One of the biggest differences between writing a song and writing a book is the number of words you’ll use. A novel might use 80,000 or more words to describe a story, but with a song lyric you really only get a tiny fraction of that; maybe 100 words or so. So with novels, the […]
Improvisation plays an important role in pop songwriting. And we love that feeling of quickly coming up with musical ideas and having them sound great right from the start. Hopefully you know, however, that most songs, even the ones that seem to spill deliciously out of our musical minds within minutes, require some working and […]
Thousands of songwriters are using the eBooks in “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” bundle to improve their technique and solve their problems. Time to take your songwriting to a new level of excellence. Get a copy of “Use Your Words! Developing a Lyrics-First Songwriting Process” FREE. A few days ago I wrote a post that […]
Get the eBook bundle that thousands of songwriters are using to polish their songwriting technique. Comes with a free copy of “Creative Chord Progressions” There is a kind of melodic structure called period structure — a two-phrase melody in which the first phrase acts as a kind of “question”, and the second phrase provides an “answer”. A […]
When we use the word “clever” in songwriting, we’re usually talking about lyrics. In that context, a clever lyric means any one of the following: There’s a double meaning going on that might not be immediately obvious. (i.e., the song isn’t about what it appears to be about) There are common words being used in […]
The purpose of a payoff line is to provide a point of focus for your lyric, and, by extension, a purpose for your song. It’s a kind of hook that is delivered by the lyric. When a listener hears a good payoff line, their subconscious reaction is, so that’s what the song’s really about. (Example: […]
