You’ve probably heard of Parkinson’s Law, which says that work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion. In short, if you’ve got a task to do, and it should normally take one hour to complete it, but you’ve got three hours to use, you’ll find that it will take three hours to […]
Why are you a songwriter? You may be hoping for a career either as a singer-songwriter, or as a member of a band that makes use of your songwriting skills. Or perhaps you’re hoping to entice others to sing your songs and make a name for yourself as a go-to for good songwriting material. “The […]
It’s fair to think that your songwriting ideas come from your musical mind, and so your uniqueness as an individual, including all your life’s experiences, will influence those ideas. But the instrument you use to give life to your ideas also influences your songwriting. In a way, your chosen instrument acts as a kind of […]
This blog article is a bit of a ramble, so I hope you’ll forgive me for letting my musical mind wander a bit! Sometimes when I look at a painting, I find myself wondering what I’m not seeing. It might be that the painting is a landscape — a winding river with a grassy hill […]
In practically any human activity you can name, having an “instinct” — what we might otherwise call a natural ability — is an important starting point. For example, you can teach someone the essential skills involved in hitting a baseball, but it’s far better to work with someone who just seems to have a natural […]
It’s a given that in order for a song to be powerful and effective, it needs to be memorable. But what makes a song memorable? As we know, songs are a partnership of many different elements all working together. So it’s difficult to point a finger at one particular component and say that it alone […]
