What is a strong process to help strong music students become great songwriters?

Answer 1

My advice is to help students on multiple fronts. This includes:

1) A really strong understanding of music theory -- chord patterns, song structure, strategies to match a strong chord pattern with a great melody, what works well and does not work well.

2) Build confidence. Encourage students to be creative, fearless and have confidence they can do it!

3) Review song structures. Sure, every song has a verse and melody, but working with students on creating an intro, outro, transitions, playing with interludes, changing rhythms and many other types of variations on the standard theme is a great way to encourage creativty.

4) As it relates to lyrics, helping to teach students to write from the heart, to create a hook, to have songs with a message, to integrate interesting elements to lyrics (unique words, places, foreign languages, etc.) is all part of making a truly interesting song.

5) Also, sometimes tying together songs into a concept (create meaning with a series of songs) is a cool exercise.

6) Most of all, just encouraging students to be creative, think about expressing themselves and their feelings and beliefs and lessons learned in life are all great items to explore during the songwriting process.