Like many people, you may have a love of music. You might have found yourself fascinated with particular songs, artists, and songwriters in the past and thought to yourself “could I do that?” Beyond picking up an instrument, you might well have an interest in the act of actually penning a song, yourself. But where would you even begin with such a voyage? Here, we’re going to look at a few tips that can help you get into songwriting.
Get the basics of song structure down
First of all, you should make sure that you know what a song is made of. Yes, a good song can be inspired by a specific sound, a chord progression, a riff, or something standalone and simple. However, in order to build on it, it’s a good idea to learn about song structure, put together intros, verses, choruses, and bridges, and see how they all fit together to make up a song. You can experiment with song structure in a variety of ways, but you should make sure that you learn the basics first and foremost.
Learn some music theory
You can look deeper into music than song structure alone. While song structure can help you turn your ideas into the full song that you’re looking to create, music theory looks a little deeper at specific sounds, notes, chords, and so on, looking at the values and ideas that we tend to attach to sounds to better help us understand why music brings out the emotions that it does. What is a sad sound? A happy sound? An exciting, angry, or anticipatory sound? Music theory lessons can help you get to grasp shared music history and symbolism that a lot of us already have in our minds, we’re just not aware of it as of yet. You don’t need music theory training to write a song, but it can definitely help.
Break it down with some help
You can learn music theory and how songs come together from a wide variety of resources. However, one of the best things you can do for your songwriting is to be able to break down the songs that you love and find what works about them. Reaction videos on YouTube might not have the best rep, but there are plenty of musicians who are reacting with the knowledge and insight to help you better understand what makes certain songs hit the way that they do. Many of them teach the tools that you can use to do the very same thing, which will also allow you to build off your ideas by fitting the insight you have built onto them.
Experiment with your instrument
Of course, you can’t passively turn yourself into a songwriter. You have to get into the act of songwriting as well. This can involve sitting down with a piece of paper and a pen, writing entire songs from the start. However, in most cases, it tends to come from playing your instruments or producing music, finding the sounds that you want to build on. If you play guitar, then investing in a looping pedal is one of the best things that you can do for yourself. If you play something that you really like the sound of, you can record the loop and listen to it over again, playing the rhythm guitar or bass over it and thinking about how to complement it, which can lead to writing a full song quite easily.
Get into the creative process
The tips above can help you learn the basics of how to get into songwriting. However, as with everything else, if you want to really get good at it, you have to keep doing it. As such, you should make sure that you keep a notepad on you, ready to write down ideas or even use a notepad app on your phone. You should look for inspiration everywhere, not just in music that you hear, but in music communities that you’re a part of, in other forms of art, and how everyday or out-of-the-ordinary occurrences inspire you. You have to get into the mindset of a songwriter to make yourself as open to ideas as possible.
Inspiration can be a very helpful thing, but you don’t have to be struck by it out of nowhere. A lot of people find that inspiration is much more likely to hit them when they have learned more about using it or explored their creative sides further. The tips above can help you do that.
*contributed post*
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