Well, here i am blabbing on about songwriting tips–getting the full picture and doing everything in the right order, when i really should have said–Buy a book–download some information and generally educate yourself on the back of other peoples experience.
So you have all this great new information and now you want to put it into practise. Now is a good time to look at what structure the song might take. As the word structure suggests–it means how you build your song and what shape it will take. Once again i should make reference to the fact that i am talking mainly about writing Folk songs. Most folk or ballad songs as they are refered to, serve the purpose of telling a story and passing on some information about an event or a person, wheter they be real or imaginary, the rules are the same. Firstly the listener does not want to listen to an epic, so writing a 15 minute song is out of the question. Listen to your favourite artist or similar songs on the radio and try to gauge what the average time is for these songs. I would say that three and a half to four minutes is long enough, as you dont want to lose the interest of your hard won audience. Folk and ballad usually go verse chorus verse chorus verse chorus or some variation or repeat sequence. O ften a change of key or some musical interlude can be an attractive feature of some songs.
So to recap–get the facts right before you start–decide on your structure–experiment with a key change or some music only in a part of the track.
I think i can hear the song playing already…hope you can too. Back soon with some more info—meanwhile get busy writing, and stay tuned to
Martin
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