Expanding Your Palette.
Expression has many forms. In songwriting, words are the front lines of our communication. They pull the listener in, create intrigue and interest, and tell a story.
The musical aspects of expression in songwriting – melodies, musical lifts and patterns – also affect a listener deeply on their own. When words and melody merge together to become one expression, we have the art of song. It becomes something more than the sum of its elements.
We begin with an idea, but how we express it will determine what it becomes, and how it may affect the listener. The style in your songwriting is shaped not only by the lyrical and music colors you have in your ever expanding palette, but the way you combine them. As we develop and hone our craft, I have always felt that writing what comes natural, with an added awareness of technique, is a powerful combination. The art and the craft can then work together to produce great results. To me, the craft is what gives the art its place to live. It’s the frame to the painting, and the map to the treasure. As a great writer once said, ”To write is human, to edit is divine.”
Lyrical Expression
In lyric writing, like any good writing, we must be concise. Not that it has to be inherently short, but as the great literary guru William Strunk Jr famously said, “every word tell”. Phrases that say a lot, and words that say more due to the context in which they are used – these are the kind of elements in writing lyrics that give a song it’s depth. When a lyric and melody are glued together in some connected, organic way, then we are on to something good. A lyric and a melody should sound like they sprang out of the same well. And sometimes they do, in a moment of stream of consciousness creative flow, but sometimes as songwriters we need to do the pairing. Melodies have a mood, and words have a message. How we combine these ingredients is where the song magic hides.
Poetry.
Poetic lyrics paint with emotion and say a lot. Alliteration and poetic nuances to songwriting can give us a less analytical and more soulful style of expression. We can then edit in ways that use the best of the poetic clay we unearthed, but then add shape and clarity. Then it's time to step back and see if what we have is a cohesive verse, whether more abstract or more literal, that works. If not, we craft the art a little further until it does. I think it's good to be adventurous with words. We can always tame them down if we go too far, and sometimes that’s the only way to know that we’ve reached far enough. The shallow pond is comfortable, but it is the depths of the unexpected that will always call us to explore. Tap the poetic well, it is deep with possibilities.
Hooks favor the bold.
In writing hooks, I’ve found that really, really stretching and pushing for new ways of looking at things is so key to progressing as a songwriter. To do this, we first have to recognize when we haven’t stretched enough. After that, it’s on us to do the imaginative thinking that might lead to a unique angle and hook to an idea. Maybe it’s a surprising perspective, maybe it’s an unexpected word or phrase used to apply to something in a way you’ve never heard it applied to. Maybe it’s a fictional story that has characters and happenings that take the listener to an interesting scenario, relatable but imaginative.
Genres have much to do with hook styles. Country music can be much more about telling stories, but vibe and emotional texture is found there as well. In Pop music, we may need more vibe, less literal story, but again there are exceptions. Expanding our songwriting into new genres may require some artistic control of our expression at first. That is the craft. We just can’t lose the art and originality in the process. That will always be what’s most important at the end of the day.
In writing lyrics, I've found that it's not just being good with words that matters most. It is having a closeness to words and their nuances. Another important factor in lyric writing is not in what words say, but how words sing. A word or phrase can feel very different depending on the melody that delivers it. It doesn't change the words, but melody will greatly affect their mood, and the meaning that comes across. Developing a sharp ear for how words feel in a melody is a real strength when it comes to writing great songs. It keeps us pushing and not settling for a word that may say what we want to say, but it is not feeling how it needs to feel.
Songwriting is a dynamic process. Songwriters should delve into those dynamics and get to know them more fully. In this way, we get closer to the music, and closer to some of that song magic waiting to be found.
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