Ideas and Advice for Real Songwriters (formerly songwright.co.uk)
Category
Stealing ideas
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02.28.10A new discovery – Songwritingscene.comI've just stumbled across a new (to me) songwriting blog called Songwritingscene.com and a fun little post with a great songwriting idea: '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.”
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06.14.09Stealing Ideas From Iron Maiden’s Fear of the DarkIron Maiden are one of my favourite bands, and one of the most influential heavy metal bands ever. A great post over at 'Troll in the Corner' got me thinking about them, and listening to some of my favourite Maiden songs. Fear of the Dark, the title track from their 1992 album, the last before Bruce Dickinson left (temporarily) to pursue a solo career. It's far from Maiden's longest song, but at seven and a half minutes it's a masterclass in how to manage pace and momentum over longer periods of time. I want to point out two great ideas that could be ...
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01.11.098 and a half tips for writing good riffs.A riff is a short, repeating musical phrase that forms a structural basis or hook for your song. Sometimes they're used as a main hook, sometimes as the basis to a verse, sometimes both. Rock songs often use riff ideas for the verse and chordal patterns for the chorus. I've put together a short and not at all definitive list of a few ideas you could use to help your riff writing. 1. Use Chord Notes - The famous, often repeated rock and roll bass line follows this. For example, Elvis Presley's version of Hound Dog. The main riff in C follows the ...
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12.31.08Should we try to be original?Is originality possible in songwriting? over the last few months I've been having regular songwriting sessions with my sixth form students. They're a heavy metal band - a genre that has an interesting mix of originality and copycat songwriting. Like any other genre, over time you can see clear innovations - metal has pushed modal and chromatic harmony into new areas for pop music and explored new guitar and vocal timbres. However, generally speaking, any one band, album or song tends to fit into a wider style. You can listen to a song and say 'there's a Metllica style verse riff, with Iron ...
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10.18.08Songwriting Improvisation Part OneA little freebie for you: part one of 'Songwriting Improvisation', a little PDF I've put together. Get your copy here: songwriting_improvisation_part_one.pdf What's it for? Well, the fact is a lot of our best songwriting ideas come to us during improvisation. But I find it's easy to run out of things to try. You can end up feeling like you've played every combination of chords and sung every combination of notes. Songwriting Improvisation Part One contains some graphic prompts to help you look at improvising in a fresh way. There are some structural prompts and some contour ...
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10.12.08Quick songwriting tip – A Gospel EndingThe Plagal cadence I mentioned a few posts ago is a way of ending a progression that you often hear in christian music - Chords IV to I, eg. F to C. This is often extended with a couple of passing chords to F C/E G/D C (or IV Ib Vc I). You can hear it in Let it Be by the Beatles:
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10.09.08Songwriting Clichés – the list so far…I'm collecting songwriting clichés, for my own amusement. Here's the list so far: - The 'tone-up' key change for the final chorus - A saxophone solo in a power ballad - Rhyming self/shelf, love/above, together/forever (thanks Jannie) - Using an established folk tune (looking at you Bob Dylan). - Overuse of the word 'Baby' (thanks Corey) Have you got any others I can add to the list?
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09.29.08Melodic ShapeI want to draw your attention to three great posts by a man named Jerry Gates. Melodic Shape 1 Melodic Shape 2 Melodic Shape 3 They're about three types of melodic shape that Jerry calls 'Line', 'Circle' and 'Square'. I'm not sure if I would have picked those particular shapes for his examples, but the principles he's talking about are sound and should help you get a handle on the type of melodies you want to write.
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09.28.08Songwriting PrinciplesAnother recomendation: Gary Ewer's 'Songwriting Principles' series on his Essential Secrets of Songwriting blog. Songwriting Principle No. 1: Contrast Makes or Breaks Your Song Songwriting Principle No. 2: Energy Propels Your Song Forward Songwriting Principle No. 3: Chord Progressions- What Makes a STRONG One? Songwriting Principle No. 4: Fragile Chord Progressions Will Suit Your Verse Melodies I particularly like the concept of weak and strong chord progressions - weak progressions being those that are harmonically ambiguous, strong those that are definitely in one key.
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09.27.08Bonus Bass lineFollowing on from my previous post about bass lines, here's a bonus idea: The Pedal Note My chords are in C, and there's a C note in every chord. So I've written a simple bass line using only C notes. Pedal Note Bass Line
