Tips for Songwriters/Should you learn to read sheet music?

Q: Do producers and artists take a songwriter seriously if she can't write or read sheet music? There are many services out there that ask for money to put your songs on sheet music, and they claim this is a must to have anyone take your song seriously. Are they taking advantage of my ignorance, or is this a must to get someone to consider your work? 

A: Let's look at the logic of this. If you got someone else to do the lead sheet, that would not mean you could read music even then. So the producer or artist would still not take you seriously, if that were the criterion. So whoever is telling you this is suggesting you mislead the artist or producer into thinking you write and read sheet music, right? So how do you feel about the person who suggested this to you now?

I don't think it's important at all to producers or artists that a songwriter can read and write music. All that should matter to them is how good the song is. I've noticed that a good ear is vastly more important in writing songs than the ability to notate and read. Naturally, reading increases your ability to study scores and other written works-to play exactly what someone wrote, provided that person notated it, himself. And writing music is helpful if you get an idea in the car and you don't have a tape recorder. But beyond that, it's a skill much more necessary to the arranger and film composer than to the songwriter.

Do's and Don'ts on Songwriting:

1. Do it because you love it, not because you think there's money in it. 

2. Do it honestly and expertly. Learn to write songs before you show the songs. Test the songs out on friends, then strangers, then more strangers. 

3. Don't send them to industry people until you've proven you can have emotional impact on people who are not biased in your favor. 

4. Don't write song in musical genres which are not your own, unless you're experimenting and learning. When it comes time to develop a great idea, don't choose music which is unfamiliar to you because you think it's "selling." 

5. Don't write something you know nothing about, lyrically. Write what you know. Write what's true and real (not necessarily factual-they are two different things). As the old cliché goes, show it don't tell it. If there's a way to put it in pictures, do that. Listeners will forgive many songwriting sins (lack of clarity, self indulgence, no melody) if there are enough pictures. Many contemporary singer/songwriters are proof of this. 

6. Don't whine. Don't preach. Speak from your own viewpoint. Don't speak for everyone (e.g., "we all...") Show some wisdom, some understanding and be forgiving every now and then. In your songs and in your life. The songs will be better and the singer will be more likable.

7. Do develop a sense of irony. Read literature, novels and poetry (especially modern poetry with no meter and rhyme). Listen to great composers including the classical composers. They will give you a sense of harmonic progression you won't get by listening only to top 40 . Be aware of where you start your story. Just like films, songs don't necessarily start at the beginning. Sometimes there are flashbacks. 

8. Don't change viewpoint or refer to the same person as "you" and "she" in the same song. Be specific as often as possible, rather than general. 

9. Don't throw the title on after the song is done. The title should direct your writing. Understand metaphor and analogy and realize how many great songs were based on them. 

10. Don't let your writing be crippled by people who critique it who can't write a better song than you can, especially if they give you rules like "Get to the chorus in 4 lines" or "Never repeat a word in a verse" or some other such arbitrary rule that comes from not knowing what to say to you at a pitch session. 

11. Finally, do trust your own instincts, over everything I've said here. But be able to learn from the songs you admire. That's the best way, in the final analysis.

© 1999 Just Plain Folks.