How To Enhance Your Songwriting :The Elements of Emotional and Confident Music

Figrin D'an & The Modal Nodes

There comes a time in any serious musician’s life when you stop bashing on your instrument and you start thinking about what exactly it is that you are doing. You want to write a powerful song, everyone does; so what makes a song powerful?

Music has a magical quality that is completely unique; It makes us feel. Some songs are happy, some are sad, but more complex emotions like humor, anticipation and even danger are all easily conveyed if you know how to do it. I’m sure you all know that a lot of music is written to illicit specific emotions but it’s not only what you play, it’s how you play it.

What Message Do You Want To Send?

The first thing you need to do is decide what kind song you want to write. What emotions are you trying to convey? Let’s say you want to write an uplifting song. You will probably want to use a major key with a moderate to fast paced tempo and play it with confidence. There are a number of ways to accomplish this. All You Need IsLove by The Beatles is a good example, or listen to Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 17 Finale.

These songs incorporate major scales and chords for a dramatic and positive emotional response form the listener. Notice that certain chords are emphasized. For example, In All You Need Is Love, The chorus is very strong, and the instrumentation is a lot more intense. Also notice that the music walks down the major scale in a very frantic way, slightly decreasing in intensity before the chorus crashes in with big, confident strokes backed by a full orchestra in full force. Very dramatic indeed.

On the other hand, if you want a more somber or reflective tone, you will most likely use a minor key at a slower pace. This tends to have a very emotional and pensive feeling. One of my favorite examples of this is Strange Weather by Tom Waits. It’s a simple tune in a 3/4 time signature. Its drags along and is interlaced with Tom’s signature gravely vocals, with a soulful sax and some clever use of horns, clarinets and trombones to add to the melancholy atmosphere.

It’s All In The Approach

The intensity, frequency, and loudness of your approach also affect the song. For instance, a waltz works because the loudness of the first beat accentuates the relative weakness of beats two and three. When this 1-2-3 pattern is repeated in this way, it gives the music that lilting quality that gives the waltz its particular and danceable characteristic.

Not To Touch The Earth by The Doors is a perfect example of the use of semitones (notes that are directly next to one another) to achieve a frantic, anticipating or nervous feel. By repeating the two semitones D and Eb with a frantic tempo, you get the sense that something dangerous is coming. This is accentuated by Jim Morrison’s mysterious lyrics in a terrific example of how the meaning of the song is enhanced by the lyrics and the atmosphere provided by the music itself.

You will want to note that each instrument has its own timbre or tone that gives it a unique quality. Oboes and baritone saxophones tend to have a sad quality while flutes and ukulele’s tend to have a brighter and happier timbre. When these instruments are used to support certain characteristics of the music, it lends to the overall emotional impact of the music as well.

Know When To Break The Rules

Of course, these rules are not strict. A minor key can be played at a quick tempo and be celebratory. I like to cite Figrin D’an and the Modal Nodes, more commonly known as the Star Wars Cantina Band. The song form the bar scene called Cantina Band is in the key of Dm, but uses a ragtime feel and a fast tempo to give the feeling of a celebration. It moves through the keys of C major and F major for the lifts and give the piece complexity and a genuine levity that most everyone enjoys.

Leonard Cohen, in turn, can make any song somber and reflective. Hallelujah is in C major, but in the hands of Mr. Cohen, it’s downright depressing for his low, smooth vocals over a slow tempo that meanders through the major scale and gives it a very haunting feel.

All of this goes to show that clever use of keys, scales, tempos and modes can greatly enhance your sound and the dynamics of your musical performance and take you well beyond the 3 chord blues or punk rock song. If you’re not doing it now, try experimenting a little with these techniques. Pick your favorite song. Isolate the parts that excite you the most, or have the most impact and pick it apart. What are they doing and how are they attaining that effect? Chances are they are using some of these techniques in their songwriting.

Break On Through

If you feel like you’re in a musical rut, try exploring some of these musical concepts and see if you can create something new and exciting that may re-energize your songwriting process. At the very least, these ideas may help you to write a more compelling piece for your group and might even influence your next album. If it does, make sure to thank me in your liner notes!

Ref.

How Music Works by John Powel

http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/sound/timbre.html

The Benefits Of Being A Music Teacher: How I Re Discovered My Appreciation For Rock N Roll

I’m learning a lot by teaching. I think it might be a good idea for every musician to take on at least one student. It forces you to focus on every minute detail of music. The fundamentals; the nuts and bolts. Heck, you might even discover that you missed a little here and there or that your own understanding shifts the way you look at music. It teaches you about yourself. What do you really know? Are you as good as you think you are? You’d better be because this person is going to take your knowledge and run with it. Teaching music has renewed my appreciation for all forms of expression again.

You know, lately I’ve been straying form rock n roll. Not that I have anything against it mind you, but for years, I was consumed by it…I was so involved in it that I lost myself. That can happen with Rock n Roll because rock is excess. It’s is over the top, it is everything society screams against when it’s done right. The fact that society mirrors Rock N Roll in many ways is somewhat disturbing.

 Society is on drugs all the time, staying up way too late and having far too much sex with unsavory characters. That’s what’s wrong with us- we've decided that everyone is a rockstar; every man, woman and child. Hey rockstar, its time to change your diaper again.

 You know, when you watch Star Wars, Darth Vader is awesome, but you’re not supposed to go out in the world and be Darth Vader.He is the bad guy. Rock N Roll is like Darth Vader, strong in the force and a very, very bad guy. They kind you don't take home to mother. And as cool as he is, you don't want to be like him, really. He is living in hell, his mind is constantly being tortured and he lives in constant pain. HE does look good on camera though, ill give him that, but at the end of the movie you leave his excess behind in the theater and resume your daily routine. End scene.

Society needs a reset button. That’s why I’m playing in a folk band. It’s a rocking folk band, to be sure, but it is a folk band. It’s time to drag you all the other way and pull you out of the excess, so rock can mean something more again. God bless the rockers for sacrificing their sanctity in the name of our merriment and escape.Rock has given us people to vicariously live through so that we don’t have to abandon our families, get wasted on Night Train and wake up in a puke stained hotel room with some dreadful woman in your bed. It’s no fun and besides, what do we tell our kids when we stumble through the door at 11 AM, reeking of Stolis and vomit?

Now i can appreciate it again, after taking my brief hiatus. I'm still having way too much fun playing old drunken folk songs and recalling cold winter nights in old European inn's. Everyone's dancing. I like that. It took putting it down, walking away from it to find it again. More specifically  by going back and teaching others why it is so good, I rediscovered what I love about it.

Back to teaching. Teaching allows us to impart all kinds of wisdom about music to open ears that are uninformed and opinionated. What a responsibility and what a joy. We get to go back to the roots ourselves and give it to a new generation, to see what they do with it.

The last thing I want to do is make them play like me. No, no, no. I want them to take my knowledge and write the song nobody’s thought of yet. But in order to do that, they must know everything from the ground up. Nuts and bolts. Then they can build their machinations as they see fit and our past is relived, our metal tested. Dust off the old books and try again.

So learn something about yourself by teaching someone else, you will regain an appreciation for something you never knew you lost. Long live Rock N Roll.

Lil ‘A’ and the Allnighters: Special Project

This is probably one of the most faithful contemporary recordings of classic jump blues and 12 bar blues rock n roll from the 50s-60s sound I’ve come across. Inspired by the harmonica greats like little Walter and William Clarke, this album packs a punch. Fronted by Alex ‘Lil A’ Woodson, this record simply rocks. He is supported by Joe Conde and Anthony Contreras sharing guitar duties, AJ Martel on drums and Norm Gonzales lays the foundation on the bass guitar.

 Each member serves the music and settles right in to tight grooves and boogies all night long with some of the most tasteful guitar playing your find in the genre today and a healthy dose of gritty blues harp. The bass is solid and groovy and the slick back beats, shuffles and marching New Orleans style drumming is not to be ignored either.

Low Down Dog by Smiley Lewis Kicks off with a strong blues harp and heads right into some good old fashioned 12 bar blues rock. It’s definitely for a more mature audience who appreciates the bygone era of music and reflects a musical purity that seems lost on a lot of modern music.

Then into Mellow Down Easy by Walter Jacobs is a similar vein, jumping swinging blues with superb blues harp played on top.

Off the Wall is another Little Walter tune, written for the blues Harp. It’s a classic instrumental blues and it’s executed with terrific authority and understanding. The breaks are all spot on and the backbeat is in the pocket.

Aint Gonna Do It is another Smiley Lewis song and its very jazzy number that picks it up with a solid beat and carries it throughout the song

Chicken Shack is an Amos Milburn tune. This one is right at home in a juke joint in Memphis. It brings to mind hot nights, good booze and great times.

It closes out with A.C. Boogie penned by the groups own Anthony Contreras; it’s a great little boogie woogie number that is smoking throughout.

I’ll say this, you are hard pressed to find a better 50s rock n blues band than Lil A & the Allnighters. They are tight, and have a dedication to the classic blues that really kicked off the Chess Records era of the genre in a terrific fashion and a great Homage to great players and songwriters. The boys have crafted a mighty strong blues record here so If you are a hardcore blues fanatic, you should add this lil gem to your collection.