Keyboard lessons

Using Familiarity and Innovation Within the Same Song

All songs are a mixture of things that we find familiar and predictable, with a touch of innovation and newness tossed in. The familiar things, as far as a listener is concerned, start with the very sound of the music: the sound is often what gives the genre away. “Use Your Words! Developing a Lyrics-First Songwriting […]

Peter Gabriel's "Panopticom"

Combining Complexity With Simplicity: Peter Gabriel’s “Panopticom”

There’s more to a song hook than meets the ear… a lot more. “Hooks and Riffs: How They Grab Attention, Make Songs Memorable, and Build Your Fan Base” is a vital manual for any serious songwriter. The issue of complexity and simplicity in songwriting is an important one. Songs that are too simple are usually […]

Piano and guitar

When Your Songs Don’t Fit the Verse-Chorus Format

Progressive rock isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. Most prog rock tunes are longer than the standard 3-4 minute length you expect with typical pop songwriting, and that alone will turn some listeners off. Also, it’s not unusual for prog rock songs also to use complex chords and lyrics. In other words, most music that would […]

Christmas Candles and Choir

Writing a Christmas Tune That Everyone Will Enjoy

If you’ve been planning to write a Christmas tune, you should be working on it now — Christmas is less than a month from now. In a way, there’s not really a lot of difference between a good holiday song and the ones you’d normally write. But if you’re looking to write something that everyone, […]

Guitarist - songwriter

Don’t Get Overly Worried About Similarity Between Your Songs

Similarity is a dangerous quality in the world of the creative arts. And it is a particular problem in pop songwriting, because — weirdly — it’s also an important quality. And it all comes down to how you define similarity and how excessive that similarity might be. If you’re ready to take your songwriting to its […]

Microphone

Pulling Different Melodic Ideas Together To Finish a Song

If you look at your most recent song’s verse and compare it to the chorus, you’ll usually notice: There is likely a similarity in the kinds of chords you’ve used in both sections. The lyrics are probably different, with verse lyrics setting up a scenario, and chorus lyrics expressing the emotions created by the verse. […]