In case you’re wondering, yes - you’re in the right place.

What if I said you could have a great time on the weekends without spending a dime, you could listen to great music spun by a well-known DJ, and you could interact with that DJ and his on air partner via an online chat room with friendly members, all from the comfort of your own home; would you be interested? 

DJ Jorge Ojeda, a legendary Miami, FL DJ with the help of partner J Cool Suave has been running a live internet radio show out of Miami called “Master Mix Sessions” and it has exploded worldwide.  The key to their success has been first and foremost, great club music mixed by an industry veteran on Friday and Saturday nights, their lively and warm personalities, and the support from faithful members (including me) who interact with them and each other at the free internet radio station chat room of 1CLUB.FM! 

Ojeda and Suave have become so hot they’ve had to say goodbye to their original South Florida radio station in order to expand their horizons.  They’ve formed a partnership with a handful of other talented industry veterans (“El Chi Chi” Carlos Jose, Eddie Alexander, JonPito, Andres Vega, Luis Beyra, Angel Rodriguez) and they’re about to launch WEPA.FM on 1CLUB.FM radio! 

For WEPA.FM, in their own words, IT’S ALL ABOUT THE MUSIC.  WEPA.FM will feature Retro, Real 80’s, 90’s Dance, Rock, Salsa, Merengue, Latin Rock, Freestyle music, with a touch of today’s jams.  They’re aiming at bringing back DJ personalities heavily into the mix (something major music markets are straying away from) to gain faithful listeners and so you can interact with them and simply have a great time!      

The official launch date of WEPA.FM is this coming Saturday (11-22-08) at 8:00 Eastern.  Master Mix sessions will be featured on Fridays and Saturdays. 

To my friends at WEPA.FM, I wish you the best!  A special shout out to all my friends at 1Club.FM; I’m looking forward to this Saturday!

If you’re interested or at least curious, visit 1CLUB.FM,  sign up for a free membership, and join us in the chat room while listening to DJ Jorge and J Cool this Saturday.  Yours truly will be there hanging out and having a good time!

I can’t wait!   

In pop music, if you’re looking to create a good song, write it using simple, catchy, repetitive phrases in the lyrics as well as the music in many parts of your song. The whole idea is develop a strong “hook,” build your song around it, and let the song take you in different directions leading to other “mini-hooks” in the song.

When you’re trying to build a main song hook, keep in mind the initial ideas you come up with don’t necessarily have to end up in your chorus. Many hit songs have been written by creating a “hook” which eventually were placed in a verse or other song section instead of the chorus.

How To Use Simplicity To Your Advantage

The vast majority of the greatest songs in the history of respected pop music have used simplicity to create their hooks. I.e., from the early days of songs like “My Girl” (Temptations, written by Smokey Robinson, Ronald White,
Mick Jagger) to the present day, “Disturbia” (Rihanna, written by Robert Allen, Andre Merritt, Chris Brown).

Hit songs have historically used easy, sing-songy melodies with memorable, short lyric phrases with great success. The pop writing lesson here: to write a good song, write short melodies and lyrical lines (from one to three notes and words), then let this lead you wherever else you want to go with that particular song.

How To Use “Catchiness,” and “Repetitiveness” To Your Advantage

This one’s easy and enjoyable!  Study some of your favorite songs and try to figure out what it is that attracts you to the song, and invariably the answer will be:

1. The song has one main hook that really stands out.Nine times out of ten that hook will be in the chorus. Take a look at Neyo’s big hit “Closer” and you’ll see the hook is actually contained in the prechorus (not the chorus). Notice also how the majority of hit songs have very repetitive main hooks; this is what keeps the listener coming back for more!

2. The song has a few other repetitive, catchy hooks I like to refer to as “mini-hooks.” Many times these come in the form of an instrumental intro riff (at the beginning of the song) that continues throughout the song whether through chord structure or underlying melody line.

Hooks are the biggest key to creating hit songs!  It’s what you do with the song after you’ve created the great hook (i.e., strong verse writing, song makes sense, song is meaningful, etc.) that earns you either respectability or the dreaded “Cheese Award” and a nomination for one of the worst pop songs in history!   

To create a catchy repetitive hook, you need to play your instrument or sing, and concentrate on 2 to 3 notes at a time until you like a certain combination, then build from there using one to three more notes at a time.

When you’ve hit on a a few notes that contain that certain singable part that makes you go “Wow, that sounds good (or cool)” you’ll know you have something people are going to love!  Now you have the makings of a good song.  Write on!

Once you start writing the rest of the song,try to think of catchy instrumental or melodic phrases to bracket (fill in the gaps) the vocals in certain areas using the same two to three note-finding method as your starting point (described above).

Oftentimes the only thing you need to bring a song to life is to fill in empty spots in your song by inserting mini-hooks, and by slightly changing the melody or words of your hook.

Bottom line is: after you’re done writing the song, if it hits you in the chest with the “wow” factor, it’s going to be a darn good song.  Write away and keep churning out those hits!

Even the best songwriters of the wonderful craft we call songwriting continually work on their songwriting skills with one simple goal in mind; to become a better songwriter.

They know not only that they’re sometimes seen as ”only as good as their last hit song” in the eyes of many music publishers, but that they need to stay on top of their game by studying and implementing new songwriting techniques whenever possible in order to compete with others in the ever-changing business world of songwriting.

If you think your songwriting is a little stale or if you’re in a rut, you can usually break free of this by reviewing songwriting basics and learning a couple of fresh songwriting techniques.  In other words, go back and read your songwriting books, go out and watch some live acts performing original songs, and re-connect with your instrument of choice by practicing.

If you’re serious about continually becoming a better songwriter, use this as a starting point:

1.  To become a better songwriter, you should periodically review the songwriting basics, from song forms to rhyming techniques to chord structures to everything in between.

For example, reviewing songwriting basics might look something like this:

(a).  Reviewing the function of each song section (verse, bridge, etc.), and how each one is used to create a song.  I.e., the bridge adds a whole new dimension to your song by changing the melody, rhythm, and harmony before going into the final chorus.  If you know basics like these, you can bend the rules far more easily and you can put yourself in a better position to be more creative and original.

(b).   Reviewing basic chord structures and formulas for working in any key and expanding your chord knowledge by learning at least 1 new chord every week.

For example:  I, IIm, IIIm, IV, V, VI, VIImb5   in the key of of G his would be: G, Am, Bm, C, D, Em, F#mb5   also sevenths:  I7, IIm7, IIIm7, IVmaj7, V7, VIm7, VIIm7b5 would be G7, Am7, Bm7, Cmaj7, D7, Em7, F#m7b5.  We know that for any given key we could use a combination of any of these 14 chords as a starting point.  There are many more chords we can use for any song but that’s a lot of territory to cover, so I will dedicate a whole new article about it sometime soon! 

2.  You should listen to other songwriters’ songs and try to analyze what makes them successful.  I.e., why are there two extra lines in the 1st verse?  Why does a particular song begin with the chorus without sounding cheesy?  What is the rhyming scheme of the song?

3.   If you play an instrument or if you sing, practice!

4.  Finally, continually seek out new ways to improve your craft either through songwriting workshops, buying new reference books, and keeping yourself up-to-date with the many informative and “cutting edge” websites like this blog and the ones listed below in the “links” section.  Hint: Many Pro songwriters admit to constantly seeking out fresh articles on the web to inspire their songwriting!

If you want to become a better songwriter, the shortcut to success lies in how much effort you want to put into your craft.  The information is available, and mostly for free; go out there and grab what’s yours!

One of my favorite songwriting lyric tips and tricks is to use inner rhyming to my advantage by continually finding fresh ways to use this type of effective rhyming.  Inner rhyming has a tendency to build momentum in any part of your song, so if you’re looking to add life to your creations, this method of rhyming is an outstanding, contemporary choice.

Next time you’re using inner rhyming in a song, try not ending any verse line with a usual rhyme.  Instead, use inner rhyming on every line until you get to the chorus.  

For example, this technique really works well in r&b or pop songs which are beat-driven, but you can definitely use it in any song genre. Keep in mind I’m just making up lines that come to my head in real-time just to show you this example:

I’ve never mentioned this to you before  
But the more I talk to you
The more I’m sure you know
I’m trying to go slow but I’m having trouble

I get puzzled by the way you say
You’d like to stay but you gotta’ go
Hey, I know you should command respect
But i feel like a wreck on a deserted island

Cause with you I’m finding
I may be heading where nobody will ever find me…..

{Chorus}

This is a fairly decent first draft that would take some rewriting but you get the picture.  I like the way the first verse ended but the first few lines need a little work!

Notice in the 2nd and third lines:

But the more I talk to you
The more I’m sure you know

The last word you is not really inner-rhymed because I intentionally placed it close to the end of the following line before the word “know.”  This is actually a common advanced songwriting lyric writing technique where the songwriter can actually control the rhythmic momentum of a song by not rhyming two or three lines, then rhyming the following lines thereafter, creating more excitement after the non-rhymed lines.

Take this example and use variations such as rhyming the first two or three lines of a verse, then going into total inner rhyming to speed up and bring excitement to your song.  The possibilities are endless!

This is an article originally released in the September, 2008 ”Tune Sleuth” newsletter, inspired by one of our reader’s questions that I found to be very helpful for other readers to enjoy!

Before using a songwriter demo service to record your original songs,be absolutely certain they are ready to be recorded by making sure you polish them with a rewrite. Also, test your songs out by singing them either a capella or with an accompanying instrument by yourself and in front of friends, family members, etc.  Taking your gut feeling and your listener’s reactions into account, it’ll be easier to decide if and which of your songs are ready to be recorded.

A songwriter demo is exactly that - a demo!  This is why they are and SHOULD BE far less expensive than a recording for a CD release.  Therefore, what you want to look for instead of a company promising you a “radio-ready” recording with all the bells and whistles, is a company that’ll be able to provide a clean, pro-sounding recording to give your song the best possible chance.
 
To find a great songwriter demo service you’ll need to start right in your own hometown!  Take the time to contact and visit studios performing these services in your area, ask to hear examples of their work, and try to establish some type of rapport or relationship with them so they can take you more seriously and not see you as JUST ANOTHER CUSTOMER.  

There are many studios offering excellent songwriter demo services but you have to do much initial legwork to find one that works for your songwriting goals.  This involves comparing several companies before making a decision. If you don’t have any companies offering demo services in your vicinity, then as a last resort you may have to consider an online demo service, but you should proceed with caution.

Songwriter demo services are very competitively priced these days and many offer flat rates with optional costs such as background singers, extra instruments, etc.  Starting rates vary from as low as approximately $100.00 to $800.00 per song, and you generally get what you pay for!  Recording is not cheap, and if you’re not a music producer or an arranger, remember, these companies try to provide all of these services as inexpensively as possible in one package! 

Beware, there are companies out there that give legitimate ones a bad name by drawing you in and charging you extra with each visit to cover what they say are their increasing recording costs.  Songwriters and other musicians have found themselves in a bad situation where they’ve literally spent hundreds with no decent product to show for it.  Negotiate a flat fee with a demo service, get it in writing, and stick to it!

Also, when you do find a songwriter demo service you want to try, it’s wise to commit to only ONE RECORDING AT A TIME.  Remember, this is a business, and demo companies need your business, so some will try to make you commit to more than one recording because it benefits them! 

Keep total control by recording only one song at a time until its completion-this way, if for any reason you are dissatisfied with your first recording, you can pick up and go elsewhere and you will not have needlessly wasted money on other songs.

Of course, the best possible scenario when recording your songs would be to do it yourself in your own home studio.  Recording setups have become increasingly more inexpensive and if you’re planning on chasing a professional songwriting career, it would be wise to try your hand at production even if it means being able to record only a piano or guitar/vocal of your songs.  By choosing this route you can actually save yourself the $1500 or so you would have spent on a three song demo, and instead use that to build your own songwriting studio in your own home!

Many amateur and pro songwriters have their own little home studio setup with some of the equipment or similar items shown on this page:
http://www.songwriteradvisor.com/build-your-studio.html

The only drawback to having your own studio is it takes few months to really learn your equipment and make effective recordings.  But in the end, it can be the best investment you’ll ever make in your songwriting career-you’ll never have to pay for a songwriter demo service ever again!

This was somewhat true in the old days, even though pop music is littered with a few exceptional songs anyone could have predicted as a “sure hit.”

These days, hit songwriting in pop music has become far too predictable!  There are basically three main genres (pop, r&b, and rock) on the charts because the major labels and radio stations nationwide have always been in complete control of what we listen to on pop radio, and they’ve been stuffing mediocrity in our ears for quite a few years now.  They’ve actually conditioned our minds to hear what they want us to hear!

The biggest difference I see in pop music today is that the overwhelming majority of songwriters are not taking the time to craft memorable lyrics in the verses.  They’re getting lazy after they come up with all of these fantastic hooks in the chorus, and forgetting to round out their songs with original, imaginative phrases and lines in their verses.  So, what will  happen as a result of this?

Most songs recorded today, are fly-by-night flavors of the month that’ll yield less and less profit for the songwriters in the future.  There are far less classic songs being written today in pop than ever, and the vast majority of these songs will never be heard again on a consistent basis once they’ve run their course.

Hit songwriting has become a make money quick scheme for major labels and they’re using us as bait!  This has aways been part of the system, but never this blatant!

I challenge major labels to offer the public a better quality of music and to quit insulting our intelligence, by instead, signing artists with at least some type of depth in their music.  I challenge major label publishers to take the time to listen to new songwriters with something meaningful to offer, and quit trying to sign songwriters who can conform to your tired label’s style in order to be part of a meaningless factory of music.  Attention Major Labels; you’re already in deep doo-doo and your sales have been plummeting for years.  Bring back the possibility of finding a “Prince,” a “Billy Joel,” or an “Elton John.”  They’re out there!  You’re simply overlooking them!

In a previous post I talked about the wealth of free songwriting information on the Internet and how webmasters put forth great efforts to make this available to you! 

What you’ll need is a large, 3-ring binder with dividers, and access to a decent hole-puncher.

To begin creating your personal songwriting guide, research the following topics on the Internet, print out the pages you believe can help you, punch holes in them, then use dividers to categorize each of the following topics:

1. How to Create a Melody
2. Rhyming Tips And Techniques
3.  Song Verse Development 
4.  Pre-chorus Tips
5.  Chorus Development
6.  Second Verse tips
7.  How to Write a Bridge 
8.  Song Forms (how to choose, etc.)
9.  Song Title (how to create, etc.)
10.  How To Create a Song Hook

These are just the basics to start! If you take the time to make your own songwriting guide, you’ll be forced to read every article before you choose one, and you’ll expand your songwriting tremendously! Even advanced songwriters stand to benefit from this by picking and choosing advanced topics such as “songwriting tips to create contrast,” “creating powerful opening verse lines,” etc.

The fun part of building a songwriting guide is you’re able to access many different “point of views” from many different resources.  So, although many articles will contain similar content on each topic, you will definitely find some gems of information that you would never have found if you hadn’t taken the time to read articles on the same topics by different authors.

Enjoy!

As much as I’d like to think of this SongwriterAdvisor.com blog and its parent website, SongwriterAdvisor.com as your “one stop shop” for songwriting resources, that would be egotistical and foolish! There is so much free songwriting help on various websites, and you just have to weed through information you believe will help your particular issue or stage of learning how to write songs. 

It pays to spread your knowledge out and learn as much as you can from all songwriting resources available.  I myself, have been a long-time fan of Muses Muse which I still consider to be one of the best complete songwriting resources, and quite a few other websites listed at the bottom of this blog.

Most songwriting webmasters launch their websites simply out of love for the craft of songwriting, and to share their usually vast experience and knowledge with fellow songwriters.  If they make a little advertising income from the process so that it at least pays for hosting, then that’s fine also.  But I can tell you this;  the time put in to maintain the average songwriting website yields less than .050 cents an hour!  This is because “songwriting” is simply not a sought after or highly clicked “niche” market, and it takes a lot of effort to map out successful techniques for songwriters.

But looking through the internet, it’s easy to see how much time and effort songwriters have put forth in making their blogs and websites beneficial to other songwriters.  I’ve always tried to keep an open mind and learn from as many resources as possible, so today, without blowing smoke, I want to sincerely thank the songwriting webmaster community for pursuing their love for songwriting, and for providing their songwriting resources so that we can all better ourselves in the process.  With that said, I would also like to remind all songwriters there is a wealth of knowledge waiting to be devoured by placing keywords such as “songwriting help” and “free songwriting tips” into your Google search box!

In a previous workshop, Really Focus On Your First Verse, we talked about the importance of creating an idea or story before writing a song in order to focus on the song’s idea to make the song clear for your listeners.

Let’s take the lyrics we used as an example for that article, and use it for the concept I’m about to explain:

My eyes have been locked into yours all night
Now tell me it isn’t so
Your smile has found me more than once or twice
Enough to tell me all I need to know

The particular verse lyrics example above sounds like the start of a country tune to me, so I’ll keep using that country flavor as I go.  Keep in mind you can use the following tips for any genre in music effectively!

Let’s introduce the technique; we want to place a shorter line after a longer one to call attention to the lyrics and melody of the short line.  Using the above lyrics, I’ll continue writing the verse using this example (the song is called, “Don’t Get Carried Away“):

(1st Verse)
Your eyes have been locked into mine all night
Now tell me it isn’t so
Your smile has found me more than once or twice
Enough to tell me all I need to know

But I’m holding back I don’t trust myself
I usually go after what I can get
It’s gettin’ pretty hot in this happenin’ place
And your “hello” hasn’t found me yet

(Prechorus)
In my head
A little voice says
Don’t get carried away
Don’t get carried away

followed by the (Chorus)……………………………………l.

What I’ve done is:

(1). I shortened the phrases in the prechorus by a few syllables to place emphasis on those lines, and

(2). I’ve included the song title in the prechorus, which leaves me the option of using the song title again in the chorus to drive my message home! 

A recent pop/r&b song that used this technique effectively was Ne-Yo’s “Closer,” where right before the Chorus, there’s a short prechorus containing the title:

Come closer
Come closer

In “Closer” the song title is never used in the actual chorus and the song was still powerful because it used the technique explained in this article effectively!  As you can see and hear, knowing how to write great songs involves experimenting, even if it means not including the song title in the chorus in certain songs.

For example, the recent hit “American Boy,” by Estelle, an English hip hop singer, featured rapper Kanye West doing his thing while will.i.am. produced and also co-wrote the song.

If you’ve ever been a rapper or a songwriter enlisted to write rap parts for a song, you know it appears easier than it actually is! It actually takes much practice and talent to pull it off.

Rap has been known to cross over into many genres over the last several years. Jazz rap was huge in the late 80’s and early 90’s, but can you imagine how cool and refreshing you can possibly make a song if you feature a rap part on it? For example, take a straight-up, powerful rock song, and depending on the feel, see if you can write a rap part and sing it yourself, or feature a local rapper on the song. I believe you’d be amazed at the results. This goes for any music genre, too!

To get yourself off to a good start, here are a few tried and trusted tips from pro rappers to help you sound professional:

1.   Listen to few songs from well-known or favorite rap artists such as Kanye West or 2Pac, and study the rhyming scheme they use.

For example in American Boy, Kanye raps:

Just another one champion sound
Yeah Estelle about to get down
Who the hottest in the world right now.
Just touched down in London town.
Bet they give me a pound.
Tell them put the money in my hand right now.
Tell the promoter we need more seats,
we just sold out all the floor seats

What can we learn here?  Kanye used one of the most common rhyming techniques, which is to;  rhyme lines two at a time, and sometimes use the same words in the rhyme.  Notice how he rhymes sound with “down” “now” “town”, etc.

2.  Let your lines breathe!  For example, using the beat you’re working with, it gets tiresome to hear the same amount of syllables in every line.  If you’ve just rhymed 4 lines with the same general meter, vocal delivery, and rhymes, change it up the next 1 or 2 lines to add interest. 

3.  One of the marks of a truly great rapper is the ability to match rhymed syllables in a fresh way. To do this, after you get a rough draft of your rap, start with the word at the end of each line and try to emulate the following example:

Look at West’s first 4 lines and notice how smooth the endings are in all 4 lines. 

Just another one champion sound
Yeah Estelle about to get down
Who the hottest in the world right now
Just touched down in London town

champion sound flows seamlessly with about to get down, and
world right now flows perfectly with London town

4.  Focus on what your song’s topic is about and try to flavor it with whatever desired effect you want it to have!  For example, if the song were titled, “I Need More,” and was about a person needing to see more of their  lover for the relationship to survive, you could approach the song either as an outsider telling the person to forget about the person or as the lover trying to fix the relationship.