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How To Get Started With Songwriting-Page 1
A song is words+music, and for a song to be successful it has to have great lyrics and great music.
A great lyric is simply a mix of easy, nice words revolving around an interesting topic. The good thing is that lyrics don't have to go by any rules; it is simply a matter of practice...May be there are some rhyming "rules" but those can be hardly called rules, we will discuss them later.
As for great music, you don't have to create a complicated masterpiece..!! Actually, great music in this context means simple, "catchy" melody and well-structured chord patterns. We will see about music later.
OK. Now we got music and lyrics but that means nothing if a catchy melody and a number of nice words were just scattered all over your song...Music and Lyrics need to be put into a concrete Song Structure...
A song usually have three short melodies, two of which are repeated over and over again....
Chorus: The chorus is a lyric-music combination that is repeated with little or no change throughout the song. Usually, the chorus lyrics include the song title and gives the listener a general idea about the song topic. The chorus music includes the most catchy melody in the song...The chorus is generally the part that your listener will remember from your song.
Verse: The verse has the second melody of the song, this melody hardly changes throughout the song. What changes is actually the verse lyrics; as the verses usually give details about the song topic. Notice that no matter how the lyrics change they all have to fit the same melody, without having to look "artificial"...This actually is a great challenge ;).
Bridge: The third melody and the one that is -in most song structures- appearing only once. It is better if the listener gets a "tiny" surprise in the bridge; that can be a change in the chord structure accompanied by a smooth shift to another scale...etc. However, the bridge melody always ends by shifting back to the original mood and repeating the chorus all over again. As for the bridge's lyrics they usually represent a conclusion or a flash back to the whole song, this adds to the surprise. Sometimes, -especially in rock- the bridge is just a solo with no lyrics.
But how are those three parts arranged in the song? Well, you got Chorus, verse and bridge...Yes, arrange them in any way you want, but don't get too messy or your listener will get lost. To make it easier, songwriters have come up with these agreed-on song structures most of the songs follow those three structures:
verse / chorus / verse / chorus / verse...etc.
verse / chorus / verse / chorus / bridge / (verse) / chorus
verse / verse / bridge / verse
Now, about the verse / verse / bridge / verse ... This structure takes a tricky melody for the verse; it has to be catchy, and longer than the usual verses. Moreover, you have to spice it up every time you repeat it with a new thing (like a new instrument in the background, or a back vocals line...etc.). I personally like this structure because I feel it gives a certain freedom with the lyrics, the other two structures don't give. Besides, this structure gives room for musical intros and outros, not to mention the opportunity to add some musical "breaks" (between the verses) without having to worry about making the song too long.
Copyright © 2007 by Mahmoud Ibrahim. All Rights Reserved.