How do you begin a song?
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- KVRAF
- 6596 posts since 21 Jun, 2004 from Secret Underground Hideout
on the keyboard or guitar, it's my left hand wandering
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- KVRist
- 445 posts since 24 Apr, 2005
Take lots of rich organic sounds and arrange them in interesting ways. Somehow, a song gets built up out of that process.
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digitalmessiah digitalmessiah https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=45221
- KVRist
- 361 posts since 21 Oct, 2004 from sunny florida, baby!
most of my songs were born out of auditioning pad patches.
be part of the solution, not the problem
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- KVRAF
- 10597 posts since 13 Jun, 2004 from Alberto Balsam
i usually get a song started when i make bass or beats that i want to keep. Then I build a song around that.
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digitalmessiah digitalmessiah https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=45221
- KVRist
- 361 posts since 21 Oct, 2004 from sunny florida, baby!
you're right. one could go on and on with the intro and the body of the song but ending it is a bit tricky. sometimes i do a repetition of a section and fade or go softer then stop or just crash everything and end it.Cheeso wrote:Beginning is dead easy...it's finishing a song that can't do for the life of me.
be part of the solution, not the problem
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- Rad Grandad
- 38041 posts since 6 Sep, 2003 from Downeast Maine
I love these questions...cause I never have an answer...
...I can't think of one time I sat down and said...."I'm gonna write a song"...I sit down and work on songs...but the songs all come from different places. Sometimes I'm working on a song and I'm just not in that song's groove that day and I find myself just messing about with my gi-tar or a synth and/or B4 and I say "ooh I should tape that"...I even have awoke in the night, had an idea and taped it...
...I can't think of one time I sat down and said...."I'm gonna write a song"...I sit down and work on songs...but the songs all come from different places. Sometimes I'm working on a song and I'm just not in that song's groove that day and I find myself just messing about with my gi-tar or a synth and/or B4 and I say "ooh I should tape that"...I even have awoke in the night, had an idea and taped it...The highest form of knowledge is empathy, for it requires us to suspend our egos and live in another's world. It requires profound, purpose‐larger‐than‐the‐self kind of understanding.
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- KVRian
- 564 posts since 16 Nov, 2004 from The People's Republic of West Palm Beach
Usually jsut fiddle around with chords on the acoustic guitar. The songs let you know when they want to be recorded.
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- KVRAF
- 2070 posts since 2 Apr, 2004
Dont think of it as a song, most of my (better) songs start with thoughts like:
-What will happen when I mix this sound with that sound?
-What does this button do?
-What will happen when I mix this sound with that sound?
-What does this button do?
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- KVRian
- 697 posts since 2 Dec, 2002 from northern germany
i usually start with some kind of idea like "i'll take a one-bar bassline and repeat it for 5 minutes, now i'll make something cool out of it"
well, usually i fail
but hey, who finishes songs anyway?
well, usually i fail
but hey, who finishes songs anyway?
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- KVRian
- 958 posts since 14 Apr, 2004 from Maryland, USA
Since I'm mostly a lyrics-first songwriter, it's typically one little bit, one line, that cues something in my head that gets me rolling. For example, during one particularly miserable session of lawn mowing, after I'd been neglecting it for too long, my dripping, overheated, miserable brain started thinking "this lawn is like a jungle." By the time I was done mowing, I had a set of lyrics in my head that I typed up as soon as I was done. Doesn't happen often, but it's fun when it does.
For instrumental stuff, it mosly comes out of playing/poking around with the guitar or keyboard until some interesting little idea pops out, and then building from that.
DaveL
For instrumental stuff, it mosly comes out of playing/poking around with the guitar or keyboard until some interesting little idea pops out, and then building from that.
DaveL
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- KVRist
- 227 posts since 27 May, 2003
Most of the time I have it already in my mind, before I touch instrument or turn up the computer. It is usually at least a melodic idea, few chords, groove and overall feel of the song. Then I make some basic parts of the song, work on guitar part, work on refining existing parts a little bit and then add missing parts of the song, like, if I have chorus, and guitar riff, I'll play around till I found something that can work as a verse.
What I really find helpful is to stop playing song or instrument every few minutes and concentrate to hear all parts in my head. It is much easier for me to come up with parts I need and arranging ideas this way. As close as I could come to wires going directly in my head, translating music from my mind to the computer data, the better.
I used to noodle around on guitar untill I come up with something, but not anymore, I have found that this way I often play things that are just combination of music I already know to play on the guitar, so nova days I tend to compose even guitar solo without guitar, it is easier to come up with something unusual and interesting that way.
What I really find helpful is to stop playing song or instrument every few minutes and concentrate to hear all parts in my head. It is much easier for me to come up with parts I need and arranging ideas this way. As close as I could come to wires going directly in my head, translating music from my mind to the computer data, the better.
I used to noodle around on guitar untill I come up with something, but not anymore, I have found that this way I often play things that are just combination of music I already know to play on the guitar, so nova days I tend to compose even guitar solo without guitar, it is easier to come up with something unusual and interesting that way.
Last edited by Vervil on Sat Jul 23, 2005 12:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.