What is your songwriting process?

Pressure. With three exceptions, everything I've written was because somebody told me they needed a song - like yesterday if not sooner. I've done stuff for theatrical productions, mostly themes and incidental music, and in only one case did I have to write lyrics with a specific focus. Short answer - nobody makes me, I don't write.

[Nailpicker]

Originally Posted by jseth

My "process"? Seems a funny way to name it, but I'll play...

I will take songs ANY WAY THEY WANT TO COME TO ME! There is NO proscribed method, no rigid rules or requirements... I've had songs that just "showed up" overnight, waking to find the thing fully formed in my head and I wrote it down as fast as I could... I've had others that have taken me 5 or 6 years to complete...

One thing I AM exacting with is "what" the songs say... I have never written a song that I felt was a "cheap shot", as far as rhyme scheme or lyric... I think that songs SHOULD say something, even if if what they say is obscure or difficult to grasp... it doesn't have to some heavy topic or anything, but I HAVE TO BELIEVE IN IT FULLY... I do not write songs that I think other people will like or buy or will make me a bunch of $$$... I keep it to things that mean a lot to me. The real challenge is to say something without preaching or looking down on your (prospective) audience...

Sometimes I will get a line or a phrase in my head and that translates to a song... other times...

I can't begin to count the number of tunes that I've just never finished, simply because they weren't complete and no amount of "forcing the issue" on my part would get them there... others I have just realized that the thing isn't saying anything I want to put out there...

Frequently, when I've been chugging along with the composition of a new song, I'll get to a point where from then on, I'm actually making the whole point of the tune... like some "fork in the road" of songwriting or something... when I do reach that point, I take extra care with what I say and where I'm going with it. Other songs, I've known from the onset what it was to be about (although that can always change)...

As I get older, lyrics seem to be the most elusive; not sure why that is... I suspect that as I've grown, I have come to accept many things that I railed on when I was I kid... I've also realized that my opinion really matters very little to anyone but myself, and I am not as quick to pontificate about any given subject. When I was in my teens and 20's, I had a LOT of big ideas and I was very quick to "download them" to the people around me; not so much nowadays...

I would suggest that, if lyrics or subject matter is elusive for you, spend some time reading authors who are wildly different than your norm; poetry or prose, famous or not so... check out Keats and Joyce and Bukowski and Camus and Faulkner and the like... dig in with those types of writers and you'll get great ideas of different subjects and ways to approach them...

I couldn't say anything more than what jseth says. It's almost exactly how it works for me. But I will add that melody and lyrics have to pop into my head almost simultaneously for a song to work for me since I think melody and lyrics need to blend and compliment each other and for me that works best if done together rather than one before the other. I'm in a hurry this a.m. so I hope that makes sense.

[jseth]

Originally Posted by Nailpicker

I couldn't say anything more than what jseth says. It's almost exactly how it works for me. But I will add that melody and lyrics have to pop into my head almost simultaneously for a song to work for me since I think melody and lyrics need to blend and compliment each other and for me that works best if done together rather than one before the other. I'm in a hurry this a.m. so I hope that makes sense.

Makes perfect sense, and I'm surprised I didn't include the melody in the equation... usually, it's the melody that actually gives me the subject matter! Rarely will I ever have lyrics and put music to them, not per se... I will "mine" my scribblings for lines and ideas, but I don't know that I have ever put a song to previously written prose or poetry...

[berg]

sometimes, inspiration comes out from nothing. just empty yourself from anything and specially any effort to create music. nothingness, the source of creativity...

b.


https://www.reverbnation.com/bergzea
https://bergzea.bandcamp.com

[Bern]

Very much asleep right now...

[Davis Webb]

My new material is based on a riff, chord progression. Then I throw fairly random words in there, I want the syllables to work, the vocalizations over the music, to work, melodically....I don't care at all what the words mean. I think a folk writer is a lyric crafter. Regular composing without lyric crafting works very well. Tom Petty is a master of this.

I need to know, I need to know....

or

Running down a dream

Just infectious matching of syllables to beat and chord. Steely Dan was a master of this as well, half of his songs didn't even make sense or tell a story, Tom Petty says it takes years to write clean, basic riff based songs. None of his songs are deep, but they say it clean...as did Steely D.

Bodhissatva...what the heck was that song about?

I think finding good vocal and guitar syncopation and complements are much more important than lyrical content, to the point that you can dump lyrical content entirely, and focus on one image or one line.

Unless you are a folk writer, in which case its the lyrics that count and the melody is secondary...think Phil Ochs. He then synchs the melody to bring out the feeling in the lyrics.

For lyrical content, Marie Lynn Hammond or Bruce Coburn are masters, Ron Sexsmith....but that is another story.... for most of us mortals a simple catchy line with good music to support it is more than enough.

This has taken me decades to learn. Work for the hook, forget the story. Unless yer Ron Sexsmith.

[hello people]

A wonderful summary of the skillful skills one requires to excel with excellence in this fabulously fine art of song composing, Davis.

From one songsmith to another, I salute you, good sir!

[Scootch]

Words come to me first. Snippets, phrases, a couple hook lines. I write them as to not forget them. Just whip out the iPhone and enter them into notes. I have hundreds of these wanna be ditties.

I'll review them now and then and occasionally one will speak to me a little more.

However my best song, just came to me. I woke up at 5 am one day, and started to write a song about dreams. It started out like a John Prine song, morphed into a George Jones song, then I massaged it into a Scootch song. I fiddled around with phrasing for a week, and everyone likes it, even when I don't tell them I wrote it. It's got a verse, chorus, acoustic verse, chorus, final verse format. The verse and chorus are topically dissimilar. Ones about dreams and the other is about drinking. I might break them apart into two songs someday.

I try to not wear my heart on my sleeve too much. My wife passed a year and a half ago and everyone thinks if I write a song that's sad it's about her. Nope, not, nope.

I did write one about her once and everyone thought it was a suicide note. I just thought it was a Prine-ish black comedy. I'm going to have to wait awhile before I bring it out again. "Laying here in bed, wishing I was dead, thinking 'bout you."

[DupleMeter]

My process usually starts with: "the client needs this in 3 days - I better get to it!"

From there I sit down with the specs for the project and write music & lyrics based on what is being requested. I usually start with melody & harmony (chords), and then work the lyrics around the melody (making adjustments as needed for rhythms and such).

So, it's not your idealized "I was inspired by this lick or melody" and more a "I was inspired by the bills I need to pay" ;-)

That said, I keep a long list of lyrical ideas, title ideas and dozens of quick iPhone recordings of musical ideas to pull from.

I find when you are always writing, things keep coming to you. As my lyric writing professor in college used to say "writer write, so just write & let someone else worry about whether it's good or not".

[jim1960]

Originally Posted by jseth

I would suggest that, if lyrics or subject matter is elusive for you, spend some time reading authors who are wildly different than your norm; poetry or prose, famous or not so... check out Keats and Joyce and Bukowski and Camus and Faulkner and the like... dig in with those types of writers and you'll get great ideas of different subjects and ways to approach them...

I think that (and especially Bukowski) is a great suggestion because it could encourage people to break out of their own comfort zone. One problem beginning writers often have is a concern over what others might think of their songs. They might shy away from phrase or a word for fear someone might take offense and thus weaken a verse. Sometimes great songs offend some people. It's okay.