Look and Learn Information

Songwriter Victor Clayton shared: 

Look and Learn was written specifically for the show.

Back story: we were given a prompt for a scene where the drama teacher is searching for a way to reach his students with a lesson to make them better actors. I grew up in theatre (junior high, high school, community theatre, and playwriting), so I knew the spirit they were after. After a few days of brainstorming, the refrain “Look and Learn” hit me during a lunch break at work. I wrote the full chorus and verses that evening.

My writing partner, friend, and musical mentor Larry Johnson (RIP) loved it. We cut a demo and brought it to Larry Robinson, who had the connection to the show and had relayed the prompt to us. Larry Robinson produced the next demo with new music (different from ours) but kept all my lyrics. I rapped the verses; Larry and I sang/rapped the choruses. Larry Robinson delivered that demo to the producers, and they accepted it.

The show then invited Larry Johnson and me to The Record Plant to record another demo. The music changed again for broadcast, but not one word of the original lyrics changed. I was asked to rap the verses to help guide the actors who would voice over them, and Larry and I voiced the chorus as well as doubling the rhyme words in the verses. It became our first professional placement. We were paid for the Record Plant session and received writing and performance royalties because our voices were used in the TV production — you can hear us in the choruses and echoing the verse rhymes.