This is the part 1 of Understand series.
I started out writing songs since 14 years old. That is a long time ago. I started counting the songs I’ve written since about 10 years ago, it has come up to 254 songs. Some are properly recorded. Some are just rough demo.
This new song - Understand - is No. 252. This is the latest song that’s properly arranged, recorded and mixed as good as I am capable of. In this post, I am going to show you the structure of the song and some special stuffs that I had integrated which I think worth mentioning. Hopefully it will inspire you for your next song writing session.
First, let’s hear the song first.
明白 (Understand)
曲: KCLau 罗觥荃
词: WindySaturday
清晨醒了过来
日光洒在阳台
你昨天说的话
我忽然明白
在那蓝天之外
有道光线存在
照射过的人
都渴望恋爱
拨了电话 我要你明白
你的暗示 效用是否还在
你心中明白
别扯到蓝天之外
明知道爱上了心动了
就该说出来
你需要明白
把一切清楚交代
我在等你自首承认后
才能拥我入怀
I was given the lyrics by a good friend - C.Y.Ooi. His friend, Windysaturday wrote it.
Tricks used in the song writing process:
- Start with a great lyrics - since the lyrics are well structured into 3 parts - 2 verses, 1 pre-chorus, and 2 choruses, it is pretty easy to come up with the melody.
- Start with the chorus part - As usual, I sat at the piano and started off with the chorus part. It is important to lay down the melody for the chorus part first and foremost. Many times the unfinished songs are stuck at without having a stronger chorus part. You may write a memorable verse but couldn’t finish off the whole songs because your chorus and bridge parts seems too weak.
- Unique chord progression - at 0:42 to 0:45, there is a catchy progression which use some chords that’s not in the key of C. You might have noticed that this song is in the key of C Major. This part is the pre-chorus, the part that is leading into the chorus. The progression is FMaj7, Bm7, Bb7, Am7. In fact, this is the last part I wrote in the song. I was stuck here for quite long. I get the beginning of pre-chorus with FMaj7. After the phrase end with Bm7, it is some sort of jammed over there. Later, I put in the chord progression of Bm7, Bb7, Am7, and it nicely resovle to Dm7 and then G. This is an imperfect cadence where it will lead to the chorus nicely.
This post is a part of Understand 明白 Series
Part 1: Songwriting - Fill up the melody
Part 2: Music Arrangement - tritone substitution
Part 3: Vocal recording - introducing Studio Project C1
Part 4: Mixing - totally in the box
Part 5: Marketing and promotion
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