Purchase Susan’s song BE THE CHANGE in choral arrangement! Purchase includes right to print reproductions (up to 50 copies, none for re-sale) and to record and sell a recording of the song and arrangement.
SATB/Piano Sheet Music
arranged by Jon Ranard TTBB/Piano Sheet Music
arranged by Eric Knechtes Get the Lyrics
(pdf)

Download Susan Werner’s full catalog of albums, plus bonus tracks (demos and unreleased songs), and live concert video footage with one click! Delivered as Mp3s

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Includes the following:

• ALBUMS
• 1993 – Live at Tin Angel
• 1993 – Midwestern Saturday Night
• 1995 – Last of the Good Straight Girls
• 1998 – Time Between Trains
• 2001 – New Non-Fiction
• 2004 – I Can’t Be New
• 2007 – The Gospel Truth
• 2008 – Live at Passim
• 2009 – Classics
• 2010 – Kicking the Beehive
• 2011 – Live at the Center for the Arts in Natick
• 2013 – Hayseed
• 2017 – An American in Havana
• 2017 – Eight Unnecessary Songs
• 2019 – NOLA
• 2020 – Flyover Country (for downloads after Sept 27, 2020)
• 2022 – The Birds of Florida (for downloads after Jan 8, 2022)
• 2024 – Halfway to Houston (for downloads after Apr 13, 2024)
• VIDEOS
• All Mapped Out (live concert & tour footage)
• 1955 Chevy Bel Air (official music video)
• Live at Stone Mountain (concert footage)
• Free Your A** (official music video)
• EXTRAS
• Unreleased songs
• Demos
• & more

And I know some of you are thinking, “You did a record about Texas? WHY?”

I’d like to remind you of a few things: Chili. Ruby Red Grapefruit. The Johnson Space Center. Molly Ivins. Patrick Swayze. Dell Computers (even though I’m an Apple devotee). Beyonce. Buddy Holly. Janis Joplin. Willie Nelson.

Yes, OF COURSE Texas’ government is terrible. You think I’d overlook all that? Check out Welcome To Texas! written with Southpaw Jones, and Tiny Texans written with Sara Hickman.

But you’ll find plenty of love in these songs, too, in Lake of Stars and Corpus and Jalapeno Cornbread. You’ll hear great Philly musicians working their magic on this record along with guests from Austin (Tish Hinojosa and Chip Dolan).

So yeah, sure, the record’s “about Texas.” But maybe think of it as one artist’s view of life, seen through the lens of the Lone Star State.

Give it a listen, and even if you’re up in Minneapolis or over in Atlanta or out in L.A. you might suddenly find your imagination rolling down the interstate and halfway to Houston.

Get the Record Here   Get the Lyrics

Panthers iguanas and flamingoes meet up with dobros, bongos and marimbas on songwriter Susan Werner’s colorful new EP The Birds Of Florida.

“I wound up riding out the winter of the pandemic in Siesta Key near Sarasota,” Werner says, “And despite my best efforts to relax, I somehow left with an album.”

Produced by drummer Erik Johnson (Huffamoose), the lush arrangements feature Gulf and Western sounds ranging from rumba to reggae to bolero ballads to Bakersfield twang. Werner’s signature sharp lyrics capture the beauty and strangeness of the Sunshine State – from the playful lead track “Florida La La La” to the beach stroll of a love song “I Could Get Used To This” to the heartfelt and poetic “The Birds of Florida.”

“I was not looking for songs in Florida,” Werner says. “I was just trying to get through a really, really long winter, like everybody else. But the tunes started landing, like, well, birds. From a talking Blue Macaw on a man’s shoulder in Key West, to a radio report about cold-stunned iguanas falling from tree branches, to a silver haired Siesta Key neighbor who uncannily resembled an ibis, birds and flying things began appearing everywhere, including in my songs. After a while I stopped chasing them off, and I’m glad I did. Because with these songs, this recording, I might have accidentally made a good case for the Sunshine State.”

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This studio recording (release date Sept 27, 2020) features 10 Werner originals in a nod to the songforms and sounds of Americana and Country. Features lapsteel wizard Mike “Slomo” Brenner, pedal steel master Jim Cohen, a co-write with John Gorka (Wine Bottles) and Susan’s signature lyrical poetry and wit.

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NOW what has she gone and done?

For Susan Werner fans awaiting another of her unique concept albums, it’s here, and this time it’s NOLA – yup, New Orleans. Based on the piano stylings of Professor Longhair and Dr. John, Susan has written nine new tunes and tossed in a new take on an old classic. Just in time for Mardi Gras 2019!

Recorded in New Orleans and Philadelphia. Produced by Erik Johnson, High Hill Studios, Philadelphia.

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Sheet music for Susan Werner’s often requested piano instrumental, Nostalgia (from An American in Havana).  This is a single song PDF of the sheet music,$5.

Chicago musician Susan Werner wrote the six songs of “An American In Havana” during her travels to Cuba in 2015 and 2016, and the recording features her trademark wry, poetic lyrics set to Cuban sounds and songforms.  Produced with Venezuelan drummer Pablo Bencid (who plays timbales and drums) and featuring Cuban American percussionist Mayra Casales, the EP is a vivid, colorful mural of the delights (riding in a vintage American car along Havana’s Malecon), the beauty and scarcity (detailed in the lead track) and the obsession with coffee (Cortadito) that are part of every American’s introduction to the island.

This songbook includes all of the songs on the 8 Unnecessary Songs CD.

Eight little tunes on topics ranging from cosmetic surgery to the extraordinary properties of cheap beer to global warming. At turns facile, petty and uncharitable, these songs offer a kind of comfort to those of us falling wayyy short of Mother Teresa out here.

Sheet music for the often requested May I Suggest.  This is a single song PDF of the sheet music, including piano and tabs with lyrics.

This record is dedicated to my father and mother, and their fathers and mothers, and their fathers and mothers, and their fathers and mothers… farmers, all.

Songs commissioned by the University of Nebraska’s Lied Center for Performing Arts and the Institute for Agriculture and Natural Resources.

This songbook includes all of the songs on the Hayseed project. No piano music, just the guitar chords.

This Double Live CD was recorded on March 19, 2011 at the center for the Arts in Natick Massachusetts and captures one of the most magical performances of Susan’s Career. Susan along with Band-mates Trina Hamlin and Gail Ann Dorsey completely rock the house.

Kicking the Beehive is an 11-song collection of provocative, poignant, lyrical originals that are infused with the rustic roots of American folk, blues and country music. Produced by Rodney Crowell, recorded in Nashville and featuring such all star-guests as Vince Gill, Keb’ Mo’ and Paul Franklin, Kicking the Beehive is a personal project where Werner intuitively explorers the full impact of looking beyond the superficial and delving into soulful honesty.

The new year brings a new release from Susan Werner that leverages ALL of her many talents, and adds “arranger” to her long list of musical accomplishments.

A collection of live recordings of Susan Werner performing with band from two nights at Passim (May 31st & June 1st 2007) during her CD Release tour for “The Gospel Truth.” The band setup includes Werner’s long-time upright bass player, Greg Holt, as well as angelic harmonies and percussion from Colleen Sexton and sizzling harmonica, backup vocals and percussion from Trina Hamlin.

Different from the last songbook, which was piano-centric, this sheet music is also great for piano but much more guitar friendly, whether you play with or without a capo. We are providing lyrics and chords for all songs, plus lead sheets/complete charts for five of the most requested songs on the record.

Susan Werner takes on the church in contemporary American life in this gospel/bluegrass – tinged collection of 11 new originals. Quite possibly the first “agnostic gospel” album, this CD surveys the wide variety of viewpoints regarding the church today, ranging from earnest and uplifting handclap choir rousers such as “help somebody” to the introspective and critical “forgiveness” and “sunday mornings,” pausing along the way for comic relief in the frank and humorous “our father” and what is sure to become the anthem of agnostics everywhere, “probably not.” A project sure to confirm Werner’s reputation as “one of the most innovative songwriters working today” (Chicago Tribune).

13 Original songs from the CD I Can’t Be New plus two bonus charts: Movie of My Life from the CD Time Between Trains and May I Suggest from the CD New Non-Fiction. Some songs have been transposed for ease of play.

Always ready to reinvent herself, in 2004 Susan Werner released her album of instant songbook classics “I Can’t Be New” on Koch Records. For years she incorporated cabaret-style numbers in her live performances, exchanging her guitar for a piano (when there was one to be had), and she’d been asked by her audience to put all those songs in one recording. Fans and critics alike sang her praises: the All Music Guide calling it “a brilliantly constructed, soulful, and cleverly tender effort by a songwriter and musician who is in such complete command of her gifts that it’s almost scary.”

Performing Songwriter Magazine’s Editor’s Choice, top 10 DIY records of the year. Washington Post: “always an impressive songwriter, Werner continues to compose sharp, funny, compassionate lyrics, a gift rare enough to set her apart…”

Released 2001. Recorded in Nashville in the summer of 2001, NNF was produced by colin linden (producer of the bruce cockburn’s charity of night and breakfast in new orleans cd’s) and features richard bell on keyboards (from janis joplin’s pearl album), dave roe on bass (johnny cash’s gut-string bass player) and colin playing tasty slide solos and rollicking electric guitar parts.

Recorded in 2000 in Peekskill, NY, this show features a couple of unreleased songs as well as some old favorites ] from Time Betwen Trains and New Non-Fiction.

Quintessentially Nashville and rich with stand-out performances that highlight Susan Werner’s strong songwriting. Produced by guitar wizard Darrell Scott, features the likes of upright bassist Viktor Krauss and legendary timekeeper Kenny Malone.

Released 1998. Bottom Line Records. Recorded in Nashville.

Released 1995. Private Music. Susan’s national label debut (Private Music/BMG) created an audience for her beyond the east coast, with two tours with joan armatrading following this release, recorded in New York City and Los Angeles.

Produced by Fernando Saunders (Lou Reed’s long time bass player and collaborator), the cast of players includes Marshall Crenshaw and Mitchell Froom.

Released 1993. Collected solo performances from Susan’s early years, all recorded at Philadelphia’s best listening room, the tin angel located on Second Street in old city Philly.

Highlights include My Mother’s Garden, My Soul’s Not At War, Society Ball, The Country Send Up, Ain’t I Lonely Tonight, and a version of Edith Piaf’s La Vie En Rose.

Released 1993. Susan’s first recording, made possible by a gift from the late Philadelphia philanthropist Phoebe Valentine. Produced by Grant Macavoy and performed with a cast of Philadelphia musicians, this collection of songs indicates musical styles Susan would continue to explore over the next years of her career.

Highlights include Greg Simon’s The Great Out There, The Satirical Baby Boomer Song, Uncle John, and the first recording of the piano ballad Maybe If I Sang Cole Porter.