Can Sing But Can't Write: Beginner's Guide To Writing Songs

A singer can sing, but some of them can only sing a song written by some song writers that are not them. You have seen many singers with very good voice but you haven’t seen their original songs. Although being a singer means you should write your own songs to really convey your feelings, you are still a singer even if you don’t write a song because you can still convey the feelings of others and even the songwriters who write your songs through your voice. When I was looking for venue for hire in Melbourne, I came across many jazz singers who covered some songs but don’t sing any original song. While it doesn’t mean any less for you to be a singer who doesn’t write songs, don’t you want to really express feelings through a song that you write? Well, don’t worry; I wrote this article to help you boost your song writing skill. Keep reading this article to find out!

Find inspirations

Just like almost everything else in this world, you need to find inspirations in order to create something. A song is one of them. It doesn’t mean that you should copy the work of others. Finding inspirations simply means you find ideas that need to be sharpened and developed into words. Start by listening to good songs that have powerful lyrics and rhyming tone. There are hundreds of songs from many different genres, but great songs should give you a good idea of what makes a song great – a combination of profound lyrics, storytelling, solid music and powerful vocals.

Learn a musical instrument

Sure, you may be a singer in a band and you don’t play any musical instrument, and you can just ask your friends from your band to play the instrument for you. However, there are times they can’t be available for you and you have to improve your song at times when you are at home alone. Therefore, it is better for you to learn some musical instrument that will be helpful for your song writing process.

Learn some basic music theory

Music theory is not really necessary for writing good songs – a lot of great songwriters started out without knowing their scales from their chords – but it will come in handy when you want to write more something more complicated. Of course, mastering music theory can take you years, but picking up the basics is relatively easy. First, you can learn the 12 notes of the Western musical notations. These are denoted by letters from A to G. There are also ‘sharps’ or ‘flats’ (written as # or b) in between some notes. Altogether, the 12 notes are – A, A#/Bb, B, C, C#/Db, D, D#/Eb, E, F, F#/Gb, G, G#/Ab. Every piece of music is made possible by a combination of these 12 notes. Next is understanding scale. A scale is a harmonious progression of musical notes. Most scales are made up of 8 notes, called an ‘octave’ (with the 8th note repeating). There are hundreds of scales in Western music. As a beginner, you should try to learn the Major Scale in popular keys (tonal chords) like C, G and A. The most important part is understanding chords. Chords are the bread and butter of any songwriter. A chord means playing several different notes simultaneously. Since there are seven basic notes in a scale, there are seven basic chords as well. Beginners must know how to play the popular chords – C, G, D, E, Am, F, B, and Am — at least.

The final step is writing lyrics. For some people, writing lyrics is the easiest step, but for some, writing lyrics is the hardest part. However, when it comes to writing lyrics, I can tell you this; show your emotions, show what you want to share with anyone who listens to it. Lyrics in a song are your feelings that you want to share with people. If you are sad, your lyrics show how you are taking it. If you want to encourage people to be strong, your lyrics show how much you understand their feelings and how much you want people to survive the storm. Be careful with giving inspirations to people through your lyrics, though. Lyrics can lead to actions. Therefore, choose your words wisely. There are songs out there that encourage suicidal thoughts and even bad deeds. It is up to you whether you want to inspire good things or just share feelings with anyone who will listen to your songs or not, but your words can either make them just feel or take actions to the next level. Therefore, choose words wisely.