Last week I had the very great pleasure of attending a one day seminar led by Joel Payne of Resound Worship.
Being able to concentrate on writing for a whole day was so refreshing, I learned a lot from Joel, loved his uber-relaxed teaching style and really benefited from taking part in the group feedback. Having my new song (which may or may not end up being called You Spoke the Stars) critiqued by the group was the icing on the cake.
Some things I learned
Joel's rule on giving feedback was "joined in with the song as soon as you could pick it up, rather than just listening". This instantly brought home just how catchy and/or logical your melody was.
Or wasn't.
Ouch.
Joel suggested writing 10 verses and choosing the best rather than trying to hone 3 perfect ones. This may not work for every song, but it's definitely worth trying.
First lines need to be strong, but often we settle for ones that don't give any clue as to what the song is about. Go and have a look through your first lines - if you dare! More rewriting needed?
Joel divided melodic movement into conjunct (notes next to each other in the scale) and disjunct (incorporating larger leaps). He characterised them as follows
Conjunct = "easy to sing but quite boring"
Disjunct = "your favourite bit of the song".
The key is to balance the two styles.
The feedback on my own songs was very positive and encouraging (which I needed as I'm already on chorus attempt no.3) and it's given me faith to finish it.
It was great that people identified small, and hopefully fixable problems I'd missed, and hilariously, different people identified 3 quite distinct problems in one line of lyrics!
If you come across a workshop run by these guys run to sign up.
Some things I learned
Joel's rule on giving feedback was "joined in with the song as soon as you could pick it up, rather than just listening". This instantly brought home just how catchy and/or logical your melody was.
Or wasn't.
Ouch.
Joel suggested writing 10 verses and choosing the best rather than trying to hone 3 perfect ones. This may not work for every song, but it's definitely worth trying.
First lines need to be strong, but often we settle for ones that don't give any clue as to what the song is about. Go and have a look through your first lines - if you dare! More rewriting needed?
Joel divided melodic movement into conjunct (notes next to each other in the scale) and disjunct (incorporating larger leaps). He characterised them as follows
Conjunct = "easy to sing but quite boring"
Disjunct = "your favourite bit of the song".
The key is to balance the two styles.
The feedback on my own songs was very positive and encouraging (which I needed as I'm already on chorus attempt no.3) and it's given me faith to finish it.
It was great that people identified small, and hopefully fixable problems I'd missed, and hilariously, different people identified 3 quite distinct problems in one line of lyrics!
If you come across a workshop run by these guys run to sign up.
You can download Joel's songs for free from the Resound website. One of my favourites is Come See the Son
Related Posts: Free songwriting seminars - Keith & Kristyn Getty
Related Posts: Free songwriting seminars - Keith & Kristyn Getty
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