Free songwriting tips, tricks and articles

What´s to learn, do I need some songwriting tips?

We all like to think that we got it, that we master the craft, but if you ask professional song writers if they "Know it all" they will probably answer that they are still learning. They´re in a lifelong process of improving their skills.

Do I have all the answers?

I have done my share of reading books, articles and going to seminars. I have done my share of trying, failing and trying again. (For more about my story, click here). No-one knows everything about anything!

These songwriting tips and tricks have helped me on my songwriting road, and hopefully they will help you make some shortcuts in your songwriting career.

Enjoy:)

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Songwriting tips #1: Song Structure
The structure of a song is the skeleton or the framework a song is built upon. If you want to write songs for other artists or publishers you should express yourself within the structure of today´s music. The most used structure these days is the A B A B form.

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Songwriting tips #2: Don´t make your songs to long
Airtime is more valuable than ever. If your song is too long radio stations won´t play it, which again means artists or publishers won´t sign it, (they want radio hits). The sweet spot is around three and a half to four minutes.

Songwriting tips #3: Repetition, repetition, repetition
One of the most important ingredients in a hit song is repetition. We all know that best way to learn something is to repeat it. The same goes for songs. Your goal is to make the listener know your song after they´ve heard it just a few times, so use, you guessed it; REPETITION.

Listen to your favorite hit songs and analyze how they repeat a melodic theme, an instrumental riff or the choruses. Then, use the same techniques in your song, but don´t repeat so much that you´re inducing boredom. Find the balance.

Songwriting tips #4: Don´t let the melody and rhythm be too alike in the verse and chorus.

This is one of the most common mistakes my students make in the workshops. Even if repetition is an important device in successful songwriting, don´t overdo it, it will induce boredom to the listener. Here are some tips to avoid this mistake:

• Vary the rhythm in the sections. If the verse has many short notes, let the chorus have some long notes.
• Let the melody in the verse and chorus be in different ranges. Maybe let the melody in the chorus be in a higher range than the verse?
• Vary the rhythmic accents in the verse and the chorus.
• Let the length of the phrases vary in the verse and chorus.

Off course, don´t go overboard here. Let the verse and chorus belong to the same song and be about the same topic.

Songwriting tips #5: How original should you be?
When you write hit songs, don´t try to make everything new and revolutionary. It´s important to be original, but most listeners wants things they are familiar with. Learn what´s typical in your genre, and do not be afraid to use the tricks of the trade. Remember, most hit songs contains 90% familiarity and 10% originality. (If you forget everything else, remember this songwriting tip. A student of mine once said this was one of the most useful songwriting tips he had ever learned. He has today written two nr.1 hits:))

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Songwriting tips #6: Be prepared when the great ideas comes
As we know, the great ideas comes when we least expect it. It can be when we´re out driving, at a party or at work. You must therefor be able to catch this first inspiration, the seed of your song idea.

All songwriters I know always carry something where they can save their ideas. The most common tool is the pencil and paper. In a restaurant there is always a possibility to borrow a napkin, and many great songs have started out just like that, but you should be able to capture the idea also when you're out walking.

Todays technology have given us different options. You can use a cassette tape recorder or a digital recorder. Some new digital callenders or cellphone also have a buildt in recorder. I know someone who uses their cellphone and calls their answering machine and leaves a message.

Find the solution that suetes you and be prepared to capture the songwriting ideas when they comes.

Songwriting tips #7: Think about the image of the singer.
A singer takes the image of the charachter expressed in the song, so don't make the artist look bad. If the artist gets a negative persona to identify with in your lyrics, he will probably not pick your song. I once read a statement from an A&R person:

"If I sing it, they think I wrote it, and if they think I wrote it they think I lived it". (unfortunately, I don't remember where i read this so I can´t give him my aknowledgement.)

Make this knowledge to your adventage, write lyrics that makes the artists image stronger in the direction he/she wants to. Follow this songwriting tip, and you will enhance your chances for getting your song picked by the artists and A&R peaople.

Songwriting tips #8: Don't be to hard on your self in the early stages of writing.
Here I'll talk about a common problem, being to hard on your self. Many of my students comes up with an idea, then they throw it away before the idea even get a chance to live. Why? They're trying to go directly from a blank paper to a finished product. They've forgotten that most songs becomes great after many, many tweaks and rewrites. (the Beatles famous song "Yesterday" started out as "Scrambled Eggs".)

If you're to judgeable in the early stages you're stoping the creative flow, so don't make this mistake. Let the creativity have a free flow and give the ideas some chances before you throw them away. Try it out from different angels and try some different approaches. Let your self explore some new territories and take some risks. That's where you'll find the great songs. Click here to learn more about inspiration and creativity.

If you feel your inner critic is to hard and your inner judge is screaming wrong before you even get a chance to write, you're not alone. Many writers experience this from time to time, and this state has different names like writers block and paralyzing self-criticism. If you can't get out of it, there are still help to be found. There's a group called: "Artists in Recovery through the Twelve Steps",( A.R.T.S.). Check out their website at: www.artsanonymous.org

Songwriting tips #9: Decide what kind of songwriter you are
Are you a country writer, country, folk or something else? Once you identify yourself with a genre of music you can expose yourself to lots of different music in that category to get your juices flowing.

That is one thing that the great musicians did. Beethoven, Mozart, Bach—all of them knew all of the other music published in their day and mastered playing it, they didn’t just forge out on their own. Some people say that they are a maverick and don’t have a particular tradition behind them, but even Picasso was a classically-trained painter and could paint realistic portraits and landscapes before he started painting cubist style.

This tip will be very similar to deciding who you are writing for. You may not want to be constrained by a choice between say country or rock, but your listeners will generally belong to a certain group, and you will reach them through a certain type of environment or eventually station. Your group doesn’t have to be one of the big ones but it helps to identify at least one tangible type of listener and familiarize yourself with the types of music that they like.

Knowing your listeners means knowing their interests. Also it means knowing how to talk to them. Every group has a particular way of talking, and you will want to learn to mimic that to sound like “one of them.” You will want it to mirror their casual dialogue between each other so that it doesn’t appear stilted or unnatural. This will create the effect of it being an intimate conversation with the listener or like one they would have with someone else. Click here to read more about this topic under the lyric section.

Songwriting tips #10 Use emotion to give your songs appeal.
The songs that we remember are the ones that resonate with us—that touch a chord so to speak with a feeing or emotional memory we have. That emotional memory will help the song ‘catch on’ or stay with us. It will float through our heads when we are feeling in the mood that the song has created.

We will want to listen to the song when we are feeling that way—or we will listen to a song to distract us from how we feel by giving us another mood. The song will hit dead on a certain way that we felt when we broke up with someone, when we are happy in love, or when we just want to party and have fun.

If you take your listeners on a memorable and pleasant emotional journey, either to somewhere they have been in their past or somewhere they hope to go in the future, they will likely realize they identify with your work and will want to hear it again in the future.songwriting tips

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