For songwriters, it’s a perennial question: “Which should I write first, music or lyrics?”
Is it best to write lyrics first, write music first, or both together?
You can write your song’s lyric at any point in the process. You can:
- Write lyrics first, with no musical accompaniment at all
- Write lyrics while composing, a little at a time
- Write lyrics last, after all the music is composed
All three of these strategies have led songwriters to exciting, memorable work. Whichever one works for the song you’re working on is the correct strategy for that situation.
To learn the most, experiment with all of these songwriting strategies. Each approach has its own advantages and challenges, and each exercises different songwriting “muscles.” As the composer John Cage said, you really can “Start anywhere.” Anywhere at all.
Let’s look at each of these three strategies a little closer.
Strategy 1: Write the Lyric First
For a lyricist, writing the lyric first is a great way to focus on exactly what you want to say and how you want to say it. This approach also allows you to focus on the music hidden in language itself.
Challenges of writing the lyric first include:
- Finding an emotion and a lyric idea without any mood-setting music to help
- Choosing words that sing well, with lines of appropriate length
- Composing melodies that express the feeling and the meaning of the lyric
For more help composing a melody to a finished lyric, check out the post How to Write a Melody For any Lyric.
Strategy 2: Write a Lyric to Finished Music
Writing lyrics for finished music doesn’t always mean writing to a recorded track. It could just mean you’ve got chords and a vocal melody drafted for every section of the song.
The advantage of writing the music first is that the song’s structure is mapped, and the music creates an inspiring emotional drive. By the time you sit down to write the lyric, you already know how many sections you need to fill, and have a musical mood to guide you.
Challenges of writing the lyric last include:
- Inventing detailed descriptions and stories that match the music’s vibe
- Choosing words that are meaningful and fit the vocal melody
- Fitting your entire idea inside the musical structure
For some ideas on writing a lyric to existing music, see: How to Write a Lyric for an Instrumental Track.
Strategy 3: Write the Lyric While Composing
This strategy is a compromise between lyrics and music, where each inspires the other, and each takes shape a little at a time. One very common form of this strategy is to strum a chord progression (or a riff) while composing the vocal melody and the lyric at the same time, so that melody and lyric are born together.
The advantage here is that it allows you to tailor the lyric in little ways to fit the melody, and tailor the melody to fit the lyric.
Challenges of composing and writing at the same time include:
- Overwhelm, if writing alone – it’s a lot for one person to do all at once!
- Collaboration, if writing together – co-writing between a composer and a lyricist can be tricky
When do you write your lyric?
Creative Commons photo by waferboard
I’ve been in bands where I wrote the music and someone else wrote the vocal parts and I’ve been a standalone singer in a band where other people wrote the music for me to write vocals on top. I think both experiences helped me quite a bit with writing full songs on my own.
Most of my songs start with a spark of an idea that can be either musical or lyrical, but typically it’s one line of lyric. From that initial idea I typically write the meat of the song with both the music and lyrics at the same time.
Music is much easier for me to write and I write a ton of music and edit freely. For lyrics, I have to work much harder and it can take a long time for me to finish. I also consider myself to be a very limited singer.
Because I’m such a better musician than lyricist or singer, but am also really into the high-minded concept of writing great songs, I tend let the vocal parts lead and write the music to support.
I have a ton of things written and its more.of a challenge for to find the mood to match it. I usually write and have some idea of how it should come together, subconsciously.
I think it depends on what comes naturally or what you start with. If lyrics aren’t coming out but you’re writing music okay, then that can trigger lyrical ideas later on down the road, and vice versa.
But I’ve also been in situations where a collaborator has a collection of lyrics, and then based on the mood of the lyrics, it narrows down what you can write musically to suit it.
In my experience though, writing lyrics and music together never went well. I end up with fragments of a song with both music and words. I like to start with either a completed instrumental song or a complete set of lyrics.
Mostly lyrics first, on a few occasions the lyrics arrived with a bit of melody. Music first a few times from a chord progression or riff.
I’ve got another spin on the three above, all of which I’ve used at different times. I’ll often ‘hear’ the melody first – especially when there’s no instrument around, then start to add placeholder words in my head or written down (“scrambled eggs”, anyone?) then grab a guitar and find the chords that work best for the melody, and then finally the right words to carry the melody.
This approach seems to beat the ‘oh there’s those chords again’ syndrome, or the ‘those words aren’t strong enough’ obstacle. Once the melody is set, even if it’s the kernel of a verse or the climax of a chorus, that creates the starting point for all the musical, lyrical and structural challenges to come.
The one danger of this is adding chords too early, before the melody has really implanted, and taking the song in another direction. But this can end well too!
I write the lyrics and the melody just comes with it straight out of my head …. if stuck for words I sing and resing what is written and the words just keep flowing out till my little story is ended satisfactorily … I use my very basic guitar skills to keep a rythm going… Once written and I’m happy with the lyrics (length of lines, flow of words, emotion of words, fixing weak spots etc) Then I add chords to match my song sometimes changing the melody slightly… then I take my lyrics and musical ideas to a friend who is gifted with the musical side and changing the syncopation etc … and he takes my ideas and lyrics and goes so much further … but my ideas, basic as they are always inspires him.
Im the opposite …music as a guitarist and melody comes first then words..it all depends on what you see yourself …either a vocalist or a player or both x
Inspiration comes first for me. It really depends on what creative process I decide that’s best for the song I’m writing. Lyrics are very important along with a great melody and music that supports it. There isn’t a right or wrong way to write a song. At the end of the day personal songs are made to express something, while commercial songs are meant to sell something. Both types of songs serve different masters as a result.
i did wtah ever come first to ensure great and excellent work.