How To Write A Song

So you want to know how to write a song do you?

We have created a free report on how to write a song that talks directly about songwriting .  I encourage you to sign up and download the report and have a read.  It will educate you on the basics and what you need to get started.  But for the moment I will talk briefly about how to write a song and what you need to do to get good at this.

I remember when I first started out and the idea of knowing how to write a song was exciting, facinating and daunting at the sametime. I imagined being in a band or performing with my acoustic at gigs when I was a teenager.  I thought about the excitement from the audience washing over me as I performed their favour songs to them from my album.

I bet you have dream about that or something close to it.  Simple fact is a lot of people wish they knew how to write a song but only a few manage to write anything of amazing quality.  When I look back at my time in school, we would often throw chord progressions together and jam on them for hours with friends wishing we knew how to shape those simple ideals into something exciting and interesting.

Know how to write a song was the number one problem for small bands when I was in school and in college.  To have at least one person in the band who how to write a song you were lucky.  If you had several writers in the band who knew how to write a song you were very lucky. After writing for many years I have to say songwriting is not a mysterious gift or something you are born with.

Remember it is important to have a level of muscial ability when learning how to write a song.

Once you have learnt how to write a song you will understand which chords fit together really well and how to write interesting and catchy melodies that stay in the mind of the listener long after they have heard the song.    It is this good additive quality that all people learning how to write a song should be working towards.  Please read the post song refactoring as it talks about putting only what is needed into a song.

For this post on learning how to write a song I would like to talk about the very basic elements in songs which has singing instead of rapping.  Don’t misunderstand me, I like rap music but it does need a completely different approach to song construction which is more about words and rhythm. I don’t write rap songs so I will not be covering this style.  The how to write a song step by step web site is going to be inviting guest article writers to talk about rap music in the future.

I now want you to listen to your favourite song up until the end of the first chorus.

Good, now you have done that I want you to think about a key element which is important to that song.

How it made you feel

For someone learning how to write a song understanding how the song is constructed is important.

Now listen to it again and I want you to analyse each time you felt the hairs on the back of your neck or excitement.  What you need to think about is how the writer achieved that.  It is a good idea to learn the song on guitar and sing along to understand the structure.  This is the best way to understand how a song is writen and how the song is arranged.

PUT AWAY THE TAB BOOK GUITARISTS!!

What?

I knew you would think that.  I want to encourage to you to learn songs by ear.  I know you think learning how to write a song is easier and quicker with a tab book but you are losing the whole point of the exercise.  Have you ever read something by a songwriter who said he heard his biggest hit in his sleep or in his head?  Well if you don’t possess the ability to capture that idea in your head when it arrives, and believe me it will, capturing that idea will be impossible.

What is the reason for this exercise and how does it help me to learn how to write a song?

Something you need to be aware of is we often work on songs in our subconscious.  How many times has someone talked about song ideas they had in their head but they could not capture them.  So I recommend working on your musical ear as soon as you can.  This also helps with song construction and arranging but this is a bit too advanced for now.

I have read many posts on other web sites and very few if any talk about working on your ear for music to improve their songwriting.  I learnt about this a long time ago when I was learning guitar and I found the improvements were very beneficial.

My next tip for learning how to write a song is always to write using sort of time keeping device.  For acoustic music use a metronome and for other styles use a drum machine that is easy to use.   The reason I am telling you this is it forces you to write material that makes rhythmic sense.  If you listen to any really good pop songs their construction is based around the rhythm of the drum pattern.  In fact anyone learning how to write a song needs to start listening to how the drums move the song forward.   you build you song and mood around the beat.   I always use a software drum machine to write.  A large number of the songs in my recent projects started out as  drum and bass guitar arrangements.  Once I found a good groove I colored the music with vocals and guitar parts.

On the topic of Drums and Bass, listen to the Red Hot Chilli Peppers.  Their drum and bass parts are always really well arranged and compliment the songs extremely well.  This is the bench mark I believe any rhythm session should aspire to.

I know for some of you who are learning how to write a song this is basic stuff For others may be you don’t understand what this can do for you as someone who is learning how to write a song.

But I will tell you straight it does matter if you are learning how to write a song and will have a significant effect on the quality of your songs in the future.    Remember it’s important for you to sign up for the how to write a song step by step free
report.