songwriter | The Essential Secrets of Songwriting

How a Creative Chord Progression Can Make a Song More Meaningful

Of all the various elements that go together to make a song, a chord progression can get away with being less than imaginative. Your melody and lyric both need to be new and interesting, or else you haven’t written an original song. But the chords might be as mundane as a standard I-IV-V-I type of […]

What To Do When Lyrics Sound Forced

The best lyrics, whether they’re straight-forward (“Somebody That I Used to Know” (Gotye), for example), or complex (“Roundabout” – Jon Anderson/Steve Howe), share an important feature: they typically use words that you’d find in casual conversation. Take some time to look at the lyric sheets of your favourite songs, and no matter what genre you […]

Dealing With Your Own Negative Opinion of Your Songwriting Efforts

Psychologically speaking, there are two ways to approach songwriting; you can be the kind of person who assumes you’ve got it wrong, or the kind of person who assumes you’ve got it right. Most of the time, your songwriting process relies greatly on improvisation and testing ideas as you go. When you create something — […]

Creating a Song From 3 Short Melodic Ideas

Here’s an alternative to always thinking in the verse-chorus format: try creating three short melodic fragments, all in the same key, and then putting them together to create a complete song. Don’t worry or think about which one is the verse or chorus. If you want a real example of what I’m talking about, you […]

The Difference Between Meaning and Message

If you wish that your songs had better lyrics, and you’re actively working on improving that aspect of your songwriting, that is definitely time well spent. Meaningful, powerful lyrics will likely be studied and admired long after practically any other element of songs. In the writing of more poignant lyrics, it’s worth noting that meaning and meaningful […]

Experimenting To Get a Better Verse For Your Song

You’ll wind up with a better song if you’re willing to experiment and change the things you’ve written. You like to think of your song as being kind of like your “baby” — you’re willing to accept it, warts and all. But before you fall irretrievably in love with your song, experimenting by changing bits […]