This week was a wonderful songwriting week!
Ella learned a few key songwriting phrases and then had to apply them to our song!
K.I.S.S/ "keep it simple stupid":
In songwriting, especially with people that come from poetry backgrounds, we tend to fill our lyrics with big words or complicated phrases. This is great for poetry - but most of the time they wont fit in a song. We hit this a few times as we worked through our thoughts this week.
We took complicated thoughts and simplified them so that the phrasing sang better!
"Sometimes you have to kill your babies":
Everything we create is essentially "our baby" - and once we create it, we want to hold on to it. Changing songs becomes difficult because of this. Today while trying to finish the chorus of our song - Ella was saying a new awesome idea of something that we could include. This led to us completely changing the chorus of our song - melody, words, cadence.
We decided to hang on to the chorus that we had before in case we want to use it for a bridge.
"Don't bore us -- get to the chorus!":
As songwriters, we like to make sure our point gets across and that our thoughts feel complete. Because of this, sometimes we fill up too much space before we get to the "meat and potatoes" of the song -- the chorus.
Ella learned that the 1st verse sets up the chorus, the pre-chorus clarifies or expands on that in 2-ish lines, the chorus says what you mean and what you want the song to really be about, the hook ties a bow on the idea, and the second verse supports the chorus further.
For example:
If you take Carrie Underwood's "this is just a dream"
The first verse is about a wedding. We then discover in the pre-chorus that it is about a wedding that didn't happen -- or that there was something different about this wedding with "the flowers fell out of her hands". The pre-chorus clarifies this. Then at the chorus - it says what she means. The wedding didn't happen because someone passed away.
The second verse goes on to support this chorus.
The first verse:
It was two weeks after the day she turned eighteen
All dressed in white, going to the church that night
She had his box of letters in the passenger seat
Sixpence in her shoe
Something borrowed, something blue
Pre Chorus:
And when the church doors opened up wide
She put her veil down trying to hide the tears
Oh she just couldn't believe it
She heard the trumpets from the military band
And the flowers fell out of her hands
Chorus:
Baby, why'd you leave me, why'd you have to go
I was counting on forever, now I'll never know
I can't even breathe
It's like I'm looking from a distance,
Standing in the background
Everybody's saying, he's not coming home now,
This can't be happening to me
This is just a dream
Ella did so great today!
Here are our lyrics from today:
GREAT job Ella! See you next week!
Labels: Ella H.
