WITHOUT A SONG: SONGWRITERS ASSOCIATION SHOWCASE - APRIL, 4

In a mirrored dance studio in downtown Cape Girardeau, a small group of people gather in a circle twice a month to sing to each other.

They are members of the Heartland Songwriters Association, a confederation of wanna-be, would-be and could-be songwriters who support, critique and motivate each other in what one calls their shared "obsession."

This Tuesday, one is a school teacher from East Prairie, another a hairdresser. One man paints signs. One woman is a housewife. Their songs evince varying degrees of skill, but criticisms are carefully weighed. Everyone's feelings are at stake singing their own songs in this mirrored room.

"You're just sitting there waiting for someone to say your baby is ugly," says Karen Clevidence, a teacher from Charleston.

One woman, Cindy Hefner of Perks, Ill., sings a song called "White Christmas Mississippi" that is a warm quilt of back-home memories. "White Christmas Mississippi," she sings, "there's no place like home. Watch it snow in Mississippi, 'cause it's here and then it's gone."

She earns kudos.

Not everyone is as satisfied with a young man's song about a romantic encounter.

Quoting the lyric, "I looked her up and down," James Peters says, "I think you could have said something a little more interesting.

"Every time a word goes down it should mean something."

A banner on the wall reads: "Congratulations to one of our own." The man they're saluting, Peters, has just heard confirmation that one of his songs has been recorded by a new group called Brother Phelps. The band is headed by Ricky Lee and Doug Phelps, two ex-members of the highly successful country band, the Kentucky Headhunters.

Previously, Richard Stout had a corner on most of the association's honors as the writer of "Main Street USA," a tune recorded by Cape Girardeau's own Lou Hobbs.

The association, which has been around for five years, will hold its annual showcase at 2 p.m. Sunday, April 4, at the Little Ole Opry on Highway 34 between Jackson and Burfordville. Admission is $2.50.

Members of the association have contributed songs to an album, "Take One...Please," which is available in music stores in Cape Girardeau, Sikeston and Anna, Ill.

Three HSA members Peters, Peggy Moore and Dean Winstead are semi-professional musicians who play in the country band, Southern Style.

Winstead runs Riverside Recording Studios in downtown Cape Girardeau. The association's meetings are held in the same building the studio occupies.

Winstead's studio "demoed" "Eagle Over Angel," the song written by Peters, the organization's past president. Pat Lunsford is the current president.

Peters, a construction worker who lives in Jonesboro, Ill., now and used to call Nashville home, has two Tennessee-based songwriting partners who concentrate on getting their songs heard by the right people.

But the songwriters association meetings, he says, are the place where he bounces ideas off other writers.

"We're all friends here. Support is one of the big things," he says. "Not everybody understands the need to write."

Before moving to Southern Illinois, Peters was living and pitching his songs in Nashville. He mostly was striking out.

"Nashville's real cliquey," Peters said. "This group gave me the confidence and encouragement to press on."

Members of the group also share information about the song publishing business, a quagmire for the unsuspecting.

But mostly, two nights a month they come together to hear the wonderful surprises that others have created.

Carrie Little of Cape Girardeau plays a tape of a delightfully funny children's song she has written, sung in her own hyperspace-chipmunk voice.

Ruth Sauerbrum, a seamstress-designer-janitor from Cape Girardeau, brings the group back down to earth with a song called "Behind These Bars," which compares working in a tavern to being in prison.

Not everyone contributes a song, but most everyone had some of the cookies Peters passed around.

The video of his song is due out in May, with the single to be released about a week later. These are the days a hopeful songwriter dreams about.

"I'll try to mention everybody's names at the CMA (Country Music Association) awards," he jokingly assures his fellow hopefuls.

For more information about the Heartland Songwriters Association, phone 651-3500. Meetings are held at 7:30 p.m. on the first and third Tuesdays of every month in the lower level of the Riverside Gymnastics/Riverside Recording building.