Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website Follow Gary on Twitter What makes a song memorable, among other things, are patterns. Repeating elements are predictable ones, and every song needs something that keeps recurring. But there’s a problem with patterns: the human mind gets bothered, and a little bored, if the pattern […]
by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website. (Follow Gary on Twitter) With chord progressions in general, simple is better than complicated. And you’d be surprised by how simplesimple can be. A good chorus melody doesn’t need to be anything more than one or two notes, as long as the progression underneath it […]
by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website: For most songs, melodies are what we use to convey our lyrics. And it’s important to realize that in general, the kind of melody we write for use as a chorus will not be the same as what we’d write for a verse. There’s psychology that […]
by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website: I’ve devoted considerable space in my e-book “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting“ to describing the differences between verse melodies and chorus melodies. Nothing in the arts is exact; it’s not a science. If it were, I don’t believe we’d have a lot of interest in it. Songwriting would […]
Written by Gary Ewer, Senior Instructor, Dalhousie University, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website. • Follow Gary on Twitter • Good songs sell! Check out “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” 6 e-book bundle – available now at a 50% savings! ________________________________ The pre-chorus (sometimes called the “rise” or “climb”) is an occasionally-used element situated between a verse and a chorus. […]
Writing a good melody requires several things all working together; chief among them are lyric and harmonies. A melody is good if it seems to complement the emotion of the lyric. The harmonies, of course, need to support the melody. Beyond that, there is another important issue which is often overlooked: melodic shape. Melodies need countour. While there […]
