Issue Date: June 8, 2003

In this article: Lyric contest's winning song What's up with Justin Timberlake? Our recording studio on wheels

LYRIC CONTEST RESULTS

Meet the winner of this year's USA WEEKEND-John Lennon Songwriting Contest for Teens

By Frappa Stout

Contest winner Monika Pierzchlewicz, left, flew to Houston to be photographed with one of our four judges, Kelly Rowland of Destiny's Child. They spent the afternoon talking music.

In her free time, when she's not chatting online, playing tennis, listening to 'N Sync or watching the Disney Channel, Monika Pierzchlewicz loves to write. Usually, her topics cover what you might expect from a 16-year-old: love, heartache, relationships, friends.

But when the Port Charlotte, Fla., student decided to enter our 2003 USA WEEKEND-John Lennon Songwriting Contest for Teens, she was struck by a different muse. This time, the swirl of world events inspired her.

Monika Pierzchlewicz (pronounced Pierre-SHLUH-veech) and her song, "Like You", beat out thousands of student entries from across the country to win our second annual contest.

In addition to having her lyrics published here in USA WEEKEND Magazine, Monika wins a $1,000 U.S. Savings Bond from Maxell, a 16-track CD burner from Yamaha valued at more than $1,200, and an all-expenses-paid trip to New York to record her song onboard the John Lennon Educational Tour Bus. The high school Monika will attend next fall will receive $500 from the youth music resource Web site themusicedge.com (she's currently home-schooled).

The two runners-up, who also get prizes, were Sam Foster, 14, of Algoma, Wis., for his song Sorry, and Erin Surrock, 15, of Frederick, Md., who wrote "Writing on the Wall".

The winners were chosen by a panel of top recording talents: Justin Timberlake, Kelly Rowland, Vanessa Carlton and Darius Rucker. The music stars agreed that, unlike much pop music today, our three winners' songs had something to say.

"I was impressed with all of the finalists, because there aren't many creative writing classes in a lot of schools, but they all were good," says Carlton, who is now recording her second album. "If you can get beyond the love poems and step outside of yourself when you're 16 and make an observation about the world, that's rare."

Rucker says the winning lyrics stood out because they were infused with honest messages and avoided clichés. "Nowadays, it's mostly just 'I love you, I want you, my limo is bigger than yours, my Mercedes is bigger than yours,' " says Rucker, whose fourth CD with his group, Hootie & the Blowfish, hit stores this spring. "But these songs really had meaning."

Monika's song especially resonated with the judges -- not just for its message, but also for its musicality. "It was just flat-out beautiful," Rucker says. "My wife read it and said the same thing: 'That was written by a kid?' Unbelievable."

Even more surprising is the fact that Monika, an avid poet, had no previous music training and had never penned a song before. She's been writing poems since the eighth grade, about "love, depression, happiness, things teens go through," she says. Her writings have evoked tears at her church youth group meetings and serve as a sort of personal record of her life. Songwriting proved to be a bit more difficult, because of the need for rhythm, but she still found the message was key.

"I often write to get someone else to think about what I'm saying, to inspire or influence them," says Monika, who wants to be an actress. "If I can touch one person, make them think or change their mind, that's a huge thing."

Timberlake says he admired the tone of Monika's lyrics, which he described as "assertive, but it doesn't feel like she tried to dictate."

"I don't think writing a song is about dictating what the song is," adds Timberlake, who's now on tour with Christina Aguilera for his multiplatinum CD "Justified", which he co-wrote. "I think it's about letting it be whatever it's going to be. She just had something on her mind, and she portrayed it."

Inspiration can come from strange places. For Monika, it was a mix of the present and past. Her song may sound like an anti-war anthem. (See the lyrics, below.) But as the country faced war in Iraq, she found herself reflecting on other sorts of conflicts. "My great-grandfather was held as a German prisoner of war during World War II," says Monika, whose family is from Poland. "Today, it angers me that people would come and threaten us just because they don't like the idea of people living in freedom. In World War II, my home country was invaded for the same reason."

Timberlake says he finds ideas for songs in the small things. For example, he likes to sit in a restaurant and just people-watch for hours -- although that may not be as easy for the teen idol as it used to be.

"Everything is a song," he says. "It's just little simple things that can spark off a whole song. That was the other thing I really liked about her lyrics: Maybe it was the timing in the world, but her song starts off with war -- 'in the family,' 'in my school' -- and turns into something that goes a little more toward racism. I like the way she wasn't afraid to let it take a little bit of a turn."

So what should Monika and the two runners-up do from here?

"Learn to play an instrument!" Timberlake urges. (Monika's father is now teaching her the piano.) "There's nothing like being able to sit down at an instrument and see your ideas come into form so quickly."

And don't expect instant stardom, advises Rowland, of the group Destiny's Child. "I think you need patience above anything, because it's not overnight that things happen for you," she says. "It took us six years to get our record deal, and Beyoncé [Knowles] really didn't start getting her writer's credit until [our last album], even though she contributed a lot even to the second Destiny's Child record."

"Just know that if you work hard, it will come around," Rowland adds. "[Monika] is a very smart girl. And because of the contest, she's off to an amazing start."

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The winning song: "Like You"

Lyrics written by Monika Pierzchlewicz

War in the family
War in my school
War right inside myself
War
All over the world
How do we live like this?
Why is hate the king?
Black and white are just colors
They shouldn't mean anything

(chorus)

So take my hand
It has five fingers
Look into my eyes
You'll see there are two
Feel my heart beating
Don't you see?
I'm just like you
We are all so different
Yet still the same
Why are we so blind
Thinking life's a game?
You despise that boy
Simply for his color
Did you ever think
He could've been born
Your brother?

(chorus repeat)

So take my hand
It has five fingers
Look into my eyes
You'll see there are two
Feel my heart beating
Don't you see?
I'm just like you

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What's up with Justin Timberlake?

There will be no kicking back this summer for Justin Timberlake. Now that he has wrapped up his duties as a judge of the 2003 USA WEEKEND-John Lennon Songwriting Contest for Teens, he hits Oakland, Calif., and Tacoma, Wash., this weekend on his three-month concert tour with Christina Aguilera. The combo has provided plenty of fodder for the rumor mill, but Timberlake, 22, says he and Aguilera, who've known each other since their preteen stint on "The Mickey Mouse Club" in the early 1990s (along with his ex-girlfriend Britney Spears), came together for the music -- and nothing more.

"We thought it was an innovative way to go on tour, because people get two shows for the price of one," Timberlake tells us. "We have a mutual respect for each other's talent, and that's it."

They've both come a long way since their Mouseketeer days, when, Timberlake says, he had "big floppy hair, little skinny arms and a big baggy shirt and big ears. ... We were both nerds."

"When I first saw her, I said, 'Who is that?' " he says of Aguilera. "But then she opened her mouth [and sang], and it was like 'Whoa.' "

Timberlake ditched his squeaky-clean 'N Sync image shortly after his very public breakup with Spears last year. The teen idol bulked up, posed shirtless in a come-hither pose on the cover of "Rolling Stone" and discussed his sex life in numerous articles; meanwhile, rumors had him hooking up with the decade-older Janet Jackson, "Charmed" star Alyssa Milano and singer-actress Tatyana Ali.

He won't talk about whom he's now dating -- although recent reports have him romancing Staci Flood, who dances in his "Rock Your Body" video. But Timberlake says he's looking for a woman who is "confident, with a strong sense of self. Everything stems from there. I think we, as people, do things for two reasons: either out of love or out of fear. When you make a decision out of fear, it's just because of your own insecurity. If somebody believes in themself, they won't do that. And that's the most attractive thing."

As for getting too racy on his "Justified and Stripped" tour with Aguilera, Timberlake says he's not concerned. "There is such a thing as going a little too far, but I don't want to sit here and judge what she does," he says. "Maybe it's something she looks at as a playful thing. I don't know. I know there's nothing anybody could do to affect what I do on my own."

For now, that means riding the popularity of his solo album through the summer tour and spending down time with his mother and stepfather in Memphis. He also has a new gig as a sports correspondent for TNT and TBS. And most important, doing what makes him feel comfortable -- even if it means challenging fans' expectations.

"I've grown up. And it's tough to do that in front of the whole world," he says. "I think if you don't change, then you're not really an artist. Now that I have a record where people like to talk about the music, it makes a big difference. I get questions about my album, and that's a great feeling."
-- F.S.

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Our recording studio on wheels

This year, USA WEEKEND Magazine took its teen songwriting contest on the road -- literally.

We dispatched the John Lennon Educational Tour Bus, a roving state-of-the-art music studio, to schools in 20 cities. From Healdsburg, Calif., to Fort Lauderdale, Fla., the 45-foot-long bus drew crowds of curious, music-loving kids.

Many climbed aboard and -- with the help of the bus crew, who double as music producers -- created their own songs. Others simply got pumped about the many career possibilities in the field of music. The bus is the creation of the John Lennon organization, which runs the international John Lennon Songwriting Contest and is our partner in the USA WEEKEND songwriting competition for teens.

In Ohio, "The Columbus Dispatch", which carries USA WEEKEND, held its own songwriting contest in conjunction with the magazine's. A junior from Westerville North High School, flute and piccolo player Stephanie Jones, 17, won the chance to spend the day on the bus and record her song, with the help of seven friends. "She had this poem pasted on our fridge for two years," says her mother, Kathleen Jones. "I just printed it out and sent it in for her. When the principal told her she'd won the contest, she said, 'What contest?' It was funny."

The newspaper also hosted a music symposium at the school, where everyone from a local chamber music player to a rock guitarist to a creole-funk trumpeter discussed their long (and sometimes trying) careers in music.

"For the students, it reaffirmed that they should go ahead with their dreams and visions," Westerville North High principal James McCann says. "They learned that it doesn't have to be the guy singing, that they could be the technical people, the teachers, the support people. There are so many opportunities, all of them important."

In New York, four talented kids won a contest sponsored by a radio station and the "New York Daily News" for their chance to come on board. There, they worked with famous rap producer Erick Sermon to record a rap-infused version of John Lennon's "Imagine". The kids and bus crew also created a music video. BET aired a segment on the event.

"It was totally new to be working with people with no experience," Sermon says. "It was cool, because it was all fresh to them."
-- F.S.

Cover and cover story photographs for USA WEEKEND: Justin Timberlake by Robert Sebree; Kelly Rowland with teen winner by Pam Francis