Limiting The Number of Ideas Within a Song

If you were to give a speech, you’d first establish what you should be talking about, limiting yourself to a small number of related ideas. You’d then present those ideas to an audience. Once you’ve presented the ideas in general terms, you’d develop and expand on them in (hopefully) interesting ways. You’d likely then finish […]

The Power of a Progression That Doesn't Start On the I-Chord

By Gary Ewer, Senior Instructor, Dalhousie University, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website. • Follow Gary on Twitter • Make songwriting enjoyable again! Check out “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” 6 e-book bundle – available now at a 50% savings! ________________________________ You can measure the success of your song by whether or not people are humming it to themselves long […]

4 Easy Ways to Power Up Your Songs

Written by Gary Ewer, Senior Instructor, Dalhousie University, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website. • Follow Gary on Twitter • Check out “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” 6 e-book bundle ________________________________ When someone gets me to listen to their song to assess it, I always use that first listen to determine one thing: does the […]

Drop a Few Beats to Boost Song Energy

Written by Gary Ewer, Senior Instructor, Dalhousie University, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website. • Follow Gary on Twitter • Check out “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” 6 e-book bundle ______________________ Throwing something unexpected into a song will usually increase its momentum. Those little unexpected things often occur at the arranging stage: percussive and other […]

Creating a Sense of Forward Motion in Your Songs

Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website. Here are the e-books that are turning everyone’s songs into hits: “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” suite of songwriting books. ____________ It’s not enough to get someone to just listen to your song; the measure of a song’s success is whether or not you’ve […]

Composing from the Chorus Backwards

Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website. _____________ It’s not unusual for songwriters to get the chorus of their new song working before any other section. After all, it’s the hooky part that often coalesces before the other sections become apparent. But once you’ve got that great hook, how do you work backwards […]