i really struggle to write lyrics for songs and would love to hear your

[spiralganglion@merveilles.town]

i really struggle to write lyrics for songs and would love to hear your

a • general pointers / tips
b • feelings about lyrics
c • favourite lyrics

[ameliasbrain@mstdn.ca]

@spiralganglion General pointers for writing song lyrics:

• Sing your lyrics, full voice, as you work on them. Figure out which syllables stumble as you're singing, or where the natural spoken melody/accents clash with the musical melody you're trying to fit to them.

• Decide what you want to say, but then decide how important it is that you hold true to that. Are you writing a memoir, or fiction? Are you OK with letting the melody, rhyme, & word play lead the song in unexpected directions? Or is the message more important than clean sound?

• Don't worry too much about perfect rhymes. Vowel sounds and patterns of emphasis are usually what comes through when singing, while consonants fade a bit. (So, "far", "heart", "stark" could make a passable pseudo-rhyme group.) What matters is that it sounds right when you're singing it.

• Same with exact meter/number of syllables. If you can maintain the melody timing & emphasis while working around some extra or stretched out syllables, that's what matters.

[ameliasbrain@mstdn.ca]

@spiralganglion

• I find it's easier to start with lyrics & let the music flow from them instead of trying to fit lyrics onto music. Find the natural pacing & rise/fall patterns of what you want to say. (But you'll still have to do the other part for extra verses following the same melody!)

• If you are trying to fit vocals to existing music/beats, listen to the music trying to really focus on the emotions & get your body in tune with the rhythm of it, and pay attention to your breathing. Let the in/out pattern and timing of forceful vs trailed-off air movement map to melody and emphasis.

• If you're stuck on a particular line or word, skip over it & come back later. Get the whole song stuck in your head, bouncing around while not trying too hard, singing filler syllables as need be until something makes sense for that gap. You might end up grabbing a bit of a lyric from another part of the song or changing the part you can't rhyme with.

• Keep practicing, on new songs & re-writing old songs too.

[swordgeek@mstdn.ca]

@spiralganglion I'm not much of a songwriter, but I took a free course on Coursera (taught by Pat Pattison) that provided some incredible i sight into songwriting.

He also has writen 'THE' book on songwriting/lyrics.