How to find a good song title

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I see a lot of people struggle to find a killer song title, they try too hard without getting a result. The song title is one of the most important parts of your song, that’s because it’s the one listeners see first before listening to your song, you could have a great song, but won’t be able to leave a good impression to your listeners because of your bad title !!!

If you want to leave a good impression on your listeners when they read your song’s title, you have to make it unique and touchy, so when people read or hear it, they get curious to hear the rest of your song.

Writing or even finding a good song title isn’t a big deal, and for sure not space physics, it requires only a few songwriting techniques and absolutely a lot of songwriting ideas. The only thing you need to learn is to identify possible places that will serve you some song title ideas. So here are some places you can look at :

1-     1-  Newspaper headlines : these have been serving always as a huge source of song titles, because they mint to be interesting and catchy so people will continue to read the rest.

2-     2-  Quotes : while these are words of wisdom from great thinkers, try to choose deep ones that make people want to listen to your song as soon as they hear them.

3-      3- Listen to people : while this can be tricky, when you chat with your friends, you’ll see that this can give you many songwriting ideas that could be possible titles for your songs.

How to get songwriting ideas?

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An idea that is developed and put into action is more important than an idea that exists only as an idea "Buddha", this is a great quote because it explains how important taking action is, while there is 2 main problems in songwriting and with almost everything, these 2 main problem are: how can i find songwriting ideas, and how can i apply them in my song.

While songwriting ideas come usually when you don't expect them, you need to carry a notebook with you wherever you go, and as "Albert Einstein" said: "You ask me if I keep a notebook to record my great ideas. I've only ever had one". Writing down or even recording ideas is very important to you as a songwriter, so make sure you get used to it in order to catch ideas as they come to you.

Here is where you can find songwriting ideas:

1- Listen to people: honestly, i think that this is the most important source of ideas, listening to people, especially when they are having problems can give you a lot of ideas, when people get emotional, they usually express honest feelings, these feelings can be transmitted to your audience so they can taste the same emotional situation your song is talking about.

2- Listen to yourself: In order to give your listeners honest lyrics sometimes, you need to go personal, i mean by that going deep in your past or present and try to find emotional moments for you: sad, happy, touchy, disastrous...etc, and try to express it using your songs.

3- Internet: While the internet has made a revolution to our world and thinking, i usually find a lot of songwriting ideas by just surfing the internet.

4- Read: articles, magazines and especially books can act like and ideas arsenal to you, you can find hundreds of great ideas by just reading, so try to read as much as you can especially inspirational things.

5- Experience yourself: this is especially when writing music, you have to experience yourself and try many ideas and combination to figure out how your song will look like when finished, so just grab an instrument and start to play a series of chords or notes (melody) and see if they're good enough for your song.

6- Just improvise: improvising has a lot of potential in it, sometimes i hit an idea just when i'm improvising, whether it's a lyrics or music idea, don't care if it sounds creepy, after that come back the other day or so and you'll be surprised of knowing how to modify it to fit your song.

7- Listen to other songs: inspiration could sometimes come from other songs, i'm sure that at one point when you've listened to a song and you felt like a flow of songwriting ideas is coming to your head. Just don't try to copy songs "this is a bad thing!!!" for your career.

Usually you don't know when an idea strikes, but believe me if you are interested in songwriting, you'll consider everything as a possible idea. When you feel that you are running out of ideas, just go to an empty place an relax (that usually helps me get a flow of ideas), or just try to do something different.

How to write good melodies

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A melody is a succession of notes that have different pitches and durations, in western music it's played along with what we call chords (group of notes played together in the same time). It's a very important part of the song, that's why you have to take care of it using the right songwriting techniques.

A lot of new songwriters get stuck in this component (melody), because they think it's hard to write a good one, i'll tell you that it's not easy, but you can do it if you follow the right techniques. First of all you need to have a good chord progression to start with, these chords will act like the support or structure of your melodies, the next thing to watch for is to choose a rhythm to your melody, actually this is up to you, you have to use songwriting ideas to decide what rhythm you're going to be using.

Writing melodies actually requires some basic understanding of music theory, because you have some restrictions to watch for, for example you can't introduce a note that doesn't belong to your key.

In order to impress your listeners, you need to have a very strong melody, new songwriters usually overlook this part because they think that lyrics and chords are more important, "this is not true". People or "listeners" usually don't recognize chords or bass lines, but the think that catches their attention is usually the melody, in most cases it's the one that determines the good song.

Song writing tips: Writing a good song

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The only difference between a good and a bad song is the harmony between it's parts, some songwriters succeed at making each song component unique and worth listen to, others fail at one component or all of them together,so make sure you follow these song writing tips to better understand how each part should be written.

In order to write a "hit song", you have to take care of each song components at a time, because each of them require different songwriting techniques as well as many (i mean many!!) songwriting ideas.

1- Writing a good intro: In this lesson we've seen how every songwriter should start his intro by setting the mood for the listener, and grabbing his attention.

2- Writing a good verse: right after the intro where the verse comes with it's lyrics, you should be careful when moving from the intro to the verse because it requires an increase in energy and may be an introduction of other instruments. For the 2nd verse, it looks almost as the 1st one.

3- Writing a good chorus: It's a very important part of the song, because every listener can differentiate it well, you should introduce as many songwriting ideas as you can to make it unique, as well as increasing the energy to a very high level. For the 2nd chorus, it looks almost like the 1st one.

4- Writing a good bridge: Here is where you should be intense in order to prevent your listener from loosing interest in your song, it's the part that doesn't repeat itself, so make it unique because you have only one shot.

5- Writing a good outro: It's the part of the song that new songwriters always fail to write, it should be well balanced especially at the end when you introduce the fade away technique.

These are the most common parts of the song, try to take care of everyone of them in order to write a successful song that will be enjoyed every time someone listen to it.

Song writing tips: Writing a good outro

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In the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years.Abraham Lincoln, a great quote from a great man. The only thing that matters is not the end, it's the journey, the journey of the entire song from the beginning to the end.

Writing songs require some song writing tips (which i provide here!), every song part (component) requires different songwriting techniques. In today's lesson, we're going to cover some song writing tips to write a good outro.

The outro (as the name refers to) is the last part of the song (the ending), it comes usually after the last chorus. The most common form of the outro is to repeat the previous part and make it fade away gradually at the end.

The outro could take other shapes: like repeating the last chorus line or introducing a new composition, no matter what your intro is, you should have a well balanced energy to give your listeners a pleasing end (like in movies, no one likes bad endings), so take care of your fade away techniques and do not make them neither too long, nor too short.

Song writing tips: Writing a good bridge

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A lot of people get confused when it comes to writing the bridge, they think that the bridge is the same as the solo. While the bridge could include an instrumental solo, it usually comes just before the solo, so follow with me to learn how to use the right songwriting techniques to write your bridge.

In a traditional verse/chorus/verse/chorus song, people get bored quickly, here is where the concept of the bridge comes in handy. the bridge is the part of the song that doesn't repeat itself, it's main purpose is to build energy and tension to prevent your listener from loosing interest.

The bridge represents a change in rhythm, lyrics and melody. The end of it should be very intense when it connects to the final chorus.

In the case of a 3 verse song, it should have a decrease in intensity in order to connect to the 3rd verse.

While the bridge is a very important part of your song, you have to take care of it and try to come up with a lot of songwriting ideas to figure out how it should look like, just follow my song writing tips and you'll be fine.

Song writing tips: Writing a good Chorus

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A lot of songwriters argue that the chorus is the most important part of a song, well they are right in one side which is that the chorus is a very important and fundamental part in your song, but as i told you before you should take care of all of your song parts equally and use the right songwriting techniques to produce a hit song!!!

As we cleared in the "song components" lesson, the chorus is the part that comes directly after the verse, it's the part where you are going to be using a higher energy level. The energy level is built gradually until it reaches the end of the chorus. With the chorus i advice you to use as many songwriting ideas as you can, because it's a very recognizable part even by non songwriters.

Let's analyze the chorus to see how we can construct it:

- The first part of the chorus should be an extension of the verse in an energy perspective.

- When you reach the half of your chorus, you should put an intense increase in energy and musical loudness if you can, and that will continue to the very end of the chorus.

- The end of the chorus represents a decrease in energy level to be able to connect to the 2nd verse.

Like the verse, the chorus could be 4, 6, 8, 12, 16 bars long according to your song theme and composition.

Song writing tips: Writing a good verse

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As we mentioned in the lesson "song components", the verse is the part of the song that comes after the intro and before the 1st chorus. This part is where the vocals start, that's why it's a very important part, today we're going to learn the right songwriting techniques to write a wonderful Verse.

We've said in the "take care of your intro" lesson that the intro mint to grab listeners attention and sets the mood for them, so by the end of the intro you should already have your listener's attention.

The verse works the same way, you have to keep your audience's expectations on, so they always expect more and better. If you can do that, your verse will be great as well as your song.

The other aspect, is that the verse has an increased energy level comparing to the intro, so you have to build your verse along with your energy increase, until it reaches the chorus. The beginning of the verse represents it's lowest energy level, and the end of it represents the highest. So try to begin with low energy and by the middle of the verse you should increase loudness in your instruments as well as your vocals until the end of it.

The length of the verse usually is 8 bars, but you could find some that are 4, 12 or even 16 bars. You should choose a verse length according to your lyrics and song theme.

Usually most songs have 2 verses, whether there are ones that have 3 and require a bridge to connect the 2nd chorus and the 3rd verse. You can choose between maintaining the same energy level between verses or an increased one gradually from the 1st verse to the last.

Take care of your Intro

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As part of the songwriting techniques used in songwriting, the INTRO has a special place because it's the one that introduces the song, so if you can't have your audience's attention by the end of the intro, you'll never have it.

The intro is the first part of any song, it is so important because it sets the mood for the listener. When you hear an intro you'll make expectations, after that, everything will be based on those expectations. The intro gives us a clear picture about the song theme and composition, it also introduces all the other parts of the song, so it's good to have a good rhythm and harmony in it.

Intro used to be very long, but in modern music it's very short, because of this, you have to make it unique, catchy and has a very good melody, so try to come up with many songwriting ideas to form a good intro.

Usually the vocals start by the end of the intro and the beginning of the 1st verse, so try to make a good impression about your song.

From an energy perspective, the intro whether will have a constant energy or a built energy (increase in energy to connect to the verse). Sometimes the intro is used as a connection between the 1st chorus and the 2nd verse, that gives a special feeling and a well balanced energy.

The general rule suggests that an intro represents half as long as the verse, so if you have a verse of 4 bars the intro will be 2 bars...etc.

How to use the right songwriting techniques effectively

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Imagine that you spend a lot of time searching for effective songwriting techniques and you end up finding meaningless content online, this way you will lose so much time and effort and you'll end up giving up. The general rule suggests that you have to apply everything you've learned before ending up fueling the tank "memory" with everything you get your hands on.

The most important thing in songwriting is to be able to use the right songwriting techniques effectively, that will save you a lot of time and effort. In order to do this you have to follow these easy song writing tips:

1- Application is the key: try to apply the songwriting ideas you've thought of before they go away, this means that you have to test them and what they can offer you as well as your songs.

2- Learn the basic techniques first: This is very important!!! try to learn the fundamentals first, so you could have results very easily and with no time, if you start with complicated stuff, they will ruin you life and you will find yourself in a place where you can't apply anything you've learned.

3- Be yourself: Try to come up with your own songwriting ideas, your musical style as well as your purpose behind your songs, and don't just copy other's ideas.

4- Tie it to a goal: You should have goals in your songwriting career, so make a goal and tie it to a deadline, but in the same time don't push yourself too hard.

Keep expanding your chord vocabulary: Added Chords

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The only reason behind learning more chords or at least how to construct them, is not exhausting your brain or something, the only reason behind this it to give your songs many beautiful colors and provide you with more choices and songwriting ideas, so it's like painting, the more colors the more attraction, but be careful, as not all the colors could be put together, the same thing applies to notes, so make sure to follow the right songwriting techniques when using them!!!

The chords that we'll be learning today are called "add chords", these chords are used a lot in songs, because they provide a more colorful sound. From their name, we can see that these chords have one more note than the normal chord (major or minor).

Most people get confused of the difference between "sus" and "add" chords, so follow with me carefully. A sus chord requires the removal of the 3rd note of the chord and replace it with other note, in the case sus2, it's the 2nd note of the scale. Add chords keep the chord the same with the 1st, 3rd, the 5th and adds an additional note to it, in the case of add2, it's the 2nd note or interval of the scale.

Csus2: 1st, 2nd, 5th ===> C - D - G
Cadd2: 1st, 2nd, major 3rd, 5th ===> C - D - E - G.

While you can add more notes to your triad, the most common add chords are the ones with one added note.

Mistakes you should avoid when writing songs

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An expert is a person who has made all the mistakes that can be made in a very narrow field. Niels Bohr (1885 - 1962). While this is absolutely true, mistakes are the only way of making progress, but i'm going to show you how to avoid things that will slow down your progress, but it's OK if you make mistakes, because if i have not committed a lot of mistakes, i could have never done anything, and i'm sure it's the right case for you.

Here are the most common mistakes people do when songwriting:

1- Lack of organization: organization is the key to every success including songwriting. It's true that songwriting ideas come and go accidentally and instantly but you have to organize your learning and practicing time.

2- Lack of methodology: this is may be the most crucial element of songwriting, if you don't follow a songwriting method, you'll end up swimming in a sea of ideas without even having a song, so make sure you follow my songwriting methodology or try to figure out what works for you.

3- Pushing too hard: some times people push themselves too hard until exploding. From my experience i noticed that the time i'm exhausted my productivity goes down, so give your self a break when you run out of songwriting ideas and return other time to finish your task.

4- Learning too much and applying nothing: This is very important, because you need to apply the songwriting techniques you've learned and not just keep learning because it will handicap you from producing amazing songs with the knowledge and ideas you've acquired.

These are the most common mistakes people fall into, just make sure you follow my song writing tips and i assure you that you'll end up writing great songs in a very short period.

Do you really need to know how to play an instrument?

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This question is very controversial, some people emphasize that you need to know how to play an instrument in order to compose music or write songs, others think that you don't need that, the only thing you need is some songwriting techniques and ideas + a good music writing software that you can mix all together to produce a song.

Well, the 2 sides have a point, but let me explain to you a little. It's true that you don't need to know how to play guitar or keyboard to compose music, because these instruments are just an application of the music theory you've learned, you can use a songwriting software to compose you music, but...!

While this is true, i totally encourage you to learn at least one musical instrument, because this is what music is all about, music is meant to be heard and played, the other thing is that it will take you forever to learn music theory without an instrument. The instrument will give you lot of shortcuts and make your learning very fast.

So take my advice and start learning a musical instrument, but it's OK if you don't have one, because you just need a songwriting software or even a paper sheet to write down your songwriting ideas.

What else can i add to my chord vocabulary? (Suspended chords)

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Are you tired from trying to figure out how to play suspended chords or "sus chords", well i'm here for you. By the end of this lesson, you'll going to be able to play any sus chord you want. While suspended triads "chords" are used a lot as one of the best songwriting techniques to add flavor to your songs, i'm going to show you the exact way to play them.






The only thing that you're going to remember, is that sus chords doesn't have thirds (3rd) in them, that means that they are neither majors nor minors, because it's the 3rd that identifies the major and minor chords. Usually with these chords, we take away the 3rd and replace it with the 2nd or the 4th.

So:

A suspended 2nd chord (sus2) has these notes in it: 1st - 2nd - 5th
A suspended 4th chord (sus4) has these notes in it: 1st - 4th - 5th

Csus2 is: C - D - G
Csus4 is: C - F - G

That's it, try to use sus chords to expand your songwriting ideas arsenal, in order for your songs to appear non repetitive and unique.

Expanding your chord vocabulary

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A lot of people seem afraid from chord theory, they think it's too confusing and complicated to learn, that's why they don't expand their chord vocabulary. You know that you have to use a variety of chords in your songs, that's why i'm going to reveal some great songwriting techniques that you can use to expand your chord vocabulary.

As you know it's very hard to give exact rules to music theory, that's why every songwriter works with his own techniques, but fortunately, that leads always to the same thing. Let me give you a cool thing: don't bother yourself with a lot of techniques and rules that you'll be ending up confused with, the 2 main things that i need you to learn are "The major scale: the absolute of songwriting techniques", which is the golden technique and "What are Intervals?" where we've talked about a very important thing which is: intervals and their names, in this lesson we're going to see how we can use them to name and modify triads "chords".

In the lesson "First of songwriting techniques you should learn: song key", we've seen how to harmonize the major scale so we can extract chords from it, we take the 1st, 3rd and 5th note of the scale to form a major chord, this means that you can choose your root note let's say C, pick the 3rd and the 5th of the C major scale and you got it "C major chord"= "C - E - G".

Major and minor triads have 1 difference which is that major chords have a major 3rd, and minor chords have minor 3rds which is a semitone or half step less than a major 3rd. If we take the example of C major chord, the 3rd which is E becomes Eb=D# (the same). The C minor chord has these notes "C - Eb - G".

These are the most used chords in music "major and minor chords", we will learn more chords in the next lessons.

What are Intervals?

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While many people wonder what these are, i can tell you that these are probably the most important thing in music theory, so learning them will open an infinite number or gates to your music composition and also an understanding of most of the songwriting techniques that we'll be learning.

The definition of an interval is very simple, an interval is the distance between 2 notes, they are measured from the lower note to the higher one. If the 2 notes are played successively (separately), the intervals are called "Melodic". If the 2 notes are played simultaneously, the interval is called "Harmonic".

Intervals can take different shapes including: major, minor, perfect, augmented, diminished.

As i said before, the major scale is the standard of the music theory, so let's go from there and name the intervals of the major scale depending on their sizes:

Unisons, Seconds, Thirds, Fourths, Fifths, Sixths, and Sevenths.

The unison, fourth, fifth and octaves are called "Perfect intervals".
The remaining intervals of the major scale: second, third, sixth, seventh are called major.

- If we lower a major interval by one half step "1 semitone= 1 fret on the guitar's fretboard", we get a minor interval. if we raise a minor interval by one half step we get a major interval.

- If we lower a major interval by 2 half steps (1 whole step= 2 semitones), we get a diminished interval. if we raise a diminished interval by 2 half step we get a major interval.

- If we raise a major interval by 1 half step, we get an augmented interval and the opposite is also true.

In the case of perfect intervals:

- If we raise a perfect interval by 1 half step in becomes augmented.
- If we lower a perfect interval by 1 half step in becomes diminished.

The last case is the case of a minor interval, if it's raised by 2 half steps (guess what it will become), yeah you're absolutely right "augmented".

These are what you're going to be using as major songwriting techniques and also as songwriting ideas to use more chords and add flavors to your songs.

What's next?

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In the lesson of "First of songwriting techniques you should learn: song key", we have learned the first and one of the most powerful of songwriting techniques that we're going to be using in every song we write.

We've extracted 7 chords and learned "how to name them", by this you should have a lot of songwriting ideas coming to your head about how your song will look like and what key you're going to be using in you song.

While we can use all the 7 chords in our song, we should keep an eye at the chord succession or what we call "The chord progression", because some progressions are strong, some are medium and some are weak, so be careful!!!

By learning this you can make sure that every note in your song, whether it's in the chords or the melodies, belong to your key that you've chosen, so put your head on the pillow and don't worry.

By combining the right techniques of writing song lyrics and collecting some songwriting ideas, you'll be able to write your song easily and without pain.

How the hell i know if the chord is major or minor or...?

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In the previous lesson "First of songwriting techniques you should learn: song key" we've seen how we can harmonize the major scale "Extract chords from it", and by doing that we had 7 chords that we know they belong to a specific key which is in the last example is "The C major key".

You've noticed that i wrote the chords names without telling how i did it, so in this lesson i'm going to show you one of my best songwriting techniques to identify a chord from the notes in it.

In the last example we've seen the C major scale:
C - D - E - F - G - A -B - C - D - E - F - G - A -B
C   -     E   -     G                                     (C major)
      D    -    F    -    A                               (D minor)
            E   -     G   -    B                           (E minor)   
                  F    -    A   -    C                     (F major)
                        G    -   B   -     D                (G major)
                              A   -    C    -    E          (A minor)
                                   B    -    D     -   F    (B diminished)

We are going to name these chords using these 3 easy steps:

1- Take any chord you want and play it while concentrating on the notes in it.

2- Try to play the corresponding major scale to it (if it's the C major chord, play the C major scale, if it's the E minor chord, try to play the E major scale).

3- The last thing is to compare the notes of the chord with the notes of your scale:

- The C major chord has (C - E - G), in the C major scale these notes represent (1st, 3rd, 5th), that's why the chord is a C major chord.

- The D minor chord has (D - F - A), in the D major scale these notes represent (1st, b3, 5th), so when it's a flat third we call it a minor chord.

- The B diminished chord has (B - D - F), in the B major scale these notes represent (1st, b3, b5), so when it's a flat 3rd and flat 5th, we call it a diminished chord.

I think this was clear, but if you have questions don't hesitate and comment.

First of songwriting techniques you should learn: song key

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People always get confused when they begin writing songs especially writing music or melody, they usually ask questions like what chords am i supposed to use, what scales, what, what, what...?

Don't bother yourself with this, because i'm going to show you how exactly professional songwriters write their great songs everyday. So the key factor to write a harmonized and good song is to know what keys are.

The key of the song is where all the notes belong, it's like a form of music, or some rules that will make you stay on the line and never commit wrong things. The song key is named by 2 factors which are: the type of the key (whether it's major or minor), and the name of the key (the name or the root note).

You remember the lesson of "The major scale: the absolute of songwriting techniques", that's all what you are going to need to understand keys, how awesome is that!!!. You only need to construct your chords and you're done.

Chords are constructed from the 1st, the 3rd and the 5th note of the scale, we call the chord construction from the major scale "harmonizing the major scale". So let's see the example of the C major scale and try to harmonize it by picking the 1st, the 3rd and the 5th note and move to the next note as a root note...etc

The C major scale:
C - D - E - F - G - A -B - C - D - E - F - G - A -B
C   -     E   -     G                                     (C major)
      D    -    F    -    A                               (D minor)
            E   -     G   -    B                           (E minor)   
                  F    -    A   -    C                     (F major)
                        G    -   B   -     D                (G major)
                              A   -    C    -    E          (A minor)
                                   B    -    D     -   F    (B diminished)

These are our 7 chords from our C major scale, so you can use them without getting into trouble (but be careful).

Note: The funny part of all of this is that the chord succession in any major key is (major, minor, minor, major, major, minor, diminished), how cool is that!

Song components

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Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life "Ludwig van Beethoven", well this is the best quote from the best musicians (to me!), while this is so true, song success is compared to it's stability in it's energy level, that why this lesson will reveal to you one of the most powerful songwriting techniques.

Every song has components that make it unique, while there are many patterns to choose from, i'm going to show you the most simple, sweet, powerful and used one. we mean by components the form of the music.

I'm sure that you heard something like: chorus, verse sometimes, but you didn't know how and when they're used. These components are phases that you are going to go throw to give a pleasing experience to your listeners.

Most of the songs uses these form components:

1- Intro: from it's name it means that it introduces the song, we use slow playing and low octaves or keys to make the listener get ready.

2- The verse: Increase in energy and playing with the start of lyrics (vocals), lyrics most will be narrative.

3- The chorus: this one has the most energetic level, lyrics in this component are less narrative and seem almost like quotes.

4- The verse (2): same energy as the first one except with different lyrics.

5- The chorus (2): The same as the first with mostly the same lyrics as the first.

6- Bridge: This is what connects the 2nd chorus with the 3rd and last one, it introduces a different melody and increases in energy until it reaches the last chorus.

7- The chorus (3): Decreased level of energy in the beginning and then increase until it matches the 1st and the 2nd one.

8- The outro: From its name, it represent the end of the song, so it makes the fade away of the song.

These are the most popular and used song components, they will give you some songwriting ideas to begin with, good luck. 

Songs: the good, the bad and the ugly?

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So what really makes the difference between a good song, a bad or even an ugly one. The answer to this question is very controversial, it was answered by many songwriters, but no one made it simple so anyone can understand it.

Before we answer this question, let's go back in time and try to identify what's the factor that made you love a specific song for example, try to remember with me if it's the melody, the chords sequence used in it, the simplicity, the complexity, the lyrics, the right songwriting techniques...etc.

I'm sure that everyone of us has a different point, that's because we love songs from our own background, so there are people that like deep songs, others like simple composition, others like complex composition...etc.

But we haven't answered the question yet!!!?that's because there is no exact answer to this, but let me give some hints:

What all of humans have in common with music?

- A good song is the one that uses an honest language.
- A good song is the one that uses a pleasing melody to the ear.
- A good one is that has a very easy and memorable Hook.
- A good song is the one that uses the right songwriting techniques.

These are the most important factors that make great songs, if you have more don't hesitate and comment.

5 things you should learn if you want to write great songs

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Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty (Henry Ford), well he's absolutely right, learning is the key factor to any success, so if you keep fueling and learning you'll have no problem in writing songs or anything else. The songwriting techniques that we are going to learn depend on your understanding of key factor things that you should learn, but don't worry, i'm here for you and i'm going to give you the keys to the Lamborghini.

So the 5 things you should learn are:

1- Learn what's the key of a song: The key of the song is where all the melodies and harmonies of the song belong, so every note you'll play in that song will have to belong to that key you've chosen to your song.

2- Expend your chord vocabulary: Chords are what western harmony all about, learn as much as you can in order to give your songs a special flavor.

3- Learn some scales and modes: Scales and modes are very important in songwriting, because they are played along chords, they are used to create melodies or solos.

4- Learn chord progressions: Chord progressions are very important in songwriting, because you can't just play a chords sequence like that, you have to chose the strong progressions and even some of the medium ones to make your song enjoyable by your listener's ears.

5- You have to learn writing song lyrics properly: song lyrics are very important because they are what most normal people understand (words!!!), so make sure you pick them well.

These are the basics that you're going to learn in order to write good songs, and with the songwriting techniques i'm going to teach you, you'll be an invincible songwriter.

The major scale: the absolute of songwriting techniques

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Every beginner songwriter thinks at first that it requires a lot of skills and songwriting techniques especially when writing the melody, this is because of the beast that we hear about always which is "music theory".

Music theory is not a very complicated theory as opposed to physics theories!!!, it's very simple to learn especially if you have the right tools and techniques. I believe that you've heard this somewhere "everything goes back to the major scale". The fun thing about this quote is that it's absolutely true, so the only theory you'll be learning is "the major scale".

The major scale is considered the standard of the music, everything is compared to it and everything goes back to it, how cool is that!

A scale is a series of notes played successively as it's name refers to. Every scale has 7 notes in it, but you can also find scales with less or more notes. The major scale is a scale that has 7 different notes in it and has these intervals: (WH, WH, H, WH, WH, Wh, H).

WH: whole step or whole tone, in guitar it's 2 frets.
H: half step of semi tone, in guitar it's 1 fret.

The first note of the scale is called the Root note of that scale, so in the key of C, the corresponding major scale will be: C - D - E - F - G - A - B - and C again. The first C is the same as the last C but one octave higher.

On the guitar's fretboard, you can play it like this

E--------------------------------------------------------------
B--------------------------------------------------------------
G--------------------------------------2---4---5------------
D-----------------------2---3---5---------------------------
A-------------3---5------------------------------------------
E-------------------------------------------------------------

Let's have another example, in the key of A the major scale will be: A (a whole step up) - B (a whole step up) - C# (a half step up) - D (a whole step up) - E (a whole step up) - F# (a whole step up) - G# (a half step up) - A again

E--------------------------------------------------------------
B--------------------------------------------------------------
G--------------------------------------------------------------
D---------------------------------4---6---7------------------
A----------------------4---5---7-----------------------------
E----------------5---7----------------------------------------

This is your major scale, just choose your root note and follow the whole and half step formula and you're done.

What should i write first; Music OR Lyrics?

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I'm sure that this question popped up to your head at least dozen of times, well because it's a very controversial question and every songwriting begginer should ask it.

This question actually has no exact answer, because it doesn't matter whether you write the melody first or the lyrics first or you write them both at the same time, what actually matters is the songwriting techniques and the harmony behind them, but i'll give a simple answer to this very annoying question.

The simple answer is "It depends" on you, you don't have to put a restrictive rule to your songwriting, you just have to write down whatever songwriting ideas that came to your head, because you don't know when they do.

For me i like to write the lyrics first and then write the melody or sometimes write them simultaneously, but a lot of songwriters prefer to write the melody first and then write the lyrics. For you if you're holding you instrument, try to come up with musical ideas, write them down for possibly using them later with you songs. In contrast if you think that you have songwriting ideas for lyrics, then you can bring a notebook and also write these ideas down for later use in you songs.

When you assemble your song parts, make sure they fit together and that they have harmony between them, if they do then try to record your song or play it to close friends or family for opinion.

The 5 components of any music

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There are 5 fundamental components that any song has, these components are what makes the difference between a good song or a bad one. You can forget that you have to be very talented to write good songs and start following these exact songwriting techniques to write better songs.

The first of these components is:

The form: is the structure of the music, it's more like a journey that will make your mood go up and down. We mean by the form, the intro, the verse, the chorus...et, each of these form components has its own destinction from others and also has its own mood.

The melody: it's the musical part of any song, it has to be unique, strong and has to leave an impact on the listener. This melody has to go along with the music form that we have talked about.

The harmony: We mean by harmony chords, chords are combination of notes played together in the same time, chord sequences are very important in music especially western music.

Lyrics: You all know what is this, lyrics are the word part of the song, it has to be compatible with the song melody, theme, harmony as well as the song form that you've chosen. Writing song lyrics isn't hard as most people say it is, not if you have the right songwriting techniques.

These components together will make you a great song, but what if you want to make your song not just great but a song that sticks in your listeners memories, well that way you have to find a good:

Hook: There is no exact definition of the hook but i'll give you a simple one. A Hook is the part of music that stays in the listener's mind. Sure this happened to you if you are human :) , where you listen to a song and stay singing that part "the hook" of the song all day long!!!

Well that's it, it's not complicated after all, these parts alltogether, when they have been taken care of carefully will make you a great and memorable song.

What do you need to be a good songwriter?

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Everyone with no exception asks this question when they begin their songwriting careers "What does it take to be a songwriter", well sure you need the right songwriting techniques and you need to take action. I mean by taking action just starting to write songs (some chords and some lyrics) to assess your abilities and then come back to edit what you've written.

Also you need a notebook or "IPhone!!!" to write down ideas because you don't know when songwriting ideas will hit you especially when writing song lyrics.

The other thing is dedication to songwriting. You can't get bored every time you want to write a song because you find it hard and frustrating, you just have to believe that "there is a songwriter in everyone of us", but we just have to activate it!!!

Consistency is also a key to succeeding in this industry, you have to keep learning and applying until you master it and become a subconscious or natural songwriter that have songwriting ideas flow like a river.

The last thing that you need to be a great songwriter is to follow my song writing tips and also my songwriting course to improve your songwriting and to become a great songwriter.

Songwriting techniques blog:

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So what's about Songwriting techniques blog:

As most music lovers end up even listening to music all their lives or writing songs, In this blog we are going to focus on the second type of people, the type that wants to move to the professional level of music which is writing great songs.

Music plays a major role in our lives, it touches and influences us very deeply especially great songs that stay in peoples minds for a long time and even forever. A lot of people think that great music writers are born with their magnificent talent so whether you have it or not!!! I'm sure that this will make a big frustration for starters, but let me give you the truth!:

Creativity is not a thing that you're born with, it's a natural process coming from mastery. Anybody can be creative, anybody can write great songs, the only thing they have to keep in mind is that they must be passionate and work hard to achieve their goals including writing great songs.

So let's come back to what this blog is about:

This blog will show you songwriting techniques from A to Z with a very easy to understand language, from understanding the music theory (compose music) to writing you own lyrics that will touch people's hearts when they hear them.

If you're interested in becoming a professional songwriter, then this is the right place for you.

Good Luck.