PBG 3 Question Interview with Mark Andrew Hansen "To Be Loved By You" Single
- Produced by a Girl™
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
Mark Andrew Hansen’s “To Be Loved By You” is a tender, emotionally expansive reflection on neglect, disappointment, and the aching human desire to be cherished in return. Released on March 3, 2022, the single began as a guitar-led response to romantic heartbreak before growing into a lush piano-based orchestral piece, recorded remotely between Australia and America during the COVID pandemic. At its heart is Jes Hudak’s moving vocal performance, layered into a choir-like swell that gives the song its luminous emotional weight. Hansen, an Australian pianist and composer with more than 100 million streams across Spotify and YouTube, brings his gift for melody, atmosphere, and cinematic arrangement into a piece that feels intimate, wounded, and quietly hopeful.
1. “To Be Loved By You” feels like it was born from such a raw and tender place, not just the ache of romantic disappointment, but that deeper longing to be loved by someone who simply couldn’t give it back. When you picked up your guitar after that relationship ended, did writing this song feel like a release, a moment of realization, or maybe the first time you could finally speak your truth out loud?
When strumming the guitar the words came out as a realisation that it wasn’t my fault that love was withheld by the significant other person (my ex-wife & my father in particular). There was a release in the singing that made me sad but also hopeful that I could one day find the love I craved. The writing and singing of songs for me is therapeutic. It enables a higher level perspective on a situation. I become a more objective observer rather than stuck in the mud of the event itself.
2. The track opens with gentle piano and then blossoms into something orchestral and expansive, almost as if a private heartbreak is unfolding into a sweeping emotional landscape. How did you approach building the production so it could hold onto that first spark of intimacy, while also capturing the bigger, cinematic weight of the story you wanted to tell?
I knew the song needed to start as an intimate revelation and end as a big hopeful resonance. I sent a solo piano track to Jes for her initial vocals, then when I got them back I could hear a large choir joining in at the end to support and encourage her. So I asked her to record layered harmonies which she did so amazingly well. I added the orchestral parts as well as lower choir voices in the final mix to build the song to its triumphant finale. Yes, it is heartbreaking to let go but the future is full of opportunities for love.
3. You brought this song to life remotely during COVID with American vocalist Jes Hudak, whose layered vocals really give the ending that beautiful, choir-like lift. What did Jes bring to the emotional heart of the song, and how did creating together from a distance shape the sense of connection in a track that’s all about longing to be loved?
Jes did reveal that she related to the song through personal experiences. I won’t say who hurt her as that’s a private matter but you can definitely hear the emotion in her voice that reveals that this is not just a hired singer recording some vocals. She feels the pain too. She knows what it’s like to want to be loved by someone and trying hard to get that love. Creating together allowed me to be very objective about the song and to feel empathy for Jes. Even though it started out as my experiences, it transformed into a more universal story. In some therapies one is encouraged to write things down on paper and then burn them or tear them up and throw them away. Writing this song was like that for me. I go and listen to it every now and then but the pain fades each day because I’ve made an art piece with Jes’ help that holds the grief for me.
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