Behind the Song

The reason behind the song, which is well known (especially for fans of Lea Michele) is due to the death of her fiancé who she had been with for a couple of years as well as working with for over four years on Glee. Cory Monteith  (Lea's fiancé) died on July 13th 2013 in  Vancouver. The coroners report stated that Cory had "died from "a mixed drug toxicity" consisting of heroin and alcohol, and that his death appeared to have been accidental".


Michele had already completed her first solo album at the time which she has said that Monteith had often made notes on to help Michele. She then decided to postpone the album's release date, which was supposed to be very shortly after Monteith's death, and instead included songs that were tribute to Monteith's death - 'Cannonball' and 'If You Say So'.


Michele has spoke about the songs few times but in one of her videos for her YouTube channel where she described each track on the album, she said this about 'If You Say So':


"What it's about is sort of personal to me. I think that there will be a time where I'm happy to be talking in detail about it but for now I think, why I wrote it with her (Sia) was because when you lose someone, you know, one of the scariest parts of the process is being so afraid that you're going to forget. I'm 27 and I hopefully have many years ahead of me in my life and to think that I would have had a time in my life with someone and what if over time I forget things? So, I sat down with her to write this song about my relationship and we ended up writing about the last conversation I had with my boyfriend and how thankful I am to have had our last words be 'I love you'. So, it really is sort of self-explanatory when you listen to it, it's very personal to me, but this album is personal and it wouldn't be 'me' if I didn't let people in like that."

Permission

In order to use the audio of Lea Michele's If You Say So, I first had to obtain the copyright for the song from the record label she works for. In this case that is Sony Music within Columbia Records, of whom also has artists signed, specifically in the Americas, such as Adele, Beyoncé and the late David Bowie.

I used their website to find a email address in which to contact someone from Columbia Records to say how and why I would like to use 'If You Say So'. Here is a copy of the email that I sent to them to try and obtain their permission:

To whom it may concern, 
I am currently studying Media Studies at Landau Forte Academy Tamworth Sixth Form and am required to film and edit a music video for my A Level coursework. For this, I have chosen Lea Michele's 'If You Say So' and would like to produce a music video based on the song's narration. The use of this audio would be for educational purposes only and credit will be given to Lea Michele and her team.
Many regards, Victoria Oakes