Songwriting For Beginners - Let's Make That Dream A Reality 🎶

Write your first song today!

In this lesson, going to write a song together - a complete song, start to finish in just 30 minutes!

Think of this lesson as a crash course to what it's like to write a song. There's nothing to be afraid of when diving into the world of songwriting. So be fearless when you're diving into this wonderful music world!

Let's get this out of the way - the first few songs you write won't sound so great! Speaking from experience, this is how my first song went! Everything from the lyrics to the melodies was boring! But as with most things, it will get easier over time, and you will become a better songwriter with practice.

So be open to this trial and error process. Let's dive right in. :)

How To Create Your Lyrics

For this experiment, I crowdsourced lyrics from you all on my Instagram - and wow! You all came up with some interesting lines! Thank you to all who contributed, and I hope I did justice to your lyrics.

In a proper songwriting session, you'd have to spend a bit more time on the lyrics than I did. For the sake of this video, I'm pretty happy with how they turned out.

When applying pre-written lyrics to a song, you've got to be aware of pacing. Here are questions you should ask yourself when creating lyrics:

How many syllables can you fit into a line?
Can you carry a lyric over from one line to the next?
Does it make sense musically?
Do you need to re-write the lyric to shorten or lengthen it?

How To Create Music

To create music, take the chords you already them. Pick a few of them and arrange them into a chord progression. There are a few go-to chord progressions that you'll often find in popular songs.

When you're looking to create a fresh sound, try songwriting with the dice method. :)

Here's how to approach the dice songwriting method:

Assign each chord in a key a number, 1-6.
Then, you roll your dice! Whichever number comes up is the chord number you'll play first.
Roll the dice again to get the second chord in your progression.
Continue until you've got a few lined up, and give it a go on your guitar.

There's a very good chance a few chords may sound out of place! If something doesn't sound great to you, the great thing about writing music is that you can change it. After all, it's your song - you're the boss here. You've all the creative licenses in the world.

When playing your chord progression, think about rhythm and strumming patterns. Think about the tone you're after or the emotions you're trying to convey with the song. Experiment with different patterns until you find something you're happy with.

Putting Lyrics And Music Together

Now, the fun stuff. Sing your lyrics over your chord progression and hear how it all comes together. Don't be afraid to try different melody lines, too.

If you sing your song, but the chords don't sound good, switch up the chords. It's all up to you! The more you explore, the better!

Learn Music From The Best

Here are 5 ways to improve your songwriting skills:

Take a song you love and dive into it.
Pick it apart.
Look at the chord structure.
Study the melody lines, the tempo, the dynamics
Try to feel the emotion & and the storytelling in the lyrics. What is the meaning behind the words?
Take note of the things you like and the things you don't like.

Listen for what works and contemplate why it works. Do the same for those things that don't work for you. Take at the complete structure of the song - all of it!

Once you've done that, pick another song and do it all over again! Study songs in different genres. Check out songs from the same artist at other points in their career. You can learn so much by doing this and focus on listening.

Song Structure Outline

Need inspiration? Follow this common song structure to help you develop your song.

Verse 1

Start the story.

Verse 2

Develop the story but KEEP THE SAME MELODY.

Chorus

Keep it simple and hook the listener.

Verse 3

Drop it down - SAME VERSE MELODY

Chorus

SAME AS LAST TIME.

Bridge

A significant change in pace and chords.

Chorus

SAME AS LAST TIME.

Chorus

SAME AS LAST TIME (or with minor variations!).

I hope you have as much fun with this lesson as I did. This process should be fun! Don't hesitate to share your songwriting creations with the JustinGuitar Community!