Songwriting: How Do You Start A Song?

[lubeck]

Melody comes first all the time, for me. As a non native English speaker, I tend to write the lyrics last. 

 

Sometimes, it just happens when I'm strumming some chords. Sometimes, I just play a song I love, change the structure and the melody a bit, and come back with something new.

 

 

[Alistair]

On ‎10‎/‎02‎/‎2016 at 8:40 PM, McnaughtonPark said:

I do remember the one song I wrote that started with music first was Time Was Only Joking.  I played the first chord and the first lyric lines came right after.  The chord wrote the lyric.  I do know that the process I like the most is writing to a melody.  Alistair used to send me songs with him playing guitar and humming/singing odd words here and there  but the melody was complete.  In those songs, the melody wrote the lyric.  I still write that way when I don't have a complete lyric and I pick up the guitar somewhere in the process to clean up what has been written, it's just harder to stay focused on the direction I want the lyric to go in while I'm singing and playing.  The melody starts to firm up in song form, whereas in a purely lyrical form, the melody tends to float in and out of a particular pattern until the meter gets more solid, but the lyric itself stays more consistent if I wait to pick up the guitar.  Story lyrics, in particular, need that kind of focus from me anyway. 

 

I missed this topic as I have been on a long break from posting on Songstuff and, indeed, from writing or playing. Until now.

 

Tom and I wrote 9 songs using the method he described, though sometimes he already had a lyric and I wrote the music for them. Other times I had the tune and the bones of a lyric which he would complete for me. I can say for certain that some of the music I wrote I would not have written but for his lyrics. I usually start with a musical idea, then come up with a lyrical hook I can write to. But writing songs with Tom stretched me in different ways and so we got different results. When I first started writing lyrics for my tunes over 30 years ago I would just write without any clear idea of what I was writing about. The results were variable to say the least.

 

There is one song Tom and I wrote called Bittersweet (I had the title and chorus already) which, if challenged, I might be hard-pressed to explain what the lyrics mean. But it creates an atmosphere and has a  distinct feel to it which I like to think makes up for it.

 

Coincidentally you can hear the results of our efforts in an album I recently posted to Soundcloud  'A Walk In The Park'. I'm not looking for critiques, it's just to illustrate my points above with actual examples. Some of you have heard many of these songs before, except for Three Hail Marys which is a new recording.

 

I haven't written anything for two years. I decided not to. When you close your mind, inspiration does not come. It may not come even when you open it, but it is more likely to appear.

 

I have two songs in production now so I may share the results when they are finished.

[PleaseKeepUpright]

I don't really have a "method" to songwriting, and I tend not to go sit at my keyboard and think "I'm going to write a song now if it's the last thing I do". It all happens somewhat naturally, and I have drastically different approaches depending on the song. I'll give some examples. One "mantra" or whatever you'd like to call it that I tend to "live by" in terms of songwriting is that I try not to write the same song twice. This results in my music varying greatly in styles. Therefore, while it's nowadays one of the routes I take the least when composing, some of my songs just begin with me trying to emulate a genre. This would involve me thinking about one of the elements of that genre that makes it unique and then trying trying to evoke it. 

 

Most times I'll have found a "trick" in a chord progression, and I'll try to implement it in a song one way or another. One case that springs to mind is fellow Iridescence track "Rise of the Blood Moon". There are two basic chord progressions in popular music that I'm all too familiar with: the "50's progression" which can involve the chords C --> Am --> F --> G or C --> Am --> Dm --> G, and the Andalusian cadence, which can involve the chords Am --> G --> F --> E or Am --> G --> Dm --> E. Now, what I found by doodling with the chords on the piano is that the two chord progressions could be combined into one, as you might hear in the bridge sections of a song like "Shadow Dancing". The two chord progressions could come together to make Dm --> G --> C --> Am --> F --> E --> Am --> G --> F --> G --> C --> Am --> F --> F --> E --> E --> Am. The instant I discovered this, I tried to write a song that could utilize this chord progression. Granted, my song's in F while the above example is central to C, but still.

 

Most people might not think much of the message or meaning behind an instrumental song, but quite a few of my compositions have an introspective background or an applicable message laced within. These ones, I couldn't tell you how they begin, though, because these are the songs that flow almost completely naturally as if they were almost entirely formed from the jump. "Leaf in the Wind" was a song that I wrote the night my dog died. She liked to join us when we'd travel places by car, which was a pretty frequent occurrence. The night she passed and the house was quiet, I just sat in my room and started playing this riff on the 12-string guitar setting of my keyboard. I could hear it like it as some kind of folky road trip thing, and by the end of that night I had practically written the whole song, sans the bridge sections. No clue how the hell it started, but I knew where to go with it. Perhaps the only song that I wrote introspectively that I had more or less "planned out" was "Tuesday 9AM". I wanted to write an avant-garde lullaby as to compose something representing my birth (I was born on a Tuesday at 9 in the morning), and I decided to use the above 50's progression on purpose. This is because it was the first chord progression I learned on a piano in the form of Heart and Soul, and I figured that would go nicely juxtaposed to the topic of the track.

 

Other tracks might be written out of me playing a completely different song and then transforming it into my own. Example? "Psychoactivity", a song that has somewhere around 12 chords, changes time signature sporadically, has the most bizarre arrangement of instruments, compounded with a plethora of toy-like sound effects, all capped off with a psychedelic breakdown at the end, started from me trying to learn how to play The Beatles' "Sexy Sadie", a song with around 6 chords, pretty simplistic rock instrumentation, and a constant rhythm in 4/4. I even nod to the song at the beginning of my song by playing a sped-up version of the piano intro from "Sexy Sadie", but practically the only connection between the two beyond that is the fact that they're both in the key of G. The journey just came from a jam session of the song after I'd more or less learned it as I usually do with new songs I'm interested in. I was playing the chord progression of "Sexy Sadie", G --> Gb --> Bm --> Bm --> C --> D --> G --> Gb --> C --> D -->, and when I got back around to G again I decided to throw an offhand "E" note into the Gb chord. This created a Gb7. Next time around, I added a fifth note to the chord: Ab. This made it a G9 I believe. I did this again and noticed that this creates leeway for the melody to ascend every half step, G --> Ab --> A --> Bb...so I tossed Bm, C, and D out of my chord progression and replaced them with chords that could accommodate this melody: F and Bb. By this point I was playing the song faster and more energetically, so I decided "screw it, this is the sound my song's going for". After Bb, it felt right to throw a monkey wrench in there and change the time signature from 4/4 to 3/4, like a circus theme. I was well aware of the circle of fifths in music, so when I changed to this key signature I kept going after the next fifth: 3/4 on Eb and Ab. And for no other reason other than the fact that I knew I needed to get back to G somehow, I cut the chord progression from a full 8-bar cycle to 7 and hammered that D chord three times to set everything back to square one. I wrote the rest of the track over the next couple of days, but the seed had been planted right then and there within an hour. That one's still one of my favorites. 

 

 

 

 

 

In summation......................I started a song with nothing but a baseline once......

[symphonious7]

On 6/29/2016 at 7:24 PM, JH Michaels said:

For me .....they just "happen" whenever I have a "lightbulb" moment.  I don't try to analyze the process because I think that if I do....it will jinx it and they will stop.  Sometimes it will be a title, a catchy phrase, or perhaps I make an offhand comment to someone and think "Hey!"  sometimes I'm just noodling on the guitar and I will stumble on a chord progression or even a single note that suggests a song.  I hardly ever write a complete set of lyrics though until I have a feeling and mood in the music and some idea of the structure I want to follow and the story I want to tell.  Even when that's settled I will often go through several edits to get what I feel is the right mix and rhythmn.  That being said....it doesn't necessarily happen in a fevered pitch and a complete song emerges from the other end.  I have songs that have not been finished and have been waiting for just the right inspiration to finish for a year or more and maybe I never will finish them, but that's ok.  It's all part of this magic process I can't define other than it's a fantastic ride and I wouldn't trade it for anything.  Another thing I try to remind myself is that not everyone will like what I write, nor will everyone hate what I write.  We're all different and different things moves us, otherwise, the only song that ever needed to be written would be Kumbaiya.  Thank heavens for that.

This most resembles what it's like for me.  But for me it really IS kind of a frenzied process in the beginning, (at least when it's really going) I'll be watching TV, I'll start noticing this killer riff is going through my mind, I start to forget what I'm watching and jam out to the music in my head, then all of a sudden a melody or a line gets in there that makes me go "Ok, this is not just a shower song anymore this could be SOMETHING!!!"  I get CRAZY excited, begin going over it and over it in my mind, usually turning off the TV and kind of... dancing around the room to the music in my head, I almost... envision myself performing as I write just trying to hold onto the feels of like "What am I WANTING this song to be saying as I'm in the audience??"  etc, I also have this weird ability to just know what chord progressions are.

 

It's like I've been playing guitar so long that as I'm listening to melodies and riffs forming in my head I just kind of already know how to play them.  And not in the sense that I can play anything I think of, it's more like my brain is trained to think in the terms of how I already play.  So once I have a good verse/chorus idea (usually with a few real lyrics in mind and alot I intend to flesh out later) I'll then just start playing it on the guitar over and over and sing it, then I'll start to actually really like... improve licks, think about more interesting changes than just the key elements I was so jazzed over haha  And start trying to really write the thing.  In this initial stage I'll also start hearing my... like... "magical parts" for lack of a better term.  What I mean by this is my mind will naturally begin to hear like... a few specific background vocal parts or a guitar riff or an accompanying part or harmonies etc, these sorts of ideas hit but I have to record them in my phone QUICK cause they vanish as fast as they hit me.  

 

The sad thing is that with this insane rocket ride of inspiration what I'm hearing in my head is always IMMACULATE.  But, after I come back and relook at the idea, I can never quite reach that place I had when I first wrote it, and never do I really come out with a finished product that I think represents the original idea.  This is part of why I never release anything, it might be cool I guess, but it's just so far from what it was meant to be I have a hard time sharing it, and can tend to reeeeeally over think the mixing process until I'm not even that fond of the song anymore.  

 

If I could somehow just get everything magically recorded that first night I'm thinking of it?  Pfffft, now THAT would be cool.  

[symphonious7]

On 5/8/2017 at 9:06 PM, PleaseKeepUpright said:

I don't really have a "method" to songwriting, and I tend not to go sit at my keyboard and think "I'm going to write a song now if it's the last thing I do". It all happens somewhat naturally, and I have drastically different approaches depending on the song. I'll give some examples. One "mantra" or whatever you'd like to call it that I tend to "live by" in terms of songwriting is that I try not to write the same song twice. This results in my music varying greatly in styles. Therefore, while it's nowadays one of the routes I take the least when composing, some of my songs just begin with me trying to emulate a genre. This would involve me thinking about one of the elements of that genre that makes it unique and then trying trying to evoke it. 

 

Most times I'll have found a "trick" in a chord progression, and I'll try to implement it in a song one way or another. One case that springs to mind is fellow Iridescence track "Rise of the Blood Moon". There are two basic chord progressions in popular music that I'm all too familiar with: the "50's progression" which can involve the chords C --> Am --> F --> G or C --> Am --> Dm --> G, and the Andalusian cadence, which can involve the chords Am --> G --> F --> E or Am --> G --> Dm --> E. Now, what I found by doodling with the chords on the piano is that the two chord progressions could be combined into one, as you might hear in the bridge sections of a song like "Shadow Dancing". The two chord progressions could come together to make Dm --> G --> C --> Am --> F --> E --> Am --> G --> F --> G --> C --> Am --> F --> F --> E --> E --> Am. The instant I discovered this, I tried to write a song that could utilize this chord progression. Granted, my song's in F while the above example is central to C, but still.

 

 

 

 

 

 

In summation......................I started a song with nothing but a baseline once......

Totally relate to this, sometimes driving in the car a really cool groove with a strange time signature hits my head or some other just.. neat section of a song with a tweaked chord progression or just... something I've never really heard combined before, just something I hum over and over and never forget.  Then later sometime I'll be  writing a song and need a bridge or release section and VIOLA, it pops back into my head and fits perfectly, (possibly with tweaking of course)

[Just1L]

11 minutes ago, symphonious7 said:

If I could somehow just get everything magically recorded that first night I'm thinking of it?  Pfffft, now THAT would be cool.  

 

There's something to that. I've found that my best takes musically and vocally normally come from the first time I come up with and record something. I've also seen a plethora of videos about groups making albums. Staying in certain locations for extended periods of time. When that excitement comes, to the recording they go and I think that excitement comes through the final product. I know I've heard a lot of times a producer/mixer/band say they did 50 or so takes of something, only to end up using the first or second take out of the bunch. 

 

It seems like session musicians can always pull it off though even without the excitement because they're just that damn good.

[Just1L]

8 minutes ago, symphonious7 said:

But for me it really IS kind of a frenzied process in the beginning, (at least when it's really going) I'll be watching TV, I'll start noticing this killer riff is going through my mind, I start to forget what I'm watching and jam out to the music in my head, then all of a sudden a melody or a line gets in there

 

It's like a disease sometimes. Even a curse because it's like I/you can't stop it. I don't know how many times my wife has been talking to me and while I am hearing her, I'm not 100% listening because I've got that damn song cranking in my brain and I can't stop it! I've written full verses and choruses while talking with my wife at the same time. LOL 

[symphonious7]

4 minutes ago, Just1L said:

 

It's like a disease sometimes. Even a curse because it's like I/you can't stop it. I don't know how many times my wife has been talking to me and while I am hearing her, I'm not 100% listening because I've got that damn song cranking in my brain and I can't stop it! I've written full verses and choruses while talking with my wife at the same time. LOL 

I almost mentioned my wife actually lmao  Cause she'll be watching TV with me too and I'll just get up and turn it off! hahaha then I start slowing pacing around the room with an intense look on my face as I'm kinda dancing and she's just learned to play on her phone and wait for me to do my thing lol  Then it's never long before I'm like "Honey you've got to listen to this right now!!!!"   and sometimes she's unimpressed, but alot of times she's actually like "Whoa... I can so hear that in my head" so at least she's a good sport about it.  

[MikeRobinson]

First of all, I always have my (i)phone with me, and whenever "a tune pops into my head," I find some not-so surreptitious way to fire up Voice Recorder and "hum a few bars."  Each and every one of these is carefully backed-up and kept forever on my Macintosh's Time Machine.

 

When I then sit down to "write a song," trust me that I have no idea "what will happen next," but, by gawd, "I shall capture it!"  (And, having captured it, I will never entirely discard it.)

 

Then, the work part of it begins.  Going through the stuff (regardless of "when it came to me"), I look for "various somethings, wherever they might be," that I think that I can maybe use to assemble(!) "a new song" out of.  Most of those "assemblies" wind up in "the not-named-Trash folder that is never emptied."  But, a few of them make the cut.  (Probably, several candidate versions.  Always room for one more.)

 

When I finally arrive in this way at "a song outline" that seems worthy of further development, I give it my very best technical treatment, trying to find whatever best serves the musical idea that is now racing around in my head.  ("Seems to be going nowhere?  Okay, bump the version-number, carefully set the existing files aside (never to be discarded!), and try something else.)

 

Does this "creative process" sound like it has no "creative inspiration" at all?  Precisely!

 

Consider this:  at some indefinable moment in history, Michelangelo was staring at a block of marble.  Perhaps he saw David at that prescient moment.  Most likely, he didn't.  But, he went through a creative process that culminated in the famous sculpture that we know today ... and then, vacuumed up all of the marble chips!  (And, in so doing, making "the very-dirty process of chiseling and polishing stone," appear to be "magic.")

 

Actually, Michelangelo made decisions, every step of the way.  Maybe he stumbled-upon a really ugly-looking bit of rock and had to change his plans real fast.  Maybe he agonized over the character's face or hand-position before ... committing to ... "one" thing.  All of this decision-making is now lost to history.  All that we are left with is the sculpture, itself.  And, lo and behold, "it looks like magic."

 

 

- - - 

"How did they achieve that magic?"

Shhh... they didn't.  What they actually did was "to do a damned good job of getting rid of all those marble chips." 

After all, what does a museum patron actually want to know about carving marble? They want to think that it's magic.

[symphonious7]

On 7/7/2017 at 3:03 PM, Just1L said:

 

There's something to that. I've found that my best takes musically and vocally normally come from the first time I come up with and record something. I've also seen a plethora of videos about groups making albums. Staying in certain locations for extended periods of time. When that excitement comes, to the recording they go and I think that excitement comes through the final product. I know I've heard a lot of times a producer/mixer/band say they did 50 or so takes of something, only to end up using the first or second take out of the bunch. 

 

It seems like session musicians can always pull it off though even without the excitement because they're just that damn good.

somehow I missed this one but I really like what you said.  It's like... there's a place of inspiration... like a wavelength, or a pure minded focused state, but it like... takes something to set it off.  I think when you're a person who at some point began seeing it set off alot, you kind of just... start to expect it, which helps you to not question it, which just.... makes it come?  That's reeeeally not a perfect analyzation of what's going on in the mind but it was my best attempt.  

[symphonious7]

I understand your feels completely David, I really have to start with something that musically gets me fired up before I really feel INTO it.  And I've written poems and they wind up deeper than my song lyrics, more clever, but the idea of then having to mold the music around them without them following a predetermined melody just makes me feel too limited to really enjoy what I'm doing.  

[Rudi]

3 hours ago, HoboSage said:

 

I think I've answered this or a similar questions a bunch of times.  But, here I go again.

 

I won't argue what is true for you, Rudi.  But, I wanted to supplement your point in explaining my process.

 

 Staring with a lyric first, because it is not constrained by music or melody, clearly gives you the most initial freedom in writing the lyric.  But, the converse is also true; Composing and arranging something of the music without any lyrical or vocal melody constraints gives you the most musical freedom.  For me, maximum musical freedom is the most important initial freedom to have as a songwriter.  I can always and fairly easily come up with words to sing and a melody to sing them.  But, I won't think my song is any good unless it has a cool riff, progression, beat or some other aspect to the musical arrangement that I'm diggin', and in coming up with that, I feel much more initially limited.  That's why I want maximum freedom to explore and find something musical that I dig, and why I always start with something musical.  Then the vocal melody - how I want to sing words and how I want the lead vocal to sound - is next in importance to me.  Last for me are the specific words I sing with that melody and style to that music.  Music and words are both important to me.  But, I can dig a song that has killer music even if it has a lame lyric, while no matter how brilliant the lyric is, if the music sucks, I'm not liking the song.  That's just me.  But, I write songs to please me first of all. 

 

 

 

Yes I think I concur with all of that

[MikeRobinson]

"Rogers and Hammerstein," say.

 

One type of musical genius could come up with melodies more-or-less continuously.

 

The other type of musical genius could come up with lyrics to match.

 

And ... both of them, together, could concoct music for an enduring Broadway Show!

[JH Michaels]

On 7/7/2017 at 1:05 PM, Just1L said:

 

It's like a disease sometimes. Even a curse because it's like I/you can't stop it. I don't know how many times my wife has been talking to me and while I am hearing her, I'm not 100% listening because I've got that damn song cranking in my brain and I can't stop it! I've written full verses and choruses while talking with my wife at the same time. LOL 

That's hilarious.....I do exactly the same thing....sort of autopilot on the "yes dear"  while I'm working out a rhyme or verse.  I get caught at it though....she's gotten so she'll say something like "I sold your guitar, or I crashed the car...."  huh? wha? 

[Just1L]

3 minutes ago, JH Michaels said:

That's hilarious.....I do exactly the same thing....sort of autopilot on the "yes dear"  while I'm working out a rhyme or verse.  I get caught at it though....she's gotten so she'll say something like "I sold your guitar, or I crashed the car...."  huh? wha? 

 

LOL I too have been busted!

[Richard Tracey]

Yeah, I can totally relate to this. I walk about singing lyrics and ideas all day. My wife and kids think I am mad, but they will talk to me and inside I am humming and singing the song over and over till they stop talking and then I start again, till I can find a quiet moment and then sing it into my phone.

[Joe Antaine]

I always start with a full melody well actually usually a week or two  writing bad melodies then suddenly something clicks and in half hour or so I have a fully composed piece of music. 

It usually take me a while to decode the meaning inside the music but as soon as I get a topic, that can take anything from an hour to a month, then the lyric is usually written pretty fast.

[joett]

If there was a formula I think it would be really sorta boring. What brings new life into every good song is the unpredictability of it, and that generally comes by way of inspiration from wherever your head is at. With me, usually, a single word can trigger a new song. And I work it all in my head and record myself on my phone piece by piece. Guitar work comes much much later, when the song is complete. And then I would allow the guitar to take me places. Songwriting? Just allow it to happen. 

[MikeRobinson]

Please also remember that "the process of creativity is not deterministic!"  Not only is it impossible to "know 'the end' from the beginning," but there just might be "more than one 'the end!'"

 

No matter what it is that you are producing or manufacturing, there will come the point where you declare:  "FISwISI"(!!)  ("F*ck it, Shrink-wrap it, and ship it!")

 

Especially in "the Internet age," it is pragmatically possible for you to "try, try again."  It actually isn't necessary for you to presume that "you must bet-the-house on just one throw."  Of course(!) you should strive to be as prepared-in-advance as possible, but, as every psychologist well knows, "there comes a time when it's really just up to the (maze ...) rats."  Throw the dice, and see what happens.

 

(These days(!), it did not "cost you millions of [somebody else's!!] dollars(!)" to be 'wrong!')

[Mahesh]

I completely agree that the process of creativity should not be formulative and be derived from a mindset that says it's some sort of a technique that you can approach with a number of steps. But at the same time, it would be quite unfortunate if that becomes an excuse to not learn about what goes into songwriting and music from a more academic perspective. You don't have to think of any of that while you're actually writing a song. But simply the process of understanding and being aware of the mechanics of this wonderful thing called music really helps you imbibe a stronger sense of the creative process and will help you navigate better probably. 

 

They say that a good scientist is one who learns all there is to learn and then forgets it all to discover something new. It's so true. After I started teaching how to sing at a nearby music school, it dawned on me more and more how important it is to make the student be aware of exactly what is happening in the voice through understanding and perception at the moment of learning it for it to be embedded in them so that they can use it without thinking about it at all while singing a song. I think creative process with songwriting works in the same way.

 

Of course, I'm not saying you have to learn all the books out there about songwriting or even one to be able to write a good song. But I do think it wouldn't hurt your chances if not make it better. Plus it'll allow you to appreciate the art just a bit more by getting deeper into it and looking at it in different perspectives. 

 

This is not a response to any post made here but simply something that I felt the need to mention