Just wanted to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a safe and creatively prosperous 2019.
Here is something I think sums up the sentiments of the holiday season perfectly
Until next time, keep on writing,
Corey Stewart
All About Songwriting
All About Songwriting
Songwriting Tips, Ideas & Help In One Songwriting Resource
Page 2 of 15
As songwriters, we need to be eternally vigilant to any opportunity that might arise which enables us to replenish our repository of songwriting ideas.
When we talk about a songwriting process though, we generally talk about engaging in a set of activities that is separate to our lives in general. We live our lives and in between that we have to make the time to write songs then, we start living life again.
My question to you is… Why limit your songwriting process only to activities where you have to make time? Why can’t you make your whole life become one continuous songwriting process?
By doing this, you create a day-to-day life/songwriting ideas loop where one activity (songwriting) can exist within another (day-to-day life) at the same time
Think about it for a moment… When we make the most out of our lives, the experiences gained will make great songs but in turn, when we also write songs about what is happening around us it helps us make the most out of our lives.
Looking at our lives as one continuous and never-ending songwriting process forces us to pay closer attention to what we do in and with our lives and be more mindful it.
I think it was Socrates who once said that “… an unexamined life is a life not worth living.”
There is no reason why you couldn’t find songwriting ideas through the activities that make up your day to day life which will in turn inspire you to find more songwriting ideas.
Imagine your life becoming one big ideas loop. That would be very cool indeed.
This concept would only truly work if first of all, you internalise the habit of being vigilant to any songwriting opportunity that comes along and secondly, to have a means to record the songwriting idea as it happens if it cannot be worked on straight away.
It’s all about being present in the NOW, and with that in mind, I’ve now got a song to write.
Until next time, keep on writing,
Corey Stewart
All About Songwriting
I believe that songwriting tips, ideas and inspiration can come from anywhere. Especially in areas or disciplines that may not be directly related to writing songs.
A great example of this comes from an article I found on the blogging and freelance writing website Copyblogger called 6 Tips for Beating the Blank Page.
The article is the end result of an epiphany that the author received regarding writers block whilst visiting the Roald Dahl Museum & Story Centre in England.
The epiphany was described by the author Robert Peters in this manner…
As I moved through the museum, listening to audio, reading and looking at various exhibits, I started jotting down aspects of Roald Dahl’s writing process.
It proved to be truly inspirational, and I discovered a few elements of his process that are as important for digital writers and publishers today as they were for him when he was writing his books more than 50 years ago.
The six tips Robert listed are as follows…
- Capture every idea
- Create a place to work
- Create a routine
- Use the right tools
- Perfect your writing
- Do the work
My favourite tip is the last one “Do the work” as it encapsulates all of the other tips into one phrase.
When you write a song, you’re doing the work, you’re getting on with the job and you’re not waiting for the muse to knock at your door. If you don’t do the work, you don’t write any songs.
Seems very obvious but there has been a time in every songwriters journey where doing the work has been the least obvious thing to be doing.
I think Picasso said it best when he said that…
Inspiration exists, but it has to find us working
Read the article 6 Tips for Beating the Blank Page and have a think about how these tips relate to your songwriting process. Do you relate to them? Can you add to the list?
Let me know what you come up with.
Until next time, keep on writing
Corey Stewart
All About Songwriting
Original Link: 6 Tips for Beating the Blank Page – Copyblogger
As songwriters, we all need a bit of inspiration every now and then to keep our songwriting process moving along which is why a two part series of Songwriting Inspiration Tips from the Bandzoogle Blog gives us all a timely reminder that songwriting inspiration can be manufactured through disciplined activity rather than just waiting for it to appear from the ether.
Part 1 of the Songwriting Inspiration Tips series starts off with the following statement…
When you’re suffering from writer’s block, the solution can come in many forms, including de-stressing, self-care, external influence, or some sort of inspiration. For the songwriter, two types of inspiration can help: internal or external (sometimes both!)
The article goes on to list internal and external activities that you can do to generate songwriting inspiration for yourself while Part 2 gives us…
…non-traditional ways to inspire hit songs by using numbers, letters or sounds.
Both articles are definitely well worth the read if you’re looking for ways to increase your ability to generate songwriting ideas. I know I certainly got a lot out of it.
Until next time, keep on writing,
Corey Stewart
All About Songwriting
Original Links:
I just typed “songwriting tips” into Google just now and I was staggered by the amount of search results on offer. There were 30.9 million of them to go through.
If you go through the websites on the first couple of pages of Google you’ll see a wide range of songwriting tips mentioned however, after a while you’ll notice that the songwriting tips all start sounding the same.
That is, until I come across the article 10 Ridiculous Songwriting Tips That Actually Work” on the online mastering website LANDR.
The article acknowledges that a lot of songwriting tips online sound the same but in regards to their songwriting tips the article goes on to say…
But these tips are the special ones. The ones that put you and your ideas first. The ones that open up some time to really focus, experiment and make your songs work.
I’ll be honest, the article title grabbed me first and foremost. “How ridiculous are these tips?” I asked myself, but once I started to read the article I realised that I hadn’t seen these songwriting tips before.
I started to get excited about how I could incorporate these tips into my own songwriting process.
My 3 favourite tips in the article are…
- Play 5 radios at once (#1)
- Don’t talk for the entire day. Just listen (#3)
- Cut your lyrics into a million pieces (#8)
Make a point of reading 10 Ridiculous Songwriting Tips That Actually Work and see if there are any other ridiculous tips you can add onto the list and make sure you let me know what they are so we can all benefit from getting a little bit ridiculous with our songwriting process.
Until next time, keep on writing,
Corey Stewart
All About Songwriting
Original Link: 10 Ridiculous Songwriting Tips That Actually Work | LANDR Blog
If you hadn’t noticed, there’s a lot of information online about how to write a song. Some of that information is pretty light on the detail and heavy on the SEO (search engine optimization), while others are of a very good standard.
However, one of the best articles I’ve come across so far on the subject is an article that appears on the Ditto website called How To Write A Song – 10 Songwriting Tips From The Pros.
Ditto is an online music distributor that helps artists sell their music online through iTunes, Spotify and many, many other outlets so I would imagine that their knowledge about how to write a song or two would be very high to say the least.
As the article says…
Writing a song with unforgettable melodies and creative lyrics can be challenging. Even the most experienced songwriters go through writer’s block at some point in their career, and there are many different approaches to songwriting. Here are 10 helpful songwriting tips, each backed up by quotes from some of the world’s most successful songwriters.
Personally, I found their list of ten songwriting tips to be very beneficial to my own songwriting process. The tips make sense and flow on from each other but the one tip that really stood out for me was the last one…
Don’t Be Afraid To Fail
Now, there’s a real lesson to be learnt for all of the perfectionists out there (me included).
Go ahead and read the article and see if you can add your own songwriting tips to the list provided. Also, let me know what those tips are either through making a comment below or by contacting me.
Until next time, keep on writing,
Corey Stewart
All About Songwriting
Original Link: How to Write a Song | 10 Songwriting Tips from the Pros
It’s generally accepted that most songs are written about the universally perennial topic of love and all of its complicated offshoots.
Listeners (mainly females) just can’t get enough of love songs.
From the innocent musings of early Lennon/McCartney Beatles tunes to the smooth contemporary vibes of songwriters like Ed Sheeran and John Legend it seems that love and songwriting go hand.
Songwriters also love writing love songs but struggle sometimes with the concept of writing a love song that hasn’t been written before.
In a world full of songs about love it can be hard for your song to stand out but this is where an article from songwriter Nicholas Tozier comes to the rescue.
Nicholas runs a songwriting blog called The Lyric Writers Workroom and through his article titled 13 Love Song Ideas That Listeners Love, he describes the many heads of the love song animal which will give a songwriter more information as to what type of love song he or she is going to write.
He also goes on to say in his article…
When you write a love song, you explore themes that everybody can relate to: from the rush of flirting with an attractive stranger, to the constant tug of infatuation that distracts a lover’s mind all day. The shaky knees before going out, the warm comforts of coming home to a long-term partner, the sick-to-your-stomach heartbreak… the world is in love with love songs.
It certainly opened my eyes into the possibility of writing more love songs without feeling that I’ve done it all before.
What are you views on writing love song? Do you jump into writing them head first or, you avoid writing them like the plague because as Paul McCartney once said “you think that people would have had enough of silly love songs.”
To finish things off, here is McCartney’s “Silly Love Songs” for the sake of balance…
Until next time, keep on writing (love songs),
Corey Stewart
All About Songwriting
Here is the original link: 13 Love Song Ideas That Listeners Love
I find inspiration in people who are doing right now what I intend to be doing in the future. One such person who greatly inspires me for that very reason is Joyce Kettering.
She writes music to be licensed for media projects… Film, TV, games, any project that requires music. From what I can see, she doesn’t play live and she makes a good living from her music.
She runs two websites. The first being MadLass Music, her “label” as such where clients can go onto her site and license her music direct from her.
The second site is her songwriting and music licensing tips blog Creative And Productive which is fast becoming my new favourite site. online.
Joyce Kettering knows what she talking about, she walks the walk and talks the talk and when I came across her post titled Songwriters Block – Creative Tricks To Beat the Blank Page I immediately started to read it.
In the article Joyce outlines five creative “tricks” that work for her but what impressed me the most was the detail she put into describing how and why they work.
Under every trick she explains…
- What it is
- When you should try it
- Why does it work
Setting it up this way made it so much easier to internalise the information at hand.
In describing Songwriters Block, Joyce says…
…songwriters block sucks. Being stuck in a rut sucks. It’s bad for the ego, bad for your confidence, bad for the enjoyment of life in general.
Couldn’t agree more. Check out Joyce’s article and if you have any thoughts regarding the article, let me know.
Until next time, keep on writing
Corey Stewart
All About Songwriting
Here’s the original link: Songwriters Block – Creative Tricks To Beat the Blank Page
Now that we’re approaching the end of 2018, it’s the perfect time to start formulating your songwriting goals for the new year and beyond.
Personally, I love this time of year for that very reason.
Planning what I’m going to do always gives me a sense of excitement for what lies ahead and for me, 2019 is going to be a great year for my songwriting.
Will it be a great year for yours?
Even though this list of 10 songwriting resolutions mentioned in the SongTrust article dates back to 2012, every resolution is still relevant and current for each and every songwriter.
The 5 resolutions that resonate with me in the article are:
- Producing one song per month (#2)
- Set aside one more hour per week to write songs (#4)
- Eat healthier (#6)
- Read one new blog post on songwriting per week (#9)
- Collaborate with (at least) one new songwriter (#10)
What are your songwriting goals for 2019? Are you excited with what the year ahead will bring to your songwriting? Let me know or comment below.
Until next time, keep on writing,
Corey Stewart
All About Songwriting
Original Link: Open Mic: The 2012 Songwriter’s List of New Year’s Resolutions
For all of the triumphs that you will experience as a songwriter, there are going to be a lot more failures along your songwriting journey. It’s just a part of life and this is beautifully explained in Cliff Goldmacher’s article “Why Failure Is Your Friend In Songwriting.”
In his article he starts of by stating that baseball is sometimes describes as a “game of failure” but he goes on to say…
Well, using that same math, songwriting, too, is a game of failure where the greatest songwriters who have ever lived have had success with only a tiny, tiny proportion of the songs they write. Given that this is the case, it might be worth your while to make failure your friend since, as a songwriter, you’ll be keeping pretty steady company.
He also outlines the six reasons why as a songwriter, failure is your friend. Reasons such as…
- It thickens your skin
- You’re putting yourself out there
- You’re learning
- It strengthens your resolve
- It keeps you humble
- You appreciate success more
Read the article and let me know if you feel an affinity with the list. As for me, I really gravitate towards the appreciating success reason.
What other reason should songwriters be friends with failure? It’s an interesting topic of conversation.
Until next time, keep on writing,
Corey Stewart
All About Songwriting
Original Link: Why Failure Is Your Friend in Songwriting – Cliff Goldmacher
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