Your Song May Be Great, But Are You Missing Your Target Audience?

Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website Follow Gary on Twitter In the pop music world, your song may be great, but if your instrumentation, rhythmic treatment, and other basic components are from a generation ago, you’re probably missing that all-important audience you’re looking for. For pop songs, the target is […]

Adding Innovative Elements to Your Songs Without Being Overly Weird

Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website. Follow Gary on Twitter Every song should exhibit a balance between traditional, predictable elements, and innovative, unexpected ones. If it’s a hit song you are wanting to write, the balance should definitely be greatly weighted toward predictable ones. But if there is nothing innovative […]

Copyright without Registration Limits Your Legal Power

Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website Follow Gary on Twitter Every document you read will tell you that copyright is automatic upon the creation of an original work. If you’ve written it, you own it. That may be true, but unless you’ve registered the copyright, you lack the legal power […]

The Many Ways to Start the Songwriting Process

Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website Follow Gary on Twitter Even the most prolific songwriters get that writer’s block feeling… staring at a blank page, with nothing coming to mind. Writer’s block will happen more to songwriters who use the same songwriting formula, song after song. You will become much more […]

How Important is a Good Chord Progression to the Success of a Song?

Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website Follow Gary on Twitter It takes more than a good chord progression to make a song work. That’s because the best progressions in the songwriting world are the ones that stay out of the way of the rest of the song. And you’ve got […]

How to Know When and If Your Song Needs a Bridge

Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website Follow Gary on Twitter What makes a song memorable, among other things, are patterns. Repeating elements are predictable ones, and every song needs something that keeps recurring. But there’s a problem with patterns: the human mind gets bothered, and a little bored, if the pattern […]