Why Chord Progression Formulas Work

Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website. Let Gary’s songwriting e-books show you how to fix your songs. Click here to read more. ____________ Good songs are a balance of foreground and background. The foreground elements are the aspects of the song that the listener would notice right away, such as […]

The Seven Most Common Songwriting Errors

Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website. The seven problems listed in this blog are easily solvable. Let “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” suite of e-books turn your songs into winners. ______________ Why do some songs make a strong connection to the audience, while other seemingly great songs just sit there? […]

Changing Key by Using a Pivot Chord

Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website. ____ Changing key is a great device for injecting energy into a song. Known as modulating, it needs to be done with care, being unpleasantly startling to the listener if it’s done haphazardly. There are several ways to change key, including the “abrupt modulation,” […]

Building Energy: There's a Progression For That

by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website: _____________ In general, the energy near the end of your song should be more than the energy at the beginning. That rising energy is not a constant; it ebbs and flows in a generally-upward direction, much like a successful stock market chart. The latter part […]

Connecting Verse and Chorus Progressions with Chord Substitutions

Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website. You can find Gary’s songwriting e-books here, and read about a free offer. ______________ For most songs, you want to make a connection between the chords you use in your verse and the ones you choose for your chorus. A really neat way to […]

Complex Chord Changes Usually Don't Work – Predictable is Better

Written by Gary Ewer Follow Gary on Twitter When all is said and done, if you want people to really get into your song, you have to make sure that by the end of it, they really understood what was going on in it. If your song uses complex chords that don’t move forward in […]