Writing better lyrics : the essential guide to powerful songwriting
Edition
Second edition.
Publication Information
Cincinnati, Ohio : Writer's Digest Books, an imprint of Peguin Random House LLC [2009]
Physical Description
vi, 298 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm
Summary
Discusses the songwriting process and offers advice on how to improve composition skills, and the proper use of meter, verse development, and form.
"Writing Better Lyrics has been a staple for songwriters for nearly two decades. Now this revised and updated 2nd Edition provides effective tools for everything from generating ideas, to understanding the form and function of a song, to fine-tuning lyrics. Perfect for new and experienced songwriters alike, this time-tested classic covers the basics in addition to more advanced techniques. Songwriters will discover: how to use sense-bound imagery to enhance a song's emotional impact on listeners; techniques for avoiding clichés and creating imaginative metaphors and similes; ways to use repetition as an asset; how to successfully manipulate meter; instruction for matching lyrics with music; ways to build on ideas and generate effective titles; [and] advice for working with a co-writer, and much more. Featuring updates and expanded chapters, 50 fun songwriting exercises, and examples from more than 20 chart-topping songs, Writing Better Lyrics gives you all of the professional and creative insight you need to write powerful lyrics and put your songs in the spotlight where they belong."--Publisher's description.
Contents
- Foreword / Gillian Welch
- Introduction
- 1. Object writing : the art of the diver
- 2. Rusty's collar : a lesson in showing and telling
- 3. Making metaphors
- 4. Learning to say no : building worksheets
- 5. Clichés : the sleeping puppy (a case study)
- 6. Productive repetition
- 7. Verse development and power positions
- 8. Travelogues : verse continuity
- 9. Stripping your repetition for repainting
- 10. Perspectives
- 11. Point of view : second person and the hangman
- 12. Point of view : second person as narrative
- 13. Dialogue and point of view
- 14. Meter : something in common
- 15. Spotlighting with common meter
- 16. Meter : two by two
- 17. Managing couplets
- 18. Prosody : structure as film score
- 19. Understanding motion
- 20. Form follows function : building the perfect beast
- 21. The great balancing act : courting danger on the high wire
- 22. Song forms : (im) potent packages
- 23. Song forms : (im) potent packages II
- 24. Process
- Appendix. Co-writing : the "no"-free zone
- Permissions
- Index.