Writing a hit song is a daunting task for even the most seasoned songwriters. The process of conceiving the idea, developing the structure, and finishing the song can take hours.
Telling a newbie songwriter to “just write” is a bit cliche, considering that established musicians like Beyonce hire multiple songwriters to compose her smash hits. Young songwriters looking to forge a career in the musical arts must practice, practice and practice.
Why You Must Practice
To write great music, you must constantly challenge yourself to improve your songwriting skills. Not everyone can ‘freestyle’ on a beat like Eminem, Lil Wayne, or Kendrick Lamar and create a hit.
These artists can hop on any beat and make a classic because they have practiced freestyle rap regularly, and gotten better at it. To improve your songwriting skills you must create time to exercise your creative juice daily.
Take Bob Dylan and John Lennon for example. They are considered great songwriters due to the amount of well-written songs they’ve churned out. It is a result of constant practice.
Setting up a home-studio to hone your songwriting skills is a great way of motivating you to practice. Learning the basics of music production will also help you creatively transform your written idea into a song.
Understand Music Theory
You might have a catchy melody you have written down that could become a hit. If you lack knowledge of basic music theory, to harmonize the tune and keep it melodious and rhythmic will be difficult.
Content writers on best research paper writing service reviews understand the basics of writing service reviews, which helps them produce good works. Songwriters hoping to be the next ‘big thing’ in the music industry must understand the following core elements of music theory to write decent songs.
- MELODY. The arrangement of musical notes in a tune.
- HARMONY. How different notes that are played or sung together combine to make a pleasing sound.
- RHYTHM. A strong regular repeated pattern of sounds or movements,
Every good song follows a structure. A popular song structure is ‘verse before the chorus, back to verse, then the chorus, bridge, and chorus’. Some songwriters start with a chorus, before the verse, back to chorus, then verse leads to the bridge, and the last chorus.
As a newbie songwriter, you should follow the popular song structure to compose your music.
We’ve stated the importance of practice, and understanding the core elements and structure of music in improving your songwriting skills. Read on to see 5 more powerful tips to improve your songwriting skills.
1. Believe In Yourself, Know Your Strengths And Stay Confident
To excel in any given profession, you must exude confidence. Accept the path (songwriting) you’ve chosen, and be proud of it.
Your songs may not be playing on the radio at the moment, and people are still unaware of your gift. No one ever won a race by stopping midway.
No matter the current circumstance, remain undeterred and keep writing your music. As the popular saying goes “A journey of a thousand miles starts with a step”.
With self-belief and consistent practice, you will be writing something that people will enjoy listening to in no time. Take that step.
You must identify your strengths and weaknesses. Are you are good at writing over a beat but find it difficult to create a song from scratch? Do you find it hard to come up with ideas for songs?
Identify your weaknesses and work to improve them. Know your strengths and stick to them.
2. Find A Mentor
Several young entrepreneurs receive guidance from people in their field who are more experienced and established. It is like someone who wants to learn about plumbing.
He must serve as an apprentice under a professional plumber to hone his skills and get insights into the sort of challenges he will face in the plumbing career. It also applies to songwriters.
Receiving insights from a mentor who has a lot of knowledge of the music industry can expose you to things to add or remove from your songs.
3. Ask Family And Friends For Honest Feedback
To improve as a songwriter, you must remain open to criticism and learn from the constructive critiques of your work. No matter how well your songwriting appears to you, getting a second thought can help you identify areas of improvement.
Play your song to members of your family or close friends, and ask that they be brutal with their criticism. Getting feedback from friends and family, lets you know where you need improvement and offer you ideas for new songs.
By joining social media forums for songwriters and soliciting feedback, you will easily spot areas your songwriting needs improvement. With social media, you can also build a fan-base.
Allow your followers to decide what genre of music they want to hear from you next. It will help challenge you to express yourself in new creative ways.
4. Collaborate With Other Songwriters
Working with other songwriters is beneficial to newbie songwriters looking to improve their skills. By collaborating with other creatives, you will learn a new approach to songwriting which won’t be possible if you work alone.
Working with other songwriters also helps you view things from another artist’s point of view. This process will provide you with new perspectives you’ve not conceived.
Like we mentioned earlier, Beyonce credits multiple songwriters for some of her hit songs. Those songs may not have been as successful as they were if she had written it all by herself.
As the popular saying goes “two heads are better than one”. By collaborating with other songwriters, superstar Beyonce has hacked the art of songwriting. You can follow her template by collaborating with songwriters around you.
5. Get Ideas to Write Songs From Everything/Everywhere
It could be by reading a new book or visiting a new spot in town, or even following another route to the grocery store that sparks your creativity.
To improve your songwriting skills you must open your senses to the world around you. Observe the plastic bags dancing with the wind, the honk of cars, footsteps on the pavement.
For those that know how to listen, there is music in everything. Get your ideas from the world around you.
Conclusion
The assignment writing services reviews honed their writing skills over and over to be the best in custom writing reviews. To become the best songwriter in your generation, you must practice writing, open your senses to new stimuli, learn how to collaborate, and find a mentor to guide you.
About The Writer
Frank Hamilton is a blogger and translator from Manchester. He is a professional writing expert in such topics as blogging, digital marketing and self-education. He also loves traveling and speaks Spanish, French, German and English.
