When you listen to songs, you’re likely unaware of the concepts of fragile and strong being played out, but it’s actually a very important aspect of good songwriting. If you’ve written a melody and you want to explore the many ways there are to add chords to it, you need to get “How to Harmonize a […]
Most of the time when you create chord progressions for your songs, you’re using chords that all come from a particular key. Often we combine chords even without knowing what key they come from. Trying to get the chords-first songwriting process working? Your main concern with chords-first songwriting will usually be the creation of good, memorable […]
Beyoncé’s latest hit single, “Break My Soul” (written by Beyoncé, Tricky Stewart, The-Dream, et al) is currently at the top of the Billboard Hot 100. Every hit song balances standard fundamentals of songwriting with something unique and innovative. So let’s take a look at three songwriting innovations that set “Break My Soul” apart and make […]
There are many ways to categorize chord progressions, but the best way system for songwriters is to classify them as being either fragile or strong. These two words, fragile and strong, pertain to the key of your song, and specifically refer to whether a progression makes the key very obvious or somewhat ambiguous. Getting melodies […]
Inverted chords, often called “slash chords” because of the way they’re notated (C/G: “C slash G”) can add a very useful sense of creativity to an otherwise ordinary chord progression. In fact, if you’re looking to make your progressions sound a bit more inventive, exploring ways to use inversions should be your first step. Here’s […]
Changing the key of a song is not all that common. Most of the time a song will end in the same key that it started in. When a song does change key it’s often the case where the verse is in a minor key, and then switches to the relative major key for the […]
