Here’s a quote:

There’s no such thing as a conceptual songwriter. As an artist you are free to choose from all sorts of funky media and part of the game is to work outside the box and provoke thought and criticism. Songwriting isn’t like that. Composition is like that, but songwriting isn’t. As a songwriter you’ve signed up to write songs, and the popular song isn’t a very flexible form. It’s not quite as restrictive as being a sonnetwriter, but it’s closer to that than, say, a novelwriter.

There’s nothing to stop you exploding the confines of the form and writing 15-minute one-chord freeform poetry, but that’s not a song. You could argue that it is, but you’d be wrong (the word song refers to a pretty specific musical form, and let’s assume we’re talking about popular song, even late 20th Century popular song to keep things simple).

I don’t want to get into the semantics of whether we use the word ‘song’ just for short vocal forms, or for any piece of music with vocals but I do want to both agree and disagree with Ben.

I agree that no songwriter can avoid the technical aspects. Any long time reader of Songwright will know that I’m all for educated songwriters who understand the craft and know how to create well formed, interesting songs.

Where I disagree is with the apparent implication that songwriters should stick to the limits, confines and conventions of popular song forms and not try to push the boundaries and ‘think outside the box’.

Sorry Ben, that’s wrong. If you’re a songwriter, you’re a composer and if you’re not trying to do things that push the envelope, that do something new and fresh (Not necessarily revolutionary, just new, interesting, exciting) then what’s the point of writing your songs at all?

We are composers, we have a duty not to bore our listeners with conventional derivative songs. The only way to do that is to understand all the conventions and possibilities of the craft and to then try and move beyond them in a way that works.

Songwriting is a craft and an art.

Here are the notes I wrote before speaking:

1. ( A tip from Edwin Songsville) Write bad songs

Edwin says:

It’s more important to write lots of songs that it is to spend ages trying to make one perfect one.

You look at all the good songwriters and you realise they’ve written hundreds of songs. That’s how you get good at it. As Diane Warren,possibly the world’s most successful songwriter says: “My secret? I show up. That’s it.” Six days a week, she writes songs, and has been doing so for 30 years. Her very earliest songs? “They all sucked”. So write often, a song a week is a good start.

Mark McGuiness at www.copyblogger.com says:

“Creativity: Beyond the Myth of Genius, Robert Weisberg discusses statistical research into the proportion of masterpieces to minor works among great and not-so-great composers.

The researchers concluded that the rate of hits to misses was pretty constant between major and minor composers. The truly great composers produce more masterpieces than the others, mainly because they produced more work overall.”

This is a tip made by a lot of songwriters in 10 Tips for Songwriters, in different guises and the basic point is an obvious one.

If you’re going to be a songwriter, you need to write songs. We’re very good at distracting ourselves from that but actually one of the most important things to do is write songs. Lots of them.

2. ( From Gary Jugert) Know the difference between bourbon and whiskey - A songwriter needs the proper tools.

3. (From Helen Robertson) Freedom is Slavery

Helen Says

Constraints are your friend. If the tempo, or the key, or the genre, or the subject matter, or anything else are already decided before you start to write, you have much less messing about to do once you get started. It’s like the difference between trying to find a needle in a haystack and trying to find a needle in a field.

I think there’s a lot to be said for this – creativity thrives with limitations, it’s easier to be imaginitive when some choices have already been made. I’m in favour of limiting yourself in some way.

Now usually I write lyrics at the same time, or after I’ve written the music. So as a challenge to myself last week I wrote a set of lyrics before I had any inkling what the music was going to be and then had the challenge of composing the music to them.

Download The Beast of the Air

Things to take away from this song – the structure of the song isn’t verse chorus verse chorus, I saw no point in coming back to the verse material later.
The chorus is a blatant steal from the Radiohead song ‘There there’

4. (From Gary Jugert again) Practice your offended face

Sooner or later somebody is going to call you a songwriter, and you’ll need to say, “I’m a composer,” with your offended face.

5. Constantly expand you pallette

Music theory is your friend. If you only use the same three chords then you are limiting yourself. As a guitar player, if you only use standard chord voicings, well to be frank stop it put some effort in. You should know at the very lest all the chords available to you in the major key – which if you include sevenths, sixths and their inversions is roughly 70 different chords.

I remember very distinctly however, a guitar lessons from my old guitar teacher where he showed us how to harmonise the major scale to see which seventh chords you get in that. And that was interesting, but nothing very new. But then he did the same with the harmonic minor scale – and this was the first time I’d ever considered that you could have a minor chord with a major seventh, and the first time I’d ever heard of an augmented chord.

This opened my eyes to all sorts of new harmonic ideas that I’d never used before. I’d heard them in music before but never realised what they were. Since then I’ve always tried to expand my pallette and learn new things, and I sincerely think you’re doing yourself an injustice as a songwriter if you don’t continously learn new things musically.

Here’s a song that uses some of those ideas:

Things to take away :- there’s a couple of different time signatures used rather than just one, and I use some of those harmonic minor scale chords as well.

6. (From Gary Jugert again) One word: Guitar – The other instruments are for losers.

7. Songwriting is not lyric writing

Lyrics are important but they are only one element of a song. Sometimes when I say this, people reply ‘of course, there’s music too’ but there’s more to it than that. A song is not a 50/50 spilt between words and music. Your melody, your use of rhythm, groove and tempo, your choice of chord and scale, the instruments and timbre you use, each of these elements has equal importance to you lyrics.

There are writers out there who claim to write about songwriting, but only talk about lyric. There are songwriters who could talk at length about poetic meter but couldn’t tell you what the dominant chord in D major is.

One of the main reasons I started www.songwright.co.uk was my frustration at the lack of songwriting blogs that addressed songwriting, rather than just lyric writing. Melodies matter, interesting music matters. In fact interesting music is far more important. Lyrics are very often hard to make out at first listen, and even when they can be made out they don’t do much to express the meaning of a song.

What?

Yes, your lyrics are not even the primary conveyors of meaning in your song. Just as tone of voice can dictate whether speech is sarcastic or genuine, you choice of musical ideas will colour what your lyrics mean.

Which brings us to tip 8

8. Consider the meaning of your chord progressions

And while you’re at it, the meaning of the scale you’re using, the meaning of the structure you’ve chosen.

For me every chord you play is layered with meaning depending on context and relationship to what’s around it.

I could go on at length about the meaning of the various modes, but I won’t bore you with that. Instead I’ll make the simple point that this chord progression – V to I – which has been the basis of Western music for a couple of centuries now is hard to justify. Using it makes you sound corny as far as I’m concerned.

You might disagree with that example but the basis of that point is simply this:- everything you use, melody chords, everything means something, and they the listener uses your music also means something and if your song is to be successful you need to consider what those meanings are because they say more to the listener than your words do.

The Lydian mode for me has connotations of dreaminess, happiness but with an edge of strangeness. I made use of it in ‘Something’s Bound to Happen’

9. Steal Ideas

There’s a quote : ‘Good artists borrow, great artists steal’. I’ve heard that attributed to aristotle, D H Lawrence, John Lennon and Igor Stravinsky. And it’s true. I don’t mean plagiarise, I don’t mean steal music, I mean steal ideas. This way of phrasing a melody, that way of changing key, these chords, that rhythm.

I do this all the time, as I mentioned with the Radiohead song I’ve stolen from.

My last example, to illustrate my stealing an idea is from a song Called ‘Where Once They Had Hearts’. The idea I stole is from two sources – one snippet I’d read about Coltrane’s Giant Steps and two the middle eight chord progression from a song by heavy metal band symphony x – the idea of using chords a major third apart in a cycle.

The other idea I stole was from David Bowie’s ‘Life on Mars’ – the idea of composing a tongue in cheek musical style ballad.

Download Where Once They Had Hearts

10. (From Gary Jugert again) There are only nine tips for songwriting.

What motivates your songwriting? Why do you compose?

Do you write songs to sell them?

Do you write to express yourself?

Do you write to get an audience singing or dancing?

Do you write to praise a god?

To attract the opposite sex?

To make a point, political, moral or philosophical?

Answers in the comments!

(PS. Have you got your free copy of the ebook 10 Tips for Songwriters?)

10 Tips for Songwriters is a collaborative Ebook that I’ve put together with the help of 17 other fantastic composers and songwriters. Here’s an extract from the introduction:

Introduction

At my songwriting blog, www.songwright.co.uk, I often interview songwriters. I find one of the best ways to get yourself inspired and excited
about songwriting is to find out how someone else does it.

That’s what this book is all about.

It was written by 18 successful songwriters who wanted to share their 10
tips for songwriting.

Have they all written commercial hits? Have they had their songs performed by famous singers, or
sold a billion records? No, for the most part they haven’t, but what sort of a way to measure success is that?

These 18 people have all proved themselves successful at writing songs. They wrote them for a myriad of reasons, to express themselves, to earn a living, to impress their friends, for a songwriting community, to practice their craft or simply because they could.

Each of the contributors has their own way of writing songs. There are writers here who start with the lyrics, and others who start with the music. Some are theory experts, others wouldn’t know a bar line from a bass clef. Some know their way around a recording studio, others can just about manage a cd player.

Each one has contributed their 10 tips for writing songs – the 10 things that they think should matter most to songwriters. Some agree on the basics, others have very different priorities. Some you might think are stating the obvious, others might be saying something you’ve never thought of before.

But I know that no two readers will agree on which are the most important tips here.

So, you can read the book all the way through, or you can flip to a random songwriter and find out what they have to say. Either way, it is my hope that you’ll find something interesting or inspiring on each and every page.

I’ve found talking to songwriters one of the most rewarding things I can do for my own songwriting, I hope you do too.

Click here to download the free ebook.

The book includes contributions from:

Tom Slatter
T.C. Elliott
Edwin Songsville
Errol
Marie Tueje
Helen Robertson
Billy Sea
Susan Wenger
Kevin Emmrich
Gary Jugert
DF Taylor
Matt Erion
XEW
Calum Carlyle
Bill Hayes
Bart Helms
Scott Lake
Jeff Shattuck
Flav

The Big Calm

BigCalm by Tom Slatter

This 46 minute long piece was composed by members of Cafe Noodle and edited by your truly into one huge composition. The brief was to use the title to create a piece in D minor at 75 bpm.

I’m really pleased with the result and am truly blown away by the talented musicians involved.

Spinning the Compass

I’ve started a series of posts talking about the writing of my solo album, and sharing some of the demos I recorded.

How I Wrote ‘Mechanism’

How I Wrote ‘I Still Smile’

10 Tips for Songwriters

I’m also only a couple of days away from leashing the collaborative songwriting ebook ’10 Tips for Songwriters’ on the world. Stay tuned!

The idea is that I ask a load of songwriters to contribute their top 10 songwriting tips to take up a page of the ebook. We’ll then have a collection of individual takes on songwriting that we can flick through and take inspiration from – a hundred pages (hopefully) filled with a hundred individual approaches to the songwriting craft.

It Begins

I’ve already had a great response including two blog posts from DFTaylor and the man who recorded this wonderful song:

I’ve also had contributions from:

T.C.Elliot
Gary Jugert
Kevin Emmrich
Helen’s Evil Twin

As well as  offer’s from Marcus Rill, Susan from Cinder Bridge, Jeff Shattuck, Morti, and lots of other songwriters.

But I need more!

Do you want to contribute? If you’ve got a personal approach to songwriting, other songwriters will want to read about it. Here are the guidelines:

• The 10 tips are intended to fit one page – so if possible don’t write more than roughly 1000 words (Unless you really really need to).
• Keep them as individual as possible – what are your songwriting possibilities.
• Please indlue a very brief, two sentence biog, a photo and weblink so that readers can click through and listen to your songs.
• The deadline is Saturday 22nd May.

You can contact me through the comments or via email at tomslattermusic AT gmail.com

The idea with this blog is to provide inspiration and ideas to help songwriters. Music theory, chord progression ideas, possibly structures, lyric writing strategies, I’ve written about all sorts of songwriting related things. In the past I’ve interviewed a few songwriters, and I’ve found that asking other songwriters to talk about their craft is one of the most interesting and inspiring things to do.

My next little project is going to be a free ebook called ’10 Tips for Songwriters’, and I could use your help to make it happen. Essentially what I hope to create is a selection of helpful and inspirational tips by songwriters, for songwriters.

Each page of the book would contain 10 tips contributed by an indie songwriter (as well as a brief biog, photo and link to the website of said songwriter).

The idea is to share as much songwriting wisdom as possible – you should be able to flick through the book, soaking up ideas and inspiration for your own songwriting.

If you fancy contributing, drop me an email: tomslattermusic AT gmail.com

… Has written an interesting blog post about atheism and songwriting.

I’m an atheist, I admit it. I used to say I was an agnostic, but as I’ve gotten older and read more and thought more about religion, I’ve decided that every one is humankind’s creation. I’m cool with my beliefs, but I wonder if society really is, especially among those who, like myself, think of themselves as artists.

My uncertainty stems from the countless interviews I have read with songwriters, most of whom claim that their songs do not come from within, but rather from without, either as gifts of god or as creations of a force greater than humankind, creations that can only be gathered by those who pay attention. I disagree with these conceits, and let me tell you why:…

Continue reading at his site by clicking here.

‘The Random Song Generator’

Our assignment was based on a “Random Song Generator” — basically three columns of words…the first is the person, the second is the place and the third is the action. Choose one word/phrase randomly from each column and go forth to write! Hint: My assignment was “siblings, ages 9 and 11,” “in a coffee shop”, “stealing something.”

 

Recently I wrote about Gary Ewer’s great post on tension in songwriting.

His post is a list of tension and release related elements in songwriting – you can find more detail on each of them elsewhere on his site (and on this one!) – but it got me thinking about how tension and release can be found in the rhythmic elements of your songs.

Gary talks about hooks in songwriting, and how you should “a melodic/rhythmic shape that ends in such a way that the restatement of the hook acts as a resolution for the end of it.”.

Kylie!

The song ‘Can’t get you out of my Head’ is a great eample of this, a call and answer phrase with the first half rising in pitch (tension) and the second half falling (release).

The rhythm of the hook is also interesting – it employs a very simple but effective piece of syncopation.

• La La La La La La La La

The first three ‘la’s’ are on the beat, the next three off the beat, and the last two on the beat again. This gives us a simple layer of tension and release – notes on the beat are ‘at rest’, the syncopated, off beat notes add a hint of tension, before resolving straight away with the final two on-beat notes.

Any ideas?

I think there’s a much longer and interested blog post on the idea of rhythmic tension in sognwriting, which I’m not going to write at the moment. Instead I’ll end by asking for your input:

How can we add rhythmic tension and release to our songs?

My initial ideas:

• Small hints of syncopation in your riffs/hooks
• Unexpected phrase length eg. Eleanor Rigby by the Beatles
• An extra bar – eg. 5 bars in the bridge where the rest of the song is based on 4 bar sections
• A half-time section where the rest of the song is double time.

Any other ideas?