Hmmm, hummm, hmmmm, hummmm, da da da da! You know what? I gots myself a song or a melody or a chorus!!!!  That is the thought that comes to mind when I embark on the task or writing a song. Songwriting is a unique experience for everyone,  and for me the initial melody comes from the ether. My job now is to use my craft to tame that wild burst of creativity into something I can perform.

IDEAS

When I get an idea for a part of a song. I jump onto my instrument of choice: the guitar.  I start singing what I heard in my head and finding the base chords for that part. I then decide if it’s a bridge or a chorus. In this case the particular song I’m working on has started with a verse part.  I usually riff on this for awhile and then find a chorus by playing chords next to it or complimentary to it. I’m not a classically trained musician so I tend to strike chords around the area that I’m playing in and then something will resonate with me. I call that the beginnings of a chorus.  I now have a chorus and verse. Or if you are keeping track in songwriting land: an A and B part.  With these I can lay out the body of a song.  I usually get a rough version of it going by laying it out ABAB(verse, chorus, verse chorus).

BRIDGES

Now whatever I’m doing is down to finding a bridge using the same method I used prior to find the chorus. The only difference is that  I have a little more freedom to use a chord that is not so complimentary to my ears. I explore it. I lengthen it. I slow it down. I play it faster than the rest of the song. It’s supposed to be experimental. Sometimes it works right away and others it ends up taking the most time out of the entire process.  Most of the time, I write every song with the same form initially so that I can have a whole song to play: so I put the bridge or the ‘C’ part after ABAB….C and then I end on the chorus again: ABABCB.

TROUBLESHOOTS

When I have a whole song laid out, it allows me to see it for what it is. Do I like it? Does it drag? Where am I having problems? What is the ‘hook’? How can I accent that the best? Songwriting is a series of questions I ask myself to trim away an influx of ideas. Form is determined when I can stand back and see it as a whole.

THEN I try and fuck that up to make it as original as I can.  I haven’t said anything about lyrics because I usually do them last. I always have notebooks and word documents laying around about ideas for songs. I find something that I like and stick with that theme and then I’m off to write way too much about it and then I work on trimming that down. Now, for you it might work exactly the opposite and that’s great because you should use whatever works for you. There is no ‘right’ way to write a song, but you should have something that you are proud of and that you can perform.