Best songwriting tools for writing Vocal melodies(& Toplines)
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- čas přidán 8. 09. 2024
- This is one of the best songwriting tools for writing stronger vocal melodies and toplines.
Not only can it help write more memorable melodies but it can.........
Give your lyrics flow and the feeling of spontaneity,
Help, not only communicate the emotion of the song, but to create emotion.
Use few words to say a lot ,
Create expectations, that can be used for contrast and balance,
Create hotspots, so your lyrics stand out,
Allow you to use a lot of repetition without sounding repetitive.
In this video I go into how to use melodic rhythm and how this relates to the overall vocal melody and other aspects it has influence on in a song. In doing so I will show you some cool tricks it allows us to use with our songs.
hey there, if you have any questions about these tools just drop me a comment.
If you are looking for co writes you can find me on We Should Write Sometime. Its an App that connects you with songwriters in your area or you can geo locate your profile to another city to find co writes. I'm in Nashville!
@@richardcasper thanks for that Richard, I'll check it out. Hope you enjoyed the video
You do an excellent job and far superior to the other song writing channels. I work in this industry and it's refreshing to see someone explain key concepts concisely and with good examples. Grateful for the hard work. Cheers.
Thank you for you kind words Peter, it's much appreciated. Glad to hear you got some value from the content 👍
Yo, i swear you're gonna write a hit song one day lol
right back at ya Graffiti.
Tony, your quick, succinct style is great. I'm so glad I found you.
Cheers Juine, glad you got some value from it.
Damn, you slammed us with so much info my head is spinning like a top. Thanks
Hey Sal, thanks again. I hope it wasn't an info overload. I'm still trying to find a good balance when it comes to making vids. Melodic rhythm is the secret sauce of melody writing imo, it's great to play around with it.
@@SongWritersChopShop After watching this vid I realised that melodic rhythm is where my song falls down. I know I have a good song inside me trying to get out, I just have to get these things right!
@@coloaten6682 nice one Col, glad it helped. it can be a bit tricky until you get the hang of it. Practice by looking at your favorite songs and copying what they do. it won't take long to master it. good luck and let me know if you have any questions about it.
Brilliant again my man. So many gaps in my knowledge are now filled. Excellent stuff.
Cheers lee, looking forward to hearing what you come up with using some of these tools. let me know if there is anything you'd like me to cover in up coming vids? we'll get the rest of those gaps filled!
great work mate. Learnt loads and had a chuckle at the same time👍👍👍
cheers William, glad you got some value from it.
Man you have the most underrated channel. Can a guitar solo be same as a vocal Melody
Cheers Dipen. yep, guitar solos & riffs have all the same components as a vocal melody (except lyrics obviously). pitch, rhythm, motifs, phrasing, repetition, variation. the catchiest solos & riffs are singable (for the most part). I'm a fan of melodic solos, much prefer them to the fancy hundred notes a second kind. Prince is a great guitarist to study for melodic solos.
When I saw your title " the best songwriting tools ever" I was like... Nah... then I saw a lot of your videos, lol they are pretty fantastic! D:... I'm wordless! Thank you for your knowledge =)!
cheers Jose, i really appreciate that. glad you got some value from them.
I don't remember if it was on this video or other but you gave some specific tips which I kinda followed and kinda did my own thing. I just wanted to give some feedback and here's what happened...(I have to write a song to a melody):
First: I listened to it and tried to feel the atmosphere of the song.
Second: I defined the theme and what I wanted to say
Third: I structured it like this - Verse 1: ......(How I feel, what is the trouble); Verse 2: Answering why; Chorus: Emotion
In conclusion, I think it went pretty well, thanks for the tips. I will try to write 2 more lyrics to the melody because these ones turned out to be cheesy as hell :D What helped me when I didn't know what to say was following your tips to just write something without rhymes, just what I want to say and then transform it into something that sounds good. Maybe you can use this to make a step by step video :)
Cheers!
Nice one Dragon, glad to hear you got some use from the tips. It's tough enough to write lyrics to a melody so well done. the key is to have the rhythm of the words work with the rhythm of the melody. It's tricky. You're right to write / rewrite your orginal draft. It's rare to get it right on the first attempt. keep the melody's rhythm in mind and rewrite until you are happy with the lyrics. Thanks for the video suggestion. I do plan making one on rewriting and re phrasing lyrics to fit a melody. So if you have any more thoughts or questions on that let me know and I'll include in the vid. (it will take me a few weeks to get around to it) Cheers.
I Love This Video Thank you So much for making This Video 💓🤙🏼
No worries man, glad you enjoyed it. cheers
too good
cheers neighboureight.
Amazing! I do have a question though, in this current era of “cursive singing” do these rhythmic melody principles still apply in genres where vowels are stretched by singers and words often blend into eachother?
@SongWritersChopShop How are Stressed Syllables and Unstressed Syllables identify?
My comment/question is what about jazz songs? The swing and melody usually hits the 2 and 4 not the 1 and 3
You'd have to give me an example but it sounds like either syncopation or non 4/4 time signature.
Oh godddd this is so haaaaaaaaaard :')
Hi Frances. It can be hard to get your head around it at first. I put a lot of information into that video, probably too much. As a beginner, the main take away would be that stressed and unstressed syllables of words create a rhythm. hit me up with any questions you have about it.
@@SongWritersChopShop you're so sweet, thank you. Nothing wrong with your video! Your content is great - so helpful. I'm just complaining that I'm not already brilliant at all of this - ha! :))))
@@francesprendergast1721 Lol, I know what you mean. Quantity leads to quality, so keep writng. Future you will be grateful.
Amazing content. Any resources you’d recommend to understand this better? Or more examples of stressed syllables and meter in song, etc? I think I understand it but my brain is still trying to process 😅
Cheers Fontus. This stuff can seem overwhelming at first but it doesn't take too long to get the hang of it. I can't think of any good resourse, I'd say google 'poetic meter in songs' and 'lyric setting'. If you have more questions on it, let me know. I can make more videos on the subject and it's always good to have specific questions to answer.
Thanks mate! I’ll dig more into it.
Question/Comment:
1. Do you think the likes of McCartney and Sting think about stressed and unstressed syllables when writing their songs, in this manner? Or do you think they just do it naturally (subconsciously)
2. If you went through step by step and wrote an example song where you consider meter (applying what’s taught in this video) I think that could be a great resource and really speed up the understanding of the concept for your viewers.
Speaking of, I really like your format and content, thanks again :)
@@Anw120 Give this exercise a go, I think you'll find it useful czcams.com/video/QNYULlCla_Y/video.html
Sting was a teacher and Paul was always into poetry, so I'd say they were pretty aware of it but I don't think they think about it. At this stage, it would be second nature to them. But I don't know either of them, so that's just a guess. Cheers, thanks for the comment Fontus.
This may be a stupid question but I'm brand new to this...ssssso, I'm looking at One More Try by Perfume Genius, and for e.g. he sings the word "hazy" as 4 syllables (hay-zee-ee-ee), so would that be DUM-da-da-da or just DUM-da as the word "hazy" is spoken? Guessing it's the former?
ALSO, when thinking about line length, we're only counting *stressed* syllables, not all syllables within the words of each line...? (Trying to make sure I've got this! :D)
The length of a line is counted by the amount of stressed syllables, yes. I don't hear the word "hazy" as four syllables. It's not really pronounced eg as in Bowies ch ch ch changes. I think I'd count hazy as two syllables=DUM-da. I might have to listen to it again though!
What are toplines?
It is basically writing a vocal melody over an existing song. So if you wrote a song starting with the music, then move onto creating a vocal melody, you would be toplining, and then finally writing lyrics that fit the rhythms and pitch of that melody while keeping the natural shape of the language. Hope that makes sense. thanks for the question.
Oh like scatting
@@ricofiness7293 pretty much but you'd focus more on vowel sounds than in 'traditional' scatting. It's known as phonetic singing. i did a short video about it if you want to have a look czcams.com/video/53rYAu-HGnY/video.html
Dude, these videos are super informative, but you talk waaaaay tooo fast for me. I have to stop and repeat a few times until I get what you really mean. And I'm not even sure if it's the speed or you jump from one subject to another too fast.
cheers Dragon. thanks for the feedback. this is one of my earlier vids. I've slowed the pace down in my more recent output. I'm still getting the hang of making videos. cheers for the comment. any questions on it, just drop them in the comments.
@@SongWritersChopShop oh good job. I watched a few more videos and suddenly it didn't feel so hard to understand... so I thought that I just got used to it. :)
@@TheNocturna001 cool man, it might be a bit of both.
Wow, love this one. Always great content!🔥
Cheers Dr.sarah, it's much appreciated. Glad to hear you got some value from it 👍
@@SongWritersChopShop just call me Sarah! I always watch a few videos from your channel to learn new songwriting skills before I write every new song every week. Keep up the amazing work😊🔥🎵