Turning Basic Chords Into Something That Grabs Attention

Download “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” 6 e-book bundle, and kick-start your songwriting career right now! ____________ Chord progressions are usually the most predictable element we use in the creation of songs. It’s not easy to know what the next line of lyric will be, or even what direction the melody will take from one note […]

Tips ‘n Tricks: Writing a Hook that Works

Download “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting”. It’s supposed to be FUN to become the best songwriter you can be! ___________________ Say the word “hook”, and you think immediately of pop songs. But hooks have been a part of music composition starting the middle-Renaissance through to the present, in pretty much every genre you can think of. […]

5 Improvisation Activities That Generate Song Ideas

Download “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting”. It’s supposed to be FUN to become the best songwriter you can be! ___________________ I applaud the songwriter who spends as much or more time working out small songwriting challenges than they do actually writing songs. In the world of the visual arts, great artists do an enormous amount […]

Tips & Tricks: Writing a Song that Doesn't Use a Chorus

Download “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” 6 e-book bundle. Here’s how to get your songs working right away! ______________ It may be your normal way of writing to automatically go for a verse-chorus design, possibly  because the chorus (particularly the title) offers great potential for a hook. For many songs, the hook is a crucial aspect […]

Stealing from Classical Music to Write Your Next Song

Download “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” 6 e-book bundle. Here’s how to get your songs working right away! ______________ There’s a theory that not a lot has changed since the early days of what we call “Classical music” (i.e. the year 1600 through to the present). In fact, you’d be fairly safe in estimating that […]

Lyrical Emotion: There's a Time and a Place

Download “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” 6 e-book bundle. Here’s how to get your songs working right away! ______________ The simple “I’d do anything for you” lyric is usually a winner in the pop song world. Because you want your lyrics to make a personal connection with the listener, story lines that have to do […]