Fundamentals, Again

Michael Anderson

Every quarter I start at the beginning in showing students how the best way to build an understanding and mastering of the craft of songwriting is to look at the fundamentals of the art of songwriting in order to give themselves the tools and comprehension necessary to compete in an ever tougher music industry.

The temptation (and perhaps allure) of an industry that is obsessive over the "new and different" is to think that because what you do is "new and different" it must be somehow "better" and therefore exactly what the industry is looking for (or needs).

That attitude is typified in the classic "I don't want to know how a bunch of old farts did it before — I have my own style and I am in a hurry to cash in" commentary of some new students. Needless to say, the production from students with that attitude is usually much more familiar than "new and different" — in fact it is often "old and the same" and badly done.

But as I point out to my students every new semester, what the entertainment business really means is not "new and different" as much as "the same old thing only different". Just because something is "new" or "different" doesn't make it better. Often what passes for new is a repackaging of something that was successful before and has been updated or tweaked.

Michael Lloyd, one of the most successful record producers of all time, has come into my classes as a guest several times over the last few years and spoken to students. One of his repeated pieces of advice to students is that they should make a concerted effort to learn about and understand the history of pop music, study the classic composers going back through the Gershwins, Rogers and Hammerstein, Irving Berlin, the Brill Building era, through Lennon / McCartney, Bacharach and David - find out how they wrote, what they wrote, learn technique and approach from the masters. Michael Lloyd continues to have long success because he understands the business from the long perspective - not only what is "new and different", but why it is and how the development of those ideas got there.

I have written before in this column how the Beatles were students of the pop song form and the charts of their era - they had to play long sets in Hamburg, using many pop and R&B songs of their days to fill in the long hours and they knew the chords structures and pop conventions of their time. They reinvented pop music and remain the gold standard to this day through their ability to be influenced by and use what they learned from what had come before them.

To take it to another form — Pablo Picasso is recognized as one of the masters of modern art. His minimalist and cubist paintings are considered some of the masterpieces of abstract art. But before he ever started painting in an abstract style, he mastered the approach of realism — in other words, learned the fundamentals of the classic approach to painting before he (and others) rewrote the rules.

On my Amazon page for "The Little Black Book of Songwriting" the first critique of the book pans it - the critic says most of what is in the book is obvious. He is right. I have a lengthy response to his critique you can read there if you are interested, but the point is that many writers want to run before they can walk - and they end up tripping themselves for a long time wasting a lot of effort. I know I did, and I see it everyday in other writers.

I have only written one book on songwriting — and I have no plans for another (unless it is a collection of these articles), because so much of what is teachable about songwriting, like life, are the fundamentals. Anything else you pretty much have to wing on your own as an artist — and that is the kind of stuff that is difficult, if not impossible to teach — you have it or you don't.

Don't be afraid to learn from the efforts of writers who came before you — don't be afraid to be simple — don't be afraid to write or present something that feels basic, open, emotionally honest or transparent. Most of the performances in my classes by students that have been memorable have been a solo artist doing his or her song simply with an acoustic guitar or piano and devastating the room emotionally and artistically.

Writing songs is not rocket science — I have been telling my students there are two basic types of song — falling in love songs and breaking up songs — both with many subcategories. But of those are the fundamental categories pop is built on. Songs are an emotional communication on an artistic level that can only be shared in that way. And human emotions are usually very simple (in a complex way). Most good songs are too.

Learn from the writers who pulled off that contradiction.