Month: July 2019

“I write from titles. I don’t write the first line of a song. It’s a mistake, because then you have to come up with the second one” —Sting 

According to some estimates, more than one million new songs are released every year. That’s an awful lot of songs for you to compete with! 

But you have a powerful weapon that can help you stand out from the crowd … YOUR SONG TITLE. A great title can be your song’s strongest selling point and the best way to attract the attention of listeners and buyers. 

To make an impact, though, it is essential for the title to be unique and distinctive—and easy to remember. It must be able to tell people what the song is about in just one word or a single phrase, and in not more than seven syllables. 

Intriguing and attention-grabbing titles are also essential to make your songs stand out when you submit demos to music publishers and A&R reps. They receive hundreds of new songs every week, but an interesting title can go a long way toward helping your song get into their ‘must-listen-to’ pile. 

As Morrissey once remarked: “The title is often more important than the song be- cause more people will read the title than hear the song, and the title will draw them in or repel them…” 

The title has to be the emotional foundation of your song. So don’t start writing until you have a title that moves you. If you’re not inspired by the title, then it’s unlikely that it will be able to achieve an emotional connection with listeners in order to sell your song. 

So what makes a great title? 

Experienced songwriters say short phrases or powerful single words work best. In fact, Foo Fighters’ Dave Grohl reckons writers should treat their song titles like bumper stickers. His advice is: “Keep them simple, catchy and straight to the point”. 

Using action words in titles can attract attention and convey a strong image. And great ideas can come from newspaper headlines containing attention-grabbing phrases that people can relate to (after all, that’s what newspaper headlines are there for). 

Ideas for good titles can come from anything and everything around you. So always be prepared. Carry a notebook or use the voice memo option on your phone to capture exceptional ideas when you spot them. And make sure you keep a titles list. Never let a great title get away! 

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As well as giving your song an intriguing and attention-grabbing title, it is also vital to place the title line in the strongest possible position within the song. This is an- other aspect of the craft of songwriting that many new writers overlook. 

Easy recognition of the title is an important commercial consideration. It means record buyers who hear the song on the radio (or maybe during a scene from a TV drama series) will know what to look for online or at the record store. 

Putting the title in the right place will make it much easier for people to recognize it and remember it. If the title is buried somewhere in the middle of the song, listeners may not be able to pick it out. 

Trying humming your song without any lyrics and see how the melody leads you to a particular point where it feels natural to insert the title. This is most likely to be in the hardest-hitting part of your melody line: THE HOOK. 

If you’re using a Verse-Chorus structure, the most effective position is the first line or the last line (or both) of your chorus. This will allow the title to be repeated several times throughout the song like a catchphrase. 

With the Verse-Verse-Bridge-Verse format, the title should either be in the first line or the last line of the verse. One of the most famous examples of this is Paul Mc-Cartney’s ‘Yesterday’. 

While it is generally accepted that the title has to be mentioned somewhere in a song, there are exceptions, of course. 

‘Unchained Melody’ famously became one of the most recorded songs of all time despite not having the title in the lyrics. However, its backstory is a little different from most hit songs. Composer Alex North was originally asked to write the song as the theme for a 1955 prison movie called Unchained. As a result, it became known as “the Unchained melody”. When lyricist Hy Zaret came to add the words, he decided to focus the story on a prisoner who is pining for a lover he hasn’t seen in a “long, lonely time”. And the word ‘unchained’ is not mentioned once!

At the other end of the scale, in Rihanna’s 2012 hit single ‘Diamonds’—written by Sia Furler and producers Benny Blanco and StarGate—the title is sung 35 times in three minutes and 45 seconds! 

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“It’s the lyric that makes a song a hit, but the tune is what makes it last” —Irving Berlin  

No matter which music genre you’re writing for—whether it’s pop, rock, country, R&B or any other style—the melody line is second only to the title as the most important part of a song. 

The melody is the first thing that listeners catch when they hear a song for the first time. If they like the tune, they’re more likely to want to start listening to the words. That’s why melodies need good hooks, and why a strong and memorable melody is the chief reason why most songs become hits. 

It is also important to make sure that the melody in your chorus is significantly different from the verse melody to make it stand out. In most hit songs, the chorus melody is usually placed higher in the scale—or in a higher key—than the last note of the verse. 

A weak melody can’t be fixed in the recording studio with the aid of lots of production gimmicks. People won’t be able to hum vocal effects, drum fills or instrumental breaks. 

“If you have a keyboard that’s MIDI’d with a couple of synthesizers, so you have strings and horns, you can sound glorious,” said Burt Bacharach. “But when you take it all apart, when you peel back the cover, what do you have? Do you really have a song, do you really have a melody?” 

According to Glenn Frey, The Eagles put such a strong emphasis on writing memorable melodies that they even try to make their guitar solos ‘sing-able’. 

Robin Gibb once explained that the Bee Gees always made sure they had a great melody before they started writing the lyrics. “The principle is to let the melody dictate the flow of the lyrics,” he said. “A good melody is not something you should labor at. It should come easily. If you can’t remember it, then it’s probably not worth it.” 

He added: “If the melody doesn’t get you off, the chances are it won’t get other people off either.” # # # # 

“Never be ashamed to write a melody that people remember” —Burt Bacharach  

New songwriters often feel they have to come up with clever, intricate melodies in order to show how talented and ‘original’ they are. But publishing companies and record labels are commercial organizations that need to make money. They’re really only interested in one thing: songs that can potentially sell millions of records and downloads around the world. 

Creating songs with strong commercial appeal is all about achieving a unique blend of originality, familiarity and predictability that will make a song as easy to remember as possible. 

Because people listen to the words and the music at the same time, it is especially important to retain simplicity in the melody. As Emeli Sandé puts it: “Sometimes simple melodies have the greatest impact.” 

But that’s where new writers often go wrong. They worry that their songs will be regarded as boring, simplistic and unworthy if they don’t compose elaborate melodies. As a result, they can end up with songs that are far too complicated. 

If people can’t hum or whistle your song after a few listens, it is unlikely to be a commercial success. 

Many experienced writers find that simple tunes can be just as hard to write as a complex piece. “Writing a simple melody can take weeks to get it right where I want it,” admits former Yes guitarist Trevor Rabin. 

If you take time to analyze some of today’s biggest hit songs, you’ll find that it is their simplicity that makes them so memorable. 

They are almost always built on just two or three short melodic themes that link together to form bigger lines. Simple phrases containing between two and seven notes are much easier to remember after one listen. And when these short phrases are combined and repeated several times throughout the song, they can deliver a powerful and memorable melody. 

Listen to the choruses of some of the biggest-selling songs of the past 50 years— songs that have stood the test of time. You will hear that most of them have a short, catchy melodic hook that is also usually the title line. The hook features a melody and lyrics that are exactly the same every time the chorus is repeated—thus making sure the song gets well and truly stuck in the listener’s head! 

It is this repetition of musical phrases that helps to make each song sound simple, even if it isn’t. And, as the great Irving Berlin once remarked, it helps the melody to “linger” in the listener’s head long after the song has ended. 

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“When I hear music I hear words, just as I assume the composer hears music when he listens to lyrics” —Hal David  

Your success as a hit songwriter depends on your ability to communicate stories, feelings and messages that reach out and touch listeners and evoke an emotional response within them (whether it’s an urge to get up and dance, or to get all romantic). 

The key to achieving this lies in the compatibility of your words and music. 

Your melody is the powerful medium through which your lyrical content is delivered to the listener. The melody helps to interpret the emotional intensity of the lyrics, and also helps people to remember the words. 

It is therefore vital to make sure the melody and lyrics complement each other perfectly in order to convey the essence and meaning of your song. You have to make sure your words and melody belong together. 

The technique known as prosody—the way in which words and syllables line up with the notes in the melody line—is a valuable device for making it easier to communicate exactly what you’re trying to say in your song. For example, aligning downbeats or accented notes with stressed syllables or key words can play a powerful role in conveying meaning.

Music has a unique ability to express and elicit a wide range of emotions to match the accompanying lyrics. Major chords can convey happiness or joy, while minor chords create a feeling of melancholy or sadness. You can use a mix of minor chords, major chords and the tension created by unresolved chords to match what you’re saying in each line of your lyrics. 

It all comes down to experimenting with chords, intervals, rhythms and phrasing patterns to find the most effective way of marrying your melody and lyrics. When you find a combination that really moves you, it’s likely to move other people too. 

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If you’re a singer-songwriter—or if you write for your own band—your melodies will naturally be tailored to fit your own vocal range or that of your band’s lead singer. But if your aim is to get other artists to record your songs, it is important to make sure your melody lines don’t exceed the vocal range of the intended singers. For example, if you have to break into falsetto when you sing the song yourself, it’s a sign that the melody range may be too wide. 

A singer’s vocal range is often defined as the total span of “musically useful” pitch- es that he or she can produce. In other words, if the lowest notes are barely audible when the artist sings them, and the highest notes crack and can’t be sustained, then they aren’t “musically useful”. 

The maximum range for most singers is rarely more than one and a half octaves (in many cases it’s an octave plus a couple of notes). So if your song has a much greater melodic span than that, you may be limiting the number of artists who could sing the song comfortably. 

Remember, successful artists who don’t write their own material are constantly being bombarded with new songs. Because they have so many to choose from, they’re unlikely to go for a song that they find difficult to sing (especially live)—no matter how much they like it. 

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When Emperor Joseph II first heard Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s opera The Abduction from the Seraglio in 1782, he famously told the composer: “Too many notes, my dear Mozart”. It was a criticism shared by many people at the time—even amongst Mozart’s admirers. He had such a fertile melodic mind, and his head was so full of catchy tunes, that he could not resist cramming them all into his music. 

Today, new writers often make the same mistake. Their tunes may not be in the same league as Mozart, of course, but they try to squeeze too much into their melodies in order to demonstrate their talent and impress people. 

Too many notes can be a problem if you want other artists to be able to sing your songs. So be careful not to make your melodies so busy that there are no resting spaces or pauses in which the poor singer can draw a breath! 

For singers, good breath management skills are essential if they want to sound great and maintain the quality of their vocal performance every time. If you don’t allow the singer enough space to breathe, it can have a negative impact on his or her vocal quality—and the song may be rejected as a result. 

It is important to structure the musical phrases in your song in such a way that the singer can take a breath without it sounding awkward—like breathing naturally be- tween sentences when you’re talking. Notes held for more than a few beats should ideally be followed by a rest long enough to allow a breath. You should also leave some breathing space after a string of fast, short notes. 

It is also essential to leave enough spaces (lyrically and melodically) to allow artists to express themselves and interpret the song in their own way. 

The best way to check the ‘breath ability’ of your song is to print out the lyrics, read them out loud against a metronome or a click track, and mark all of the points at which you find yourself taking a breath in normal speech. Then make sure the notes you’re asking the vocalist to sing correspond with these natural pauses. Many experienced songwriters believe it is the gaps and pauses left between the notes that actually help to make the overall melody sound interesting and catchy. 

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One of the most significant features of today’s hit songs is the heavy use of repetition. Certain musical themes and lyrics are deliberately repeated throughout the song to make it sound instantly ‘familiar’ and therefore much easier for listeners to remember. 

This is especially important when relying on radio airplay to help ‘break’ a new single. Most songs require multiple radio plays over several weeks in order to climb the charts, so repetition of key melodic phrases and lyrics (especially the title line in the chorus) is a powerful way to firmly plant the song in listeners’ heads. 

Studies have found that people often feel more comfortable listening to a song they already know, or when they hear a new song that sounds kind of familiar and predictable. 

But new songwriters often struggle when it comes to finding the right balance be- tween repeating musical phrases often enough to make the song memorable … and using too much repetition which can make the song sound insignificant, twee and boring. 

Too little repetition and you can’t hold listeners’ attention; too much repetition and you turn them off; and no repetition at all can make your melody sound far too complicated to be remembered easily. 

That’s why your songs need to have a good balance of predictability (through repetition) and surprise … without overdoing one or the other. 

To find out how successful writers manage to achieve this, take time to analyze some of today’s biggest hit songs. Pick out the melodic themes, riffs and lyrics that you hear again and again. The repeated sections may comprise only a few notes or they could be several bars long. Many songs typically feature about 10 repetitions of the title throughout the song. 

Make a note of how and where the repeated sections are used in each song—and apply a similar technique to your own songs. 

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As mentioned previously, a prominent feature of many of today’s hit songs is the frequent repetition of key melodic phrases. Certain musical themes and lyrics (especially the ‘hook’ and title line) are deliberately repeated throughout the song to make it sound instantly familiar to listeners, and therefore much easier to remember. 

While new writers may understand the importance of establishing melodic hooks, some of them fail to grasp that ‘repetition’ means their verse melody has to be exactly the same in every verse, and their chorus and pre-chorus melodies should also be consistent throughout the song. 

Repetition is a powerful way of firmly planting your song in listeners’ heads, but if you include too many melody changes (no matter how subtle) from verse to verse and chorus to chorus, you will make it harder for listeners to remember them all so that they can easily sing along. 

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“Sometimes an unexpected chord change can be the difference between a good song and a great song” —Gary Talley  

You may only have one chance to get a music publisher or an A&R executive to listen to your song, so it is essential to make sure the chorus— which is the section that is supposed to really sell your song—stands out clearly when people hear it for the first time. 

With songs by new, inexperienced writers, though, it is sometimes difficult to tell where the verse ends and the chorus begins. Writers who are just starting out often don’t realize that a lack of contrast between the chorus and the verse weakens the overall song. 

That’s why it is essential for the chorus melody to be significantly different from the verse melody, with a different chord progression. The chorus should ideally start on a different chord from the first chord of the verse, perhaps using an unexpected chord change to surprise the listener. 

Varying the rhythm of your verse melody and chorus melody will also help to create contrast. For example, if your verse consists of note lengths that are fairly short, try using long, sustained notes in the chorus melody (or vice versa). 

Contrast can also be achieved by giving the verse melody a strong dynamic flow that leads the listener to an emotional ‘lift’ in the chorus—with the chorus melody typically placed higher in the scale than the last note of the verse. 

You can also use your lyrics to add greater contrast by making the chorus rhyme scheme different from that of the verse. A change in the rhythm of the words—such as a shift from staccato lyrics in the verse to stretched-out words in the chorus (or vice-versa) —will also help to provide a clear distinction between the two sections. 

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