Since the mid-2000s, Selena Gomez has been a popular actress and singer. Does Gomez write her own songs?
In the early years of her music career, it seems Selena Gomez had little input in the writing of her songs. As time has progressed, her writing credits have increased, culminating her 2020 album “Rare”, where she is credited as co-writing every song. Her songwriters have been numerous, with Julia Michaels as one of her most frequent collaborators.
For more on Selena Gomez, her music career and songwriting, read on.
Selena Gomez
Selena Marie Gomez was born on July 22, 1992, in Grand Prairie, Texas. Her parents are Ricardo Joel Gomez and Amanda Dawn Cornett, who have Mexican and Italian ancestry respectively.
Amanda was a stage actress, so it’s little surprise that Selena would enter the performing arts. Ricardo and Amanda divorced when Selena was five and, having had Selena when she was 16, Amanda struggled to provide for herself and her daughter.
Selena appeared in a number of pageants as a child and became interested in an entertainment career while watching her mother’s rehearsals. She auditioned for “Barney and Friends” and earned a role in the show in 2002, alongside Demi Lovato.
“Barney” gave Gomez her first experience in acting and singing onscreen, appearing in the show until 2004 when she was told she was getting “too old”.
In 2007, she was cast in “Hannah Montana” in a recurring role and later auditioned for Disney’s “Wizards of Waverly Place”, in which she was assigned her first leading role.
Gomez’s breakout role encouraged her and her mother to move to Hollywood and her profile rapidly grew. She was signed to Hollywood Records at the age of 16, alongside Miley Cyrus and former co-star Demi Lovato.
Looking to grow her music career, Gomez formed “Selena Gomez & the Scene”, a pop-rock band, and achieved moderate success, thanks in part to Disney’s heavy promotion of their early singles.
From 2012 to 2015, Gomez stated that she would focus more on her film career, moving away from Disney by voicing Mavis Dracula in “Hotel Transylvania” featuring in the divisive “Spring Breakers” and starring in the critically panned “Getaway”.
In 2013, she released her first solo album, “Stars Dance”, which debuted at the top of the Billboard albums chart. The album released mixed reviews, with some criticizing her lack of a strong musical identity.
Her second album, “Revival”, released in 2015 and was appropriately named as it received far more positive reviews and again debuted at the top of the chart. In 2020, “Rare” continued this trend as her third consecutive number one album.
Songwriting
Gomez has primarily worked in the dance-pop and EDM genres, though she has also experimented in others as her career has progressed. Early in her career, it seems she had little input in her music, with songwriting credits few and far between.
After firing her management team, specifically her mother and stepfather, in 2014, Gomez signed with WME and seemed to have more creative freedom in her work. Her 2020 album “Rare” has Gomez credited with co-writing every song.
For many years, Gomez worked closely with singer-songwriter Julia Michaels, who has numerous writing credits on both “Stars Dance” and “Revival” but only one on “Rare”, perhaps a sign that Selena is looking to put more of herself into her newer work.
Michaels actually came to Selena’s defense in 2019 after online trolls accused Gomez of not writing her own music, saying that she has written with her multiple times and is “very much a songwriter”.
“Rare” is a more minimalist sounding Selena Gomez album, perhaps a sign that she is discovering the voice that critics claimed she lacked in her earlier years. Whether or not she has been the main writer on most of her songs, she has played a major role in writing them.