Anybody write music after the lyrics?

[kevbrowne]

absolutely!

It is a great way to work. I have only ever managed it with other peoples words,but it is a lot of fun.

You just let the words suggest everything,style,tempo,mood,etc

Try it

[drBill]

Sure. Although I often have a melody or at least a rhythmic aspect starting to form in my mind as the lyrics are coming....

[theblue1]

Originally Posted by smili

Hey all, was curious if anybody here wrote the music after the lyrics were done and how that works? I've heard some people do it but I can't imagine how that would work.

This would be appealing to me as I'd love to be able to work with some tight lyrics that are already good (Lyrics after the fact often force you to fit one more line into the song even to make it fit - even if you don't like it alot). But that said - I have terrible time making music match lyrics so generally get the riff and melody down first. I might have a little phrase or something in my head, but it's more of a placeholder than anything.

So question is: Can you take a poem or piece of pre-written lyrics and craft a song around them? If so - How do you make it work? This is kindof a process question as much as anything. Appreciate responses.

It's typically very easy (for me, anyhow) to come up with something as long as the lyrics are already in a regular form and have good meter. (By regular form, I mean that there's a consistent and coherent organization and meter to the structure of the verses, choruses, and any other bits.)

What is tricky, of course, is to set free verse to music.

That was the challenge I briefly faced when I started playing. I was already a 'modern' poet and, of course, in the middle of the 20th century, that generally meant blank or more likely free verse, no fixed rhyme scheme, irregular meter, and so on.

The notion that I should have to write 'childish doggerel' (which is how such poets tend to think of most metered, rhyming poetry because... well, that's what most of it has been in the modern era) in order to have lyrical fodder for my songs was vexing, to say the least.

But, you know, I explored those avenues and ultimately decided that I was writing songs, not academic poetry, and that stuff that sounded corny to my ear read aloud could actually be quite effective in the context of song.

Sadly, my training had ill-prepared me. I checked a rhyming dictionary out of the library (and renewed it -- at the end of that six week period I taught myself to 'run the alphabet' looking for rhymes and that's pretty much what I did until looking for rhyme words became a semi-unconscious part of the process). The first things I wrote were, indeed, doggerel of the worst, most childish and bone-headed sort. But it was a start. I figured I'd have to burn through it. And I did.


Anyhow, back on point, once the lyrical meter and structure are in a regular form that can be fitted with music, for me, the music seems to flow fairly easily. In fact, I frequently 'practice' by coming up with entirely different chordal and melodic arrangements for existing songs. (I have one song that I've done so many different ways that it's become sort of my general warm up song... except I tend to do it a different way, including different melodies and chords each time. I almost have to stop and think about how the 'right' way is.)

That said, no one will ever confuse me, melodically, with a McCartney or Bacharach.

[smili]

Originally Posted by theblue1

What is tricky, of course, is to set free verse to music.

Yes - this is where I was coming from - and I think your comment on consistent structure is important - at least for standard verse/chorus/bridge type songs. My experience is that poem does not move directly to melody often times - or if it does it doesn't seem very inspired.

The times I've started with lyrics first the song tends to meander a bit - driven by the changes in the lyrics more than musical groove. (I do like musical grooves and place premium on them, and accommodating a lyric to me seems often not good for the groove.)

An area of flexibility: Often one short extended word can a disproportionate part of the melody if needed. You know - that song where a word like "Why?" might last a bar or two and carry a melodic phrase over the entire time like Why - ey - ey- eeeyyyyy- ey -eeeeyyyyyyy. :-)

[decay-o-caster]

i write music and lyrics independently, so sometimes the lyrics happen first. but even when i'm not writing to a melody or chords or a riff, i know that the lyrics will be lyrics, so i write to a structure that's sort of dictated by the first couple of lines. when it's time to put them to music, the structure might well change based on how singable they are (or aren't), and sometimes that does paint me into a corner where i can't find the way to add or subtract syllables to make a line work with the music. but generally i can make the lines scan, with a bit of effort.

this is one i'm working on now that started from lyrics, then got shaped by the music afterwards:
http://tempusfugitives.articulateima...eVeryRuff1.mp3

based on a mood i experienced in a hospital waiting room at 4am, filtered by way of wim wenders' 'wings of desire'. i haven't decided whether i'm going to polish it or not, but i wanted to hear it so i recorded the demo to see how it would work.

[lovenara]

That is the way Elton John worked,look up youtube,lot of his clips on how to do it.
But this way i think the music will be limited by the words.
You should try do it both ways,compose beautiful music first will have wonderful texture but can be hard to put words to them.

[cool.as.i]

Originally Posted by smili

Hey all, was curious if anybody here wrote the music after the lyrics were done and how that works? I've heard some people do it but I can't imagine how that would work.

This would be appealing to me as I'd love to be able to work with some tight lyrics that are already good (Lyrics after the fact often force you to fit one more line into the song even to make it fit - even if you don't like it alot). But that said - I have terrible time making music match lyrics so generally get the riff and melody down first. I might have a little phrase or something in my head, but it's more of a placeholder than anything.

So question is: Can you take a poem or piece of pre-written lyrics and craft a song around them? If so - How do you make it work? This is kindof a process question as much as anything. Appreciate responses.

I'd recommend a good starting point is singing your lyrics to the melody of a famous song, not all will work that well but its sometimes disturbing how interchangeable different lyrics can be to different melodies or sung at different speeds. It's a good way to further understand the way songs work, or don't, in general.

[creegstor]

Originally Posted by cool.as.i

I'd recommend a good starting point is singing your lyrics to the melody of a famous song, not all will work that well but its sometimes disturbing how interchangeable different lyrics can be to different melodies or sung at different speeds. It's a good way to further understand the way songs work, or don't, in general.

Billy Joel wrote the lyrics to "Movin' Out" to the melody of Neil Sedaka's "Laughter in the Rain". Same meters. Very different melodies.

[theblue1]

Originally Posted by smili

Yes - this is where I was coming from - and I think your comment on consistent structure is important - at least for standard verse/chorus/bridge type songs. My experience is that poem does not move directly to melody often times - or if it does it doesn't seem very inspired.

The times I've started with lyrics first the song tends to meander a bit - driven by the changes in the lyrics more than musical groove. (I do like musical grooves and place premium on them, and accommodating a lyric to me seems often not good for the groove.)

An area of flexibility: Often one short extended word can a disproportionate part of the melody if needed. You know - that song where a word like "Why?" might last a bar or two and carry a melodic phrase over the entire time like Why - ey - ey- eeeyyyyy- ey -eeeeyyyyyyy. :-)

A little bit of melisma goes a long way.

Melisma - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Wally]

I almost always start writing a great song idea and do a beat for it depending on the style tempo etc

[Neal]

Bob Dylan did, most of the time.

[Ghosted]

I suck at lyrics, and the best writers I've ever worked with had TONS of lyrics/poetry written already... they were looking for a piece of music to fit their thoughts to.

[Miharbi]

A few thoughts...

- Some people write lyrics after the music. That can be done, but I think writing lyrics first, or independently, is the better strategy if deep/interesting lyrics are the goal. It's a matter of mindset. Are you focusing on theme, concept, character, metaphor, etc, or on suitability for a given melody? I think focusing on the deeper literary elements tends to require one's whole attention. The editing and shaping can be done later.

- It's generally recommended to have ~some~ structural pattern, for poetry or lyrics, but the types of patterns available are infinite. Whitman's poetry, e.g., is often considered "free verse", but in fact he uses many patterns, just not the traditional approaches to rhyming and meter. There's almost no poetry that's truly "free". When converting lines into lyrics, I'd say adopt ~some~ kind of pattern, and shape the lines accordingly, but the pattern need not be a typical "pop song" pattern.

- Be flexible. I've found it always takes some effort and push and pull to get lyrics and music to play well together. A 3-syllable word gets replaced by a shorter synonym, or a long line gets cut in half, or a 4-line verse gets made into a 3-line verse, or a weird stray line gets turned into a bridge, or a foreboding lyric gets colored by a minor chord, or whatever. I, for one, enjoy the process of letting the lyrics and music dictate certain things to each other.

cheers!

[dtrain1234]

I write poetry and then try to craft it into a song format. Then I look for songwriters to co-write with me and put music to the lyrics.

[Equivalence82]

Yeah this is how Elton has been writing for years. In fact he said in an interview that he never changes the words given to him by Bernie Taupin, but instead changes the music to fit around the words! Thats a very neat way of working, although it takes years to master it like elton and bernie, but it can be done this way. I find that when I have the music first its harder to put lyrics to it as the music dictates too much then. Whereas the lyrics first are something you can sing along whilst writing the music, in other words theres already something to sing, rather than getting lyrics from thin air and trying to make it rhyme. I've work both ways tbh, but I prefer the lyrics first. ;-)

[ido1957]

Originally Posted by smili

So question is: Can you take a poem or piece of pre-written lyrics and craft a song around them? If so - How do you make it work? This is kindof a process question as much as anything. Appreciate responses.

Design your lyrics so they have a meter to them - a noticeable pattern to the syllables and phrases. Then you just create a melody around that meter.
I do it line by line, phrase by phrase sometimes and build the melody up from the lyrics. You should also design them with verse pre-chorus chorus bridge (or whatever) in mind. I usually have the whole song structured lyrically before I write the melody and don't usually have to change very many words.

[Brent Hahn]

Originally Posted by smili

Hey all, was curious if anybody here wrote the music after the lyrics were done and how that works?

I do music (and other stuff) for advertising, and in that world the lyrics pretty much always come first, usually written by an ad agency. I like the process, actually, but I don't think I've ever written a non-advertising song that way.

[M.T.Pilot]

Yes. Usually, there will be some sort of structure in the lyrics which will at least partly determine what you can do song-structure-wise. Coming up with lyrics usually also goes hand in hand with the melody / or the way the lyrics are sung. So, that will have an influence on how the instrumentation in the song will be. In that way, beginning with the lyrics can help you build the song, just as it would the other way around when you start out with (part of) the instrumentation.

[MLVD]

I've written many songs where I just have the lyrics and an idea for the vocal harmony but don't have any instrumentation in mind.

[pharmacybear]

I'd say I write the lyrics first, then find the chord. Typically, (as stated before) I have a "feel" or melody in mind as I'm working on them. Also, I don't know if this is considered cheating the process but I have a huge list of chord charts that I created on my own that I refer to if I don't know where to start with the music.

However, both the music and the lyrics get moved around so much for me during the writing process that neither end up how they were originally anyways.

[Apollo Soul]

I've done it every which way.

If you go that route, you need to bridge between the vocals and the music... which means finding the vocal melody. If you're unsure how to sus the chords from the melody, there are a number of youtube tutorials that touch on the concept.

Once you have the chords, you can work out the rhythmic elements (drums and bass) that complement the melody, and the rest is icing on the cake.