Composition For Dummies – Just How DO You Write A Song? (Pt. 1)

TUNEICEF is well and truly upon us, students and myself are beavering away on our songs for this year (and if anyone fancies getting in on this, just drop me a line), and as usual one of the biggest questions I face from students who have never tried their hand at writing is “Where do you start?”. This is a fair point – most songs you hear on the radio are pretty heavily produced, layered vocals, drum loops etc – and when you hear the finished product you do wonder just how the hell this thing came to be.

So the trick is to start small. Find a couple of songs that you like, and start to listen critically to figure out what you like abut them. Doing this with my students, I divide things up into four areas:

Melody – the tune itself. Are there any noticeable leaps or changes that catch the ear? Do you hear high held notes in the chorus as opposed to busier, more syncopated rhythms in the verse? Even subtle things such as the verse being phrased on an offbeat whereas the chorus comes in on a downbeat can make a real difference. Those with a more experienced ear might try an identify the interval that the melody comes in on - frequently not the root of the underlying chord (as you might expect) but it's 3^{rd. Understanding little tricks like this can kickstart your writing.}

Rhythm – anything from the tempo, the time signature to any noticeable rhythmic patterns that can become a songs' hallmark. A good example of this would be the Rolling Stones' classic “Sympathy For The Devil” - the immediately recognisable syncopated 16ths drive the song and act as a “hook”.

Harmony – the chords behind the tune. Are they diatonic (all within a key) or do they contain notes from outside the home key? Do they follow a recognisable pattern such as I, V, vi, IV? Do they contain any interesting extensions such as 7ths, 9ths etc.? A good example of this would be the Smith's “Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now” which revolves around the wistful yet melancholic sound of the major 7^th.

Texture – this concerns the production values of the recording. What instruments dominate? Guitar? If so, acoustic, clean electric, distorted, mildly overdriven? Or perhaps the song revolves around the piano? Or a synth pad?

Once you've got these factors pinned down, start mixing and matching – for example, one of my students picked “Friday I'm In Love” by the Cure – noticeable for it's chord sequence and arpeggios in the backing - and “Bohemian Like You” by the Dandy Warhols with it's major/sus4 riff. So we mixed up the ingredients – sus4 riff with “Friday I'm In Love” chord sequence.

Now, as a song, it was not yet massively impressive, but it got him started!

Next month, we'll tackle lyrics....