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I'm going to share some tips with you to help you write great songs.
Tip number one, write bad songs.
Writing bad songs is often the way to writing good songs.
And by no means do I mean that you're ultimately
wanting or desiring to put out bad material, but by writing bad songs,
we learn the craft.
Most successful songwriters I know write lots of songs.
The time perfecting one song isn't always as valuable
as time spent writing a whole lot of songs
and learning a lot from each experience.
Early in my career, a songwriter once told me,
you're not a real songwriter until you write 200 songs.
This seemed pretty daunting to me at the time,
but it wasn't until later I really understood it.
I practically had to get through that many songs
before I really started to understand how to write.
And this is not just to say write randomly, write without any thought.
With courses and study like you find here at Berklee Online,
you can really hone that skill, and in my belief,
you can write probably fewer than 200 and really arrive at a great place.
And be OK with writing something bad, because you can then let it go.
Learning when to let something go is really important.
So you have to write a lot of what you might not love,
but then you can move on to something new.
And ultimately, you'll find the level of song
you write every day gets better and better and better.
Tip number two, write when you're uninspired.
This seems to fly in the face of many things
we hear like, oh, I write when I feel the muse.
You know, I just write when I'm inspired.
And by all means, write when that's happening.
When you're feeling inspired, don't stop.
I have moments when something flashes in my head, and I'll write,
and I might go on for hours.
And maybe multiple songs come out, and those are wonderful times.
But if I was to wait for that all the time,
I don't think I'd feel inspired enough.
And there are times when you're working in this industry you
need to be able to create on demand.
I learned this early on in my career when
I started looking at successful songwriters
and how they wrote like a job, yet they were having the enjoyment out of it
like it was the best job in the world.
It didn't seem like work to them, but their habits--
they were diligent like it was work.
They showed up every day and wrote, and it was amazing
how often they were writing songs.
Compared to myself when I felt, oh, I might get a song idea here
or there, these writers were popping out songs
left and right and seemed to be inspired,
yet they were just showing up to work.
What I found is if I write when I'm uninspired, sometimes from the writing
process, I do become inspired.
It's actually like opening a door on creativity.
At one point, say it's 9 o'clock in the morning.
I don't feel inspired, and I just start writing.
It might be by 9:15 I actually am inspired.
Maybe it doesn't come until later, but the fact
that I started writing actually allows the inspiration to appear.
I feel we have to be working and writing in order
to feel that inspiration sometimes.
It's not going to always be apparent when we're doing something else.
So make it a point to write when you're uninspired.
Tip number three, do what you're terrible at.
I know this doesn't sound like fun, and I don't really
get excited about jumping into doing something I know I'm not good at.
But that exact action actually helped my career greatly.
We only get good at something by doing it.
Anything you're good at now, at one time, you weren't great at.
The demands of today's songwriter are a lot more encompassing than before.
We're expected to be able to write in different styles,
start and complete a song in different ways, have more skills,
be able to write lyrics, melody.
We probably can't do it all perfectly, but the more skills you have,
the better a writer you'll be, and the more you'll
be in demand in the industry.
The more skills that I had to bring to the table, the more opportunities
came up to write.
And actually, for me, the more fun writing was, because the more styles
I'd write in, the more projects I'd be involved in,
and the more people I'd meet.
And the more people I met, the bigger my career became.
Just try to improve one skill that you currently don't feel great at.
Start small.
It's not going to change overnight.
But just a little attention to that skill today
and the next day and the next day will start
to make you a better writer and more valuable in the music industry.
Tip number four, write with a rigorously rigid calendar.
Yeah, it doesn't sound fun, and a rigorously rigid calendar
sounded awful to me when I was younger.
However, I learned the power of a calendar.
Use the calendar in your phone or your computer
to really set a rigorous schedule.
Setting due dates and deadlines make you accomplish something.
I found without a calendar, I'd have a tendency
to let things roll, and I'd blow them off and just say like,
oh, I'll get to writing later.
I'll get to writing later.
But it was only the things on my calendar that actually happened.
If I've set a time to write, I'll show up and I'll do it.
But it really was only that calendar when I made it a priority.
I also set daily writing times, so I can take that time
when I'm thinking that I might be uninspired, and I know it happens.
So I might set a time every morning to write and also
every evening to write on a day where I know the middle of my day
is going to be full.
But make it a habit, because what happens
is all of a sudden, in that time, if you set those dates, you've come through.
You've performed.
After a few weeks, you'll find that you have written so many more times,
you'll have potentially written so many more songs,
and you've developed skills, because you've been showing up to the table
and writing on a much greater level than if you had just
let your calendar float.
And I noticed my skill level increasing, because songwriting is a skill.
There's creativity-- yes, absolutely.
There's a lot of creativity involved in songwriting,
but just like playing your instrument, the more you do it, the better you get.
So you want to show up every day, and that calendar will help you do it.
It will help you accomplish projects, and it'll
help you become a better songwriter.
So keep these tips in mind.
They're funny titles, but they're really important concepts.
They made a big difference in my career, and I feel
they'll make a big difference in yours.
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