The go-to song guru

DioGuardi might seem an unlikely candidate for taking the temperature of the "street." Born and raised in Westchester, N.Y., she earned her degree in political science at Duke University before flying to Los Angeles to take a job at Billboard. A singer since age 2, she used her Hollywood network to get her songs into the hands of label executives. Though her own recording deal later fell through, the songs had a life of their own.

"I've known Kara since she was just starting out, and I've watched her come on the scene, take it by storm, and take it over," says Ms. LaBarbera-Whites. "One day she's working on a pop record and one day she's working on an urban record, a country record, a Latin record. A great song transcends all cultural barriers, and she knows that – and she's also capable of writing it."

Though DioGuardi has yet to win a Grammy, she may have her chance with two songs on Céline Dion's new album, due out in November. DioGuardi says it was rewarding to write for a woman her own age, who has the voice to deliver. With teen singers, though, DioGuardi is no less devoted. She is a perfectionist who still agonizes, for example, over a single word in Kelly Clarkson's "Walk Away." The word "attention" in one line should really be "intention," she says, to fit the song's emotional "thesis."

"I'm not a poetic writer at all," DioGuardi adds, unabashedly. "If you wanted me to write a [Bob] Dylan song, that Dylanesque-type song would be the biggest piece of [rubbish]. I'm just trying to express emotions in a way people can understand."

And she must express them in a way that is believable for the artist. "Most people think that the artist that they've fallen in love with has written the song. It doesn't dawn on them that it could be somebody else, and when they find it out, they wish they didn't know," she says, soberly. "This is their fantasy, and that's what music is. It's about escapism."

Having climbed the highest songwriting mountains – rescuing Britney may be the Golden Fleece of the songwriting industry – DioGuardi has lately devoted her energies to developing her publishing company, Arthouse Entertainment, and its roster of 10 young songwriters. She has been holding "writing camps," where a label sponsors the studio time for her team in exchange for a first look at the songs that result.

For Lemar's new song, DioGuardi called in Zukhan Bey, who wrote the ubiquitous hip-hop head-bobber "We Fly High (Ballin')" and Emanuel Kiriakou, who wrote Nick Lachey's comeback single, "What's Left of Me." Lemar tells the team that he wants a song based on a conversation he had the night before in which he encouraged a friend to stick with his girlfriend – despite their fights.

And so it starts: DioGuardi asks Bey to set a "lights-out" mood with the drum machine, and Kiriakou strums through chord progressions on a guitar. DioGuardi hums and babbles, scat-singing a melody into existence before she belts out the chorus: "Stay where you are."

She has the hook, and she repeats it – standing, sitting, jumping, gesturing as if she were on stage herself. Lemar, whose tone has the epic quality of Seal's, joins her on the note and begins improvising lyrics of his own. A pop song is born, in less than two hours.

"Nothing makes me happier than a good song, whether I wrote it or somebody else did," says DioGuardi, as her co-writers look on. "I know how long it takes for that bus to come by, and it's a moment that needs to be celebrated."

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