I've been paying attention to songwriting and composition lately and I am always curious as to how music comes about. I myself am a bit of a songwriter/composer so I have experienced the exhilaration of having a concept, developing that concept, and watching the song take shape into final form. Themes formulate, ideas develop, and pretty soon you have a concerto or a love song or dance music. While the end result is music, the process is VERY different for each person who composes.
Sometimes when I write I will have a chorus that will come first. Some kind of primary concept that sparks in my musical right-brain and from there is put together by my left-brain. Verses are developed to surround and emphasize this chorus and then a song is formed. Sometimes it is the other way arround. The very beginning of a thought comes first and is developed as a verse... and then the conclusion is the chorus. Other times it may be a simple poem that I want to set to music so lyrics come before any type of melody or harmony. Often times these songs don't rhyme or have asymmetrical verses or an ambiguous chorus. Then of course there are those tunes that start with melodies or harmonies or chords first and lyrics are almost a by-product of the aesthetic influence of the music.
I like to imagine how the various songwriters whom I have listened to over the years developed their songs. One my favorite songwriters, Jon Foreman (lead singer of the band Switchfoot but with some really great solo music) seems to vary with how he writes. It seems some of his start with a chorus concept that he wraps beautifully with verses that decorate and emphasize the primary theme (see: Your Love Is Strong, Gravity, Learning How To Die). Other times I notice some songs were reflective concepts that likely came out of a developing verse (see: Southbound Train, Revenge, Daisy). Then there are those that are based on poetry (see: House of God Forever, Again).
Composing instrumental music can have similar processes even without the lyrics. The standard practice was to start with an initial theme and then a counter-theme and then allow those themes to interplay before they resolve at the end (see anything classical: Haydn, Mozart). Then there were those who took those rules and purposefully broke them to create something new and different (see: Beethoven, Stravinsky, Wagner). Then there are also those who write as through composed. I wrote a piece like this a few years back for solo cello. It was based on the five stages of grief and each stage was a self-contained reflection; no themes came back or resolved. This of course is similar to writing a song based on poetry.
Those of you who know me know that I have a bit of an addiction, both musically and philosophically, to Michael Gungor (and the musical collective known as Güngör). Gungor has the ability to write songs like an instrumental composer while also taking the typical songwriting box and tearing it apart, and reshaping it into something completely different like a fully functional hot air balloon and fire-breathing dragon! Songs that should be over suddenly continue in what might be thought of as a "cadenza" (see: You Are The Beauty, Brother Moon, We Will Run). Songs that use simple chord progression with standard verse/chorus format are altered in time and harmonic structure (see: Ezekiel, Crags and Clay). And then happy, upbeat, even silly songs often have the most profound lyrics with large implications (see: White Man, Heaven, Friend of God).
I am always curious about people's songwriting process. Any songwriters or composers out there? Let me know how you form your music! Melodies first? Lyric concepts? A hook or chorus first? Based on poetry? There really is no wrong answer, just different ways to get to the same destination: a fully composed piece of music.
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