Songwriting - List

A Songwriter’s List

If you want to be a better lyricist, putting lyrics at the top of your songwriting agenda is a crucial first step. Read “Use Your Words! Developing a Lyrics-First Songwriting Process.” Right now, it’s free with your purchase of “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting 10-eBook Bundle” Let’s say you’re in the market to buy a […]

Hal Blaine

Being Good, Being Unique, Being Famous

I think it’s fair to say that no one becomes famous for simply being good. There are lots of really great musicians — and I’m thinking specifically of studio musicians — but unless you take the time to look them up on Wikipedia, you’re not likely ever to know them. The ones that get famous […]

Audience entertainment

Balancing Message With Entertainment Value

“The Essential Secrets of Songwriting 10-eBook Bundle” covers every aspect of good songwriting. It’s being used by thousands of songwriters to improve their technique. Start writing the best songs of your life, now! Every song is, to some degree, entertainment. If you aren’t entertaining your target audience, you’re missing the mark. That’s not to say […]

songwriting technique

What is Songwriting Technique, and How Do You Improve It?

Every time you create something, whether writing a song, painting a landscape, or writing a novel, you are pulling two vital aspects of artistic creation together: your technical abilities and knowledge, and your creative imagination. In songwriting, we refer to technical abilities by using the word technique, and we summarize the phrase creative imagination by simply referring […]

5 tips for Silencing, then Awakening, Your Inner Critic

Being critical of what you’re writing is an essential step in perfecting your craft. Anyone who wants to improve at anything needs to be able to objectively critique what they do. To not have this kind of honest reckoning with yourself as an artist means limiting how much you can improve. The problem with being […]

Singer-songwriter-guitarist

Matching a Chord Progression to the Mood and Message of Your Song

In yesterday’s post I wrote about two-chord progressions, and how a song practically never suffers from a chord progression that’s short or boring. While that’s true, it doesn’t mean that a chord progression can’t help strengthen your song’s structure. If you’re hoping to give stronger meaning to your lyrics by using more creative chords, you […]