Great posts from Vic and Connie. Thanks very much for the ideas.
I agree with Vic's thoughts about finding a good hook. That does seem to be at the heart of most successful songs. I also like the idea that the creative process has something of a life of its own, and that you really have no idea of where you might end up when you start. Apparently fiction writers often start with a basic idea and then reshape their story several times as it unfolds. For instance, it's common to make a start with any sort of rough beginning but to go back and write a really punchy and eye-catching opener
after you've written the book, and know where it went!
The area that I find difficult right now is the music itself, rather than the lyrics. But I guess that's just a matter of doing more practice, gaining more experience and learning more about melody and harmony - and how it all fits together. It's frustrating not being a competent singer, or having a good voice control. It makes it much harder to just pick up the guitar and experiment with chords when you can't hold the voice line.
But I'm sure that, like learning any other instrument, I just need to put more work in. It was instructive to see Allthumbs comment that before he recorded the recent song he posted here, he sang it around the house
for a week. Nothing works like experience and preparation.
I guess that songwriting is a bit like improvising solos. It all looks very free and spontaneous when you see it done, but as Vic suggested it's really a product of many small known steps and relationships just mixed differently.
I see improvising as something like cooking, not as an exercise in being constantly new and groundbreaking, but more as blending a known set of elements in different ways. A good chef will take the same ingredients from the shelves, follow familiar steps, but vary the recipe and add some fresh twists and seasoning. I believe that good improvising musicians do much the same thing – put together a new mix using well known patterns, pathways, tricks and licks.
Songwriting is probably not that different. You can't beat having some knowledge and experience in your pantry.
When I first listened to Kirk play I couldn't help wondering "What’s he playing through that I haven’t got? Is it an amp, his guitar, the strings, an effects pedals, or what?" The answer, of course, is that he definitely is playing through something that I haven’t got –
forty-five years of experience. And one important element of that is all the little ways of making things work to various effect that he has discovered and I haven’t yet. Not only discovered, but played enough to be able to recreate them instantly where appropriate without even thinking about it. I'm not too bad in that regard when it comes to words - I'm just a greenhorn when it comes to doing it with music.
Time to get my fingers off the keyboard and back on those strings!....
Cheers,
Chris
Too many words, not enough notes...