Lesson's in Song Composition

One method you can use to become a better song composer is one that i used
mostly during the years just prior and during my tenure as the leader of my garage
band "The Look's" which lasted from 1996-1982.Six years is along time to carry the
wieght of being the leader of a 3-piece rock band where you write all the songs,arrange
every players part including your own and also design the recording method as i did for the
look's.It kept me very busy-let's put it that way.
The method i'm speaking of is to write and record a song that emulates
a specific artist at a specific time period stylewise in thier career.The first time i did this
was with "Are You Gonna Be My Girl" in which i recreated the songwriting style and
the recording style of the "Merseybeat" Period Beatles.This was a difficult assignment i
gave to myself but as the early Beatles sound was one of my first and biggest influence's
and inspirations it gave me alot of fuel to tackle the task.The first thing i did was re-listen
to both of The Beatle's first two records "Please Please Me" and in the U.S. "Meet the Beatles".I would listen to these albums over and over-hundreds of times gleaning every
aspect and quality i could decipher which gave then thier unique sound.One thing i noticed
was that all the songs which had the trademark Beatle's Merseybeat sound were Johns songs.
"All i Gotta Do"-"There's a Place"-"Please Please Me" were all Lennon Creations and they
exuded the beatles merseybeat sound the most.I noticed Lennon allway's doubled his vocals
and during parts where George and Paul joined in it often became difficult to tell who was
the lead singer-all thier voices seemed to merge together into a mythlogical 5th beatle vocal
sound that was very unique and very powerful.Only on these first two LP's do you here this
combined vocal sound to such a large extent.Once the Beatles started recording on 4-track with
"I Want to Hold Your Hand" the merseybeat beatles sound dis-appeared.With four tracks
Producer George Martin could seperate and re-mix all the vocals and that ended the mystery
5th Beatle vocal sound that live two track recording with only a doubling of Johns vocal being
doubled.
The early songs were very upbeat even if the song itself was sad.They often started out in
a minor key but ended on a major key.Nearly every song was filled with all the songwriting tricks of the trade-Fanstastic middle 8's-Bridges-lead breaks on middle 8's,chorus's,and on bridges never knowing which one the Beatle's would choose.On "Are You Gonna Be my Girl"
i choose to play the lead guitar part on the middle 8.Any way these are just a few of the ways i
used to re-create The Beatles merseybeat sound and i'll just mention one more element that was
vital to get that sound.The snare drum had to have a really loud snap to it-allmost like that of
a rim-shot.I spent alot of time with Lenny teaching him how to get that snare drum snap but
it had to sound like that to really be like the Beatle's Mersybeat-so it was absoulutly mandatory
to the success of the song and the recording that the snare drum had this sound.
Another type of song i finally mastered thou much later in my career was The Big Song
that Bob Dylan invented for the modern world.Bard's in the middle age's played allmost nothing but these big songs as it was one of the only way's to communicate the news of the day but
in the early sixties Bob Dylan brought the big song back-and he would revisit this 7-9 verse
style from time to time throughout the rest of his career-in this manner he was pretty much on
his own-allmost nobody else wrote any of these really big song's that became a Dylan Trademark.Here are some of Dylan's big song's-Tangled Up in Blue-Up to Me-Mr. Tamborine Man-Sad eyed Lady of the Lowlands{probably his biggest but maybe not his best}-Like a
Rolling Stone-there are others but thats a good sampling.So how do you write one of these big songs-well for one thing it's hard to write one when your really young because you don't have
enough expieriences to fill up 9 verse's of anything interesting or even 7 Verse's.The most difficult aspect of writing a big song is having all the information you need to write 7-9
congruent verse's that are interrelated.The other hard part is to get that many verse's that
all end up setting up perfectly for the chorus in rhyme and in reason.My big song is "Too Many
Tears".It has more lyrics than any other song of mine and it was definatly inspired by Dylan's
big songs.I was 35 and sober when i wrote it-but i wasn't aiming at writing a big song-all the verse's just came to me in a very organic way-it just flowed-and kept flowing but as it got bigger
i could see where it could go to and so i just rode that wave all the way i could and "Too Many Tears" which is on the "Riverside Drive" Cd was the result.I will say i think being sober helped
both in coming up with all the flowing verse's and being able to remember them.
So these are just a few ways you can learn about the creative methods of songwriting and just remember using other artists idea's as a catalyst for more knowledge and more creativity
in your own back page's is O.K-just don't steal any thing outright-make sure your song is unique in a way that's true to you own indidvidual muse-ideas are one thing-but the way you finally execute
those idea's is a completly differant matter all together.Regardless any style you might borrow
from allways make sure that your music is unique to you.

Written by Pete Holly-Copyright-2010-All Rights Reserved