So my problem is I have several songs, but I’ve never been a confident singer and never wrote lyrics, well, I have, but they just don’t seem to want to work. Another problem would be making the lyrics have their own melody, as I enjoy music with both rhythm guitar and lead making a third melody is becoming difficult, as when I try to put the selected theme lyrics over the music I ended up singing the lyrics in the melody of the lead, which isn’t what I want! Did you ever encounter this? How can I stop it?

Also the problem of making lyrics in the structure of rhyming poetry keeps getting me, ah, it’s so frustrating.

Thanks again!

Daph.

If I understand correctly your problem is that you compose your lyrics to fit melodies which are either spontaneous or else copied. You capture the lyrics by writing them down but forget the tunes.

The answer it seems would be to capture the singing as well, then you can listen to it back and learn how to recreate the bits which work for you, just like learning to understand somebody else’s song and make a cover version, except that it’s your own. Any kind of recording device wil do, an old cassette recorder, a camera with video setting, mp3 dictophone, or a laptop computer with mic or webcam.

New songs always start off quite fluid, and can develop a lot as performances go by but once you start to make a few recordings and listen to them back, the later versions become more definitive.

Hope this helps and good luck with your songwriting.

Apologies for writing such a long-winded question…
Daph.

I don’t about jotting onto an iPod though, can you do that while walking or do you have to stop and break the flow? I find that with repetition, I can memorize a few verses of a new song while walking, as long as I write it down as soon as I get to the destination.

But recently i have discovered a method which works rather well,
I pick out my main chords and write any lyrics to them, no matter how daft or silly,
As I’m a teen my head is normally filled with discusting thoughs anyway,
basicly, i would replace the “silly” lyrics with ones that fitted better and rhymed to creat a serious song,

I also walked home one night, after walking a mile with still one mile to go, i began jotting anything that came into my head, down onto the notepad on my iPod, its amazing how much more creative you are when you have time to think by yourself

Song writing and the process of writing lyrics is not the same thing as writing poetry. A song may be a great song but its lyrics may not work as a stand alone, flat on the page, poem.

I would like to define what I mean by poetry a little more carefully here. I do not mean just anything with a rhyme, a simple repeating verse form. I mean a fully formed poem in which every word and rhyme is carefully chosen to produce or add to a mood or an effect.

I just do not think that song lyrics have to be crafted in quite the same way. The words can be woven together with the music to make a whole. I know there are poems that become songs, many of Roy Harper’s songs can be read as poems for example. Leonard Cohen’s often start out as poetry first but this is not a requirement or a criteria for judging the worth of a song.

I still believe that a good song is not necessarily a good poem or vice versa. It’s not a lack of ambition on the song writer’s part but rather a difference in purpose. So I think song writers should study songs they admire rather than poems, song writers, not poets.

As far as music is concerned it depends on what your focus is. If your focus is the Music itself then lyrics can sometimes be completely irrelevant to almost the extent that they can seem as though they were probably obligatory as opposed to being crucial. And there’s the grey area, which I believe most people I in, whereby they have a love of both writing and making music. There’s also another end for people that for whatever reason write better than they play; Talent, is a spectrum.

And to say Lyrics isn’t Poetry is bizarre. Look, whether you want to call yourself a musician, a lyrical artist, a singer/songwriter, lyricist, troubadour, instrumentalist or any other label is completely irrelevant. To caste off studying Poetry, Poetic Meters and Poets when looking to write better, “Lyrics” is self-harmful. Lyrics are Poetry, the definition is exact, their purpose although differs, indeed. But most Poetry is written musically when written with an ear to the effect soft, loud, short and long syllables have on the English language, and the patterns they can create (i.e. Iambic Pentameter). Knowledge of the English language, of Poetic meter would make you a better, “Songwriter” (or whatever you call yourself, again: irrelevant). It infuriates me the way self conscious musicians deflect a blow to their ego when they cannot write to their own ambitions straight away, instead blaming it on some imaginary concept that they somehow hadn’t realised. Words are important. Songs are messages. If you ignore Poetry, a craft dedicated to sending messages, you are stunting your own, “Artistic” -growth. Period.

Rant over/

http://www.thebadhelmets.se/writing-lyrics/

//Stellan

Poems have great ideas, or “hooks” … Rip them out for the chorus.

Randomly repeat a random word in any line. This breaks up the original meter and adds a required “dollop of emotion”

Remember to keep the chorus slightly brain-dead ala Manual, nana nana is good.

And there you have it! Try it it works! Honest…

The longer answer is that it’s kind of an iterative process. You can start with a tune or start with some lyrics, it doesn’t really matter which, and then develop the tunes to go with the lyrics, and alter the lyrics to fit the developing tune. I usually go back and fore several times. Sometime the original lyrics have a rough idea of a tune in mind, sometimes not.

If you commit yourself to performing the song/poem in public somewhere, then that usually leads to a further process of refinement.

I hope this helps, looking forward to hearing more about your song writing
Cheers
Andy

i would really appreciate the help

thanks,
Lexi