city.
After graduating from college, Swann went on the road acting in various productions but ultimately found playing music more lucrative. He formed numerous bands and performed all over the country in hotels, nightclubs and on the County and State fair circuit. For a time, Swann moved to Muscle Shoals
, Alabama to break into the legendary Muscle Shoals music scene as a songwriter and session player. Though his time in Muscle Shoals was short-lived and unheralded, professional relationships were formed that would later become important in his career. After a brief stint in Nashville, Swann went back on the road playing music with songwriting being the center of his focus. In 1988, he moved to Los Angeles.
For most of the 90s and mid-2000s, Swann spilt his time between Los Angeles and Nashville, penning songs for the biggest names in country and pop music. He also became very active with the Songwriter’s Guild of America, initially by holding songwriting workshops for the organization’s non-profit foundation, then ultimately being named to the organization's Board of Directors. Through the guild, Swann became friends and a collaborator with legendary songwriters such as Jack Segal
, Bobby Troop, Vic Mizzy, Donald Kahn, Al Kasha and Ray Evans.
, Jeffrey Katzenberg
and David Geffen
; the music division of the company was headed up by iconic music chiefs, Mo Ostin
, Chuck Kaye and James Stroud
. At the time, the label was having success with artists such as Nelly Furtado
, Papa Roach
and All-American Rejects along with Nashville artists, Toby Keith
, Jessica Andrews
, Tracy Lawrence
and Randy Travis
. Swann wrote for the company until its dissolution in 2005.
. A year later, The People vs. Friar Laurence, the Man Who Killed Romeo and Juliet was co-produced by The Second City and The Chicago Shakespeare theatre. The show was a critical and commercial success and was nominated for three Jeffrey Joseph Awards including Best New Musical. Swann has gone on to compose music for the award winning off-Broadway musical, Play It Cool, as well as, DeLEARious (another Swann / West collaboration), which received the 2009 Garland Award from Backstage for Best New Score. Other musicals by Swann include, In A Booth at Chasen’s, Trombone, Neil Simon
’s Fools the Musical, Shakespeare’s Greatest Hits and It Had To Be You - a musical based on the life and songs of the famed lyricist, Gus Kahn
.
, Laura Hall
, Kelly McCleod, Roberta Duchak, Daniel Nahmod, Jennifer Capelo, Adrina Thorpe and Greg Rowles. Swann is also credited as the producer on the cast recordings of his musicals, The People Vs Friar Laurence, the Man Who Killed Romeo and Juliet and Play It Cool. Play It Cool was selected as one of eight productions to present at the 2010 National Alliance for Musical Theatre (NAMT) festival in New York City.
’s, Days of Our Lives
.
. He is a cousin to Country music superstar, Brad Paisley
. He has no relation, however, to Billy Swan
.
Clay Aiken
Clayton Holmes "Clay" Aiken is an American singer, songwriter, actor, producer and author who began his rise to fame on the second season of the television program American Idol in 2003. RCA Records offered him a recording contract, and his multi-platinum debut album Measure of a Man was released...
, Lee Ann Womack
Lee Ann Womack
Lee Ann Womack is an American country music singer and songwriter, who is best known for her old fashioned-styled country music songs that often discuss subjects such as cheating and lost love....
, Blake Shelton
Blake Shelton
Blake Tollison Shelton is an American country music artist. In 2001, he made his debut with the single "Austin". Released as the lead-off single from his self-titled debut album, "Austin" went on to spend five weeks at Number One on the Billboard Hot Country Songs charts...
, Neal McCoy
Neal McCoy
Hubert Neal McGaughey, Jr. is an American country music singer of mixed Irish and Filipino descent. Known professionally as Neal McCoy, he has released ten studio albums on various labels, and has released 34 singles to country radio...
, Rodney Atkins
Rodney Atkins
Rodney Allan Atkins is an American country music artist. Signed to Curb Records in 1996, he charted his first single on the Billboard country chart that year, but did not release an album until 2003's Honesty, which included the number 4 hit "Honesty ".If You're Going Through Hell, his second...
, Kristin Garner
Kristin Garner
Kristin Garner is an American country music singer. Garner was signed to Atlantic Records in 2001. Her first single for the label, "Let's Burn It Down," peaked at number 59 on the Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart in May 2001. Garner performed at Fan Fair in downtown Nashville in June...
and Lee Greenwood
Lee Greenwood
Melvin Lee Greenwood is an American country music artist. Active since the early 1980s, he has released more than twenty major-label albums and has charted more than 35 singles on the Billboard country music charts....
.
Early Life
Phil Swann was born to father Lewis Swann, a sign painter and engineer, and mother, Nancy (née Douglas). He was raised outside Huntington in the small town of Milton, West Virginia. He has two older siblings, Linda and Greg.At age 14, Swann began playing piano and singing in local churches, American Legions and civic organizations in-and-around the Tri-State area (West Virginia, Ohio and Kentucky). When he was 16, Swann was cast in the long running professional summer stock musical, The Hatfields and McCoys, in Beckley, West Virginia. Upon returning for his senior year of high school, Swann enrolled part-time at Marshall University where he studied theatre and speech in the evenings. He subsequently participated in the college’s theatrical productions and concerts. After graduating from Milton High School, Swann moved to New York City to attend the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. In New York, Swann continued playing piano and singing as a way of supporting himself while in acting school. He performed with bands, played on recording sessions and worked as a solo performer in piano bars throughout the city.
After graduating from college, Swann went on the road acting in various productions but ultimately found playing music more lucrative. He formed numerous bands and performed all over the country in hotels, nightclubs and on the County and State fair circuit. For a time, Swann moved to Muscle Shoals
Muscle Shoals
Muscle Shoals may refer to:* Muscle Shoals, Alabama* Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section* Muscle Shoals Sound Studio* Leo "Muscle" Shoals...
, Alabama to break into the legendary Muscle Shoals music scene as a songwriter and session player. Though his time in Muscle Shoals was short-lived and unheralded, professional relationships were formed that would later become important in his career. After a brief stint in Nashville, Swann went back on the road playing music with songwriting being the center of his focus. In 1988, he moved to Los Angeles.
Songwriter
In 1991, Swann was signed to the newly formed Los Angeles based music publishing company Southern Cow Music, a company started by his friend, Hollywood talent agent, Steve Bloch. Beyond writing songs for Southern Cow, Swann also took on the role of listening to other songwriter’s songs being pitched to the company. Swann has said in interviews that this period “on the other side of the desk” was one of the most valuable learning experiences in his career. “I started hearing my own songs with the ears of a executive and it changed everything.” Swann established himself as a prolific and sought after songwriter through the 90s, garnering cuts on many artists' albums and becoming a fixture in the LA songwriting scene. When Southern Cow Music relocated its main offices to Nashville in 1996, Swann stayed in Los Angeles to head-up the west coast office as Vice-President.For most of the 90s and mid-2000s, Swann spilt his time between Los Angeles and Nashville, penning songs for the biggest names in country and pop music. He also became very active with the Songwriter’s Guild of America, initially by holding songwriting workshops for the organization’s non-profit foundation, then ultimately being named to the organization's Board of Directors. Through the guild, Swann became friends and a collaborator with legendary songwriters such as Jack Segal
Jack Segal
Jack Segal was a composer of popular American songs...
, Bobby Troop, Vic Mizzy, Donald Kahn, Al Kasha and Ray Evans.
Dreamworks
In 2000, Steve Bloch, orchestrated a deal that landed Swann a songwriting and producer contract with DreamWorks SKG; the company owned by Steven SpielbergSteven Spielberg
Steven Allan Spielberg KBE is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, video game designer, and studio entrepreneur. In a career of more than four decades, Spielberg's films have covered many themes and genres. Spielberg's early science-fiction and adventure films were seen as an...
, Jeffrey Katzenberg
Jeffrey Katzenberg
Jeffrey Katzenberg is an American film producer and CEO of DreamWorks Animation. He is perhaps most famous for his period as chairman of The Walt Disney Company's film division, and for producing DreamWorks animated films such as Shrek, Antz, The Prince of Egypt, The Road to El Dorado, Chicken...
and David Geffen
David Geffen
David Geffen is an American record executive, film producer, theatrical producer and philanthropist. Geffen is noted for creating Asylum Records in 1970, Geffen Records in 1980, and DGC Records in 1990...
; the music division of the company was headed up by iconic music chiefs, Mo Ostin
Mo Ostin
Mo Ostin is a record executive who has worked for several companies, including Verve, Reprise Records, Warner Bros. Records, and DreamWorks. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2003 by Paul Simon, Neil Young, and Lorne Michaels...
, Chuck Kaye and James Stroud
James Stroud
James Stroud is an American musician and record producer who works in pop, rock, and country music. In the 1990s he was the president of Giant Records and held several credits as a session drummer...
. At the time, the label was having success with artists such as Nelly Furtado
Nelly Furtado
Nelly Kim Furtado is a Canadian singer-songwriter, record producer and actress. Furtado grew up in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.Furtado first gained fame with her debut album, Whoa, Nelly!, and its single "I'm Like a Bird", which won a 2001 Juno Award for Single of the Year and a 2002 Grammy...
, Papa Roach
Papa Roach
Papa Roach is an American rock band from Vacaville, California. Their first major-label release was the triple-platinum album Infest . The group's success continued with their gold album Lovehatetragedy , their platinum album Getting Away with Murder , The Paramour Sessions , and Metamorphosis...
and All-American Rejects along with Nashville artists, Toby Keith
Toby Keith
Toby Keith Covel , best known as Toby Keith, is an American country music singer-songwriter, record producer and actor. Keith released his first four studio albums — 1993's Toby Keith, 1994's Boomtown, 1996's Blue Moon and 1997's Dream Walkin, plus a Greatest Hits package for various divisions of...
, Jessica Andrews
Jessica Andrews
Jessica Danielle Andrews is an American country music singer. At age 15 in mid-1999, she made her debut on the Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks charts with the single "I Will Be There for You", from her debut album Heart Shaped World, released in 1999 on DreamWorks Records Nashville.Andrews...
, Tracy Lawrence
Tracy Lawrence
Tracy Lawrence is an American country music artist. He started at a country music restaurant called "Live At Libby's" where owner Libby Knight would help local talent find their way into country music...
and Randy Travis
Randy Travis
Randy Travis is an American country music singer and actor. Since 1985, he has recorded 20 studio albums and charted more than 30 singles on the Billboard Hot Country Songs charts, 22 of which were number one hits...
. Swann wrote for the company until its dissolution in 2005.
Theatre
In 2005, actor, writer and Second City alumni, Ron West, approached Swann to co-write a musical comedy based upon Shakespeare’s Romeo and JulietRomeo and Juliet
Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy written early in the career of playwright William Shakespeare about two young star-crossed lovers whose deaths ultimately unite their feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular archetypal stories of young, teenage lovers.Romeo and Juliet belongs to a...
. A year later, The People vs. Friar Laurence, the Man Who Killed Romeo and Juliet was co-produced by The Second City and The Chicago Shakespeare theatre. The show was a critical and commercial success and was nominated for three Jeffrey Joseph Awards including Best New Musical. Swann has gone on to compose music for the award winning off-Broadway musical, Play It Cool, as well as, DeLEARious (another Swann / West collaboration), which received the 2009 Garland Award from Backstage for Best New Score. Other musicals by Swann include, In A Booth at Chasen’s, Trombone, Neil Simon
Neil Simon
Neil Simon is an American playwright and screenwriter. He has written numerous Broadway plays, including Brighton Beach Memoirs, Biloxi Blues, and The Odd Couple. He won the 1991 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his play Lost In Yonkers. He has written the screenplays for several of his plays that...
’s Fools the Musical, Shakespeare’s Greatest Hits and It Had To Be You - a musical based on the life and songs of the famed lyricist, Gus Kahn
Gus Kahn
Gustav Gerson Kahn was a musician, songwriter and lyricist.-Biography:Kahn was born in Koblenz, Germany in 1886. The family emigrated from there to the United States and moved to Chicago, Illinois in 1890...
.
Production
Swann’s production credits include: Helen SlaterHelen Slater
Helen Rachel Slater is an American actress and singer-songwriter.She appeared in the title role in the 1984 film Supergirl. In the following years she starred in several very successful comedy-drama films such as Ruthless People, The Secret of My Success, and City Slickers...
, Laura Hall
Laura Hall
Laura Hall is an American musician from Chicago. She is best known for her role as band leader / pianist on the American version of the improvisational comedy television show Whose Line Is It Anyway?.-Career:...
, Kelly McCleod, Roberta Duchak, Daniel Nahmod, Jennifer Capelo, Adrina Thorpe and Greg Rowles. Swann is also credited as the producer on the cast recordings of his musicals, The People Vs Friar Laurence, the Man Who Killed Romeo and Juliet and Play It Cool. Play It Cool was selected as one of eight productions to present at the 2010 National Alliance for Musical Theatre (NAMT) festival in New York City.
Educator
Since 1998, Swann has taught on the art and craft of songwriting at UCLA through the school's extension program. He currently sits on the Board of Advisors for the school's music production program.Solo Career
On May 24, 2011, Phil Swann released his first solo CD, Stale Scotch and Cheap Cigars. The CD received critical acclaim and Swann has performed shows in New York City and Los Angeles.Television
Swann has appeared as both an actor and musician in numerous TV shows, most notably appearing as the character Sam on NBCNBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
’s, Days of Our Lives
Days of our Lives
Days of our Lives is a long running daytime soap opera broadcast on the NBC television network. It is one of the longest-running scripted television programs in the world, airing nearly every weekday in the United States since November 8, 1965. It has since been syndicated to many countries around...
.
Personal Life
Phil Swann is married to theatre educator, Amanda Swann. They currently reside in Los AngelesLos Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
. He is a cousin to Country music superstar, Brad Paisley
Brad Paisley
Brad Douglas Paisley is an American singer-songwriter and musician. His style crosses between traditional country music and Southern rock, and his songs are frequently laced with humor and pop culture references....
. He has no relation, however, to Billy Swan
Billy Swan
Billy Lance Swan is an American songwriter and singer, best known for his 1974 single, "I Can Help".-Life:Swan was born in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. As a child, he learned drums, piano and guitar, and began writing songs...
.