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Notes from Suzan Koc on Songwriting

notes from this video. suzan koc is a wonderful and experienced songwriter from LA. i've had the pleasure of talking with her and seeing one of her lectures live. i'm sure she would agree that her advice should be taken with a grain of salt, and that there are no hard fast rules. however, i also know her advice comes largely from today's trends and what works for songwriting in today's market.

below are notes that i found most helpful. if you have some time, i'd still recommend watching the video to hear these tips more in context, but below would be a tl;dw(watch):

-there are way less chord changes and way MORE MELODIC CHANGES in today's world. when the chords are simple, you need to create rich tension with rich and dynamic melodies.

-you need to get that hook within 30 seconds of the song.

-everything in the song needs to support the chorus.

-the hook is something familiar AND singable.

-you need lyrical, melodic, and rhythmic hooks.

-melodic phrases within a section: ABAB doesn’t work anymore. AABC, ABAC, etc., does. [more variation]

-if you’re going to repeat the verse, it better be good, or short enough where you can repeat it.

-[career advice] stick to your lane. writing for film and tv is like writing a new craft. get really good at songwriting for radio or as an artist, because writing for film can be a different beast. you will become a craftsman and not an artist by trying to write for film if you're trying to write radio hits.

-what keeps the music business going is new music. However, it HAS to be good. there are no minor leagues in the industry.

-if the songs aren’t syncopated, the audience is bored. we are in the  hiphop era.

-there is no such thing as writer’s block. you are free to write sucky songs to get to the good songs. if you hate writing the sucky songs, you’ll get constipated, so just let it out. no one died of writing a bad song!

-verse chorus verse chorus is dated. [interesting] you really should have a pre-chorus in between there.

-pre-chorus: the glue between verse and chorus. it used to be just the lift, but it also has to be hook-y.

-the bridge is NOT a contrast, the bridge is what has not been said in the rest of the song.

-deep house is coming in 2015 with bands such as clean bandit. deep house has been around forever, since late 80s or so!

-[career advice] people get in the way of themselves more than the music industry gets in their way.

-soft rhymes are GOOD because they keep the conversation feel of it. perfect rhymes are dated and make it sound too much like a broadway musical. internal rhymes are also good. ABAB can work [this form is different than the melodic structure examples mentioned above]

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Remember to Always Do This, Musicians

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For Artists: Notes/Links From the 2014 Chicago Creative Expo

This was several months ago, but these links and notes are still very useful. In March I headed over to the Chicago creative expo, an event where people talk about all things creative, from marketing to selling music to how to make a viable career as an artist. I wrote down some notes I thought would be handy. Some cater to the musician, other notes may be interesting for any creative person.

On social media & networking

-Tweetdeck and especially Hoot Suite: social media dashboards, schedule posts in advance, see all of your social media at once

-A good time to post on your social media might be between 8/10am, when people are procrastinating at work. Noon and 4-6pm are also good times, when people are leaving work/getting home from work. However, depending on who your audience is, a 1am post might be good if your audience is up late.

-Fans at a performance/on your social media page want a dialogue, not a monologue.

-On networking: establish rapport. Instead of meeting a dozen people at a networking event, you want to met one or to people. Learn a lot about them. That is more likely to produce something meaningful.

-The last eight words are what people will remember when they meet you.

Career related

-Always: 1) Trust your instincts, trust yourself, and trust your guts. 2) Take risks. If you don’t risk there’s no reward. What’s the other side of the coin of risking? Do you really have that much to lose? 3) Be patient with yourself and with your career.

-Lay out your career in a one, three, or five year plan.

-Reel Chicago: Good source for acting/visual media

-How ready are you really? If you stumble out in the world, people have big memories.

-The secret of Gene Hackman’s success was sticking out those extra 20 years.

Does your music album have: ISRC cods, UPC codes, Gracenote, audio tagging?

-People 40+ are willing to pay full price music or art; under 30 sometimes want it free

-Songwriter’s Market Book: So many resources in one book. Check it out.

-Radio-locator.com: get your music on the radio.

-The number one place for finding and listening to music in the world is... YouTube.

-Chicago is the land of "independent everything," but when it blows up, you have to move to the genre-specific city.

-The laws are behind the technology. Technology is moving quicker than the laws to support and protect artists.

-indieguide.com

-Are your music mixes: Radio friendly? Alternative versions? Have vocals up in the mix, vocals down?

-Put a “video coda” in your YouTube videos: add extra audio at the end so people won’t be enticed to download directly from YouTube instead of purchasing it.

-For writers: createspace.com, Lulu.com

-Merch on demand: upload art and put it on a t-shirt. Fans pick what they want. Use things like CafePress, Zazzle, DistrictLines, Spreadshirt

-musicsupervisors.com: list of people looking for music supervisors, music supervisors looking for music

-goseedo.org

-thebasslinegroup.com

on Kickstarters

-Three weeks is an ideal campaign length

-If you reach 30% of your goal, it’s likely you’ll reach the whole goal

-Don’t list perks that take a lot of time and money.

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What Makes a Good Song Great

I've been songwriting for 10+ years, I have over fifty songs that I consider good material. I've collaborated, written the theme song for a TV program or two, and won contests with my work. Here is what I believe are some guidelines to keep in mind when trying to create a great song.

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Logic Pro Advice

Logic Pro X, a computer recording program (commonly referred to as a Digital Audio Workstation) can be broken down in to a few really big (and really important) sections. If you become familiar with these "sections" like a boss, you'll know Logic in depth.

Logic’s instruments. If you're recording in the box, and not recording any live instruments, learn all of Logic's instruments like Ultrabeat or the Vocoder. But get to know a couple of these instruments really well, because the instruments have a lot in common. For example, most of them will have envelopes, LFOs, and filters, so figure out how to use those. Play around with them all the time, and save anything you create as a preset so you can pull it up later. Read the manual, look at YouTube tutorials to learn even more in depth. (Reading and watching tutorials is the best way I learn Logic)

Logic’s effects. Do you know compression and EQ? People say EQ and compression are the most important plugins and effects, and I agree. Get to know these. Logic has several built-in EQs. Don’t forget multi band compression! There are other great plugins, like the auto filter, guitar/bass amp (don’t just use for guitars/bass!) and space designer. Maybe one day go through all of them and at least become familiar with all of them. Also, go under Plugins -> Audio Units -> Apple, and there’s another world of plugins to become familiar with.

Logic’s presets. These can be found in the library or in the menus of the instruments or plugins. It’s a good way to see what kind of sounds the developers made. You can also tweak them and use them as a starting point for shaping your own sounds.

The arrange window. Are you familiar with what every button and drop down menu does on here? Automation and flex mode? (The world of automation is huge, you can control any knob or fader in an instrument or plugin over time!) There’s also a quick help button in the top left if you need that.

Same for the mixer. The arrange window and mixer are where you access pretty much everything.

Logic’s menu bar. Here you have preferences and project settings, and lots of other fun stuff that can help you customize logic.

Keyboard shortcuts. Ultimately, you want to access everything as quickly as possible so that it doesn’t affect creativity. Customizing keyboard shortcuts (Alt + K) will help with this.

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You Can't Do It Alone

As one of my top bands Vampire Weekend says in one of their songs, you can't do it alone. Whenever I hear that, for some reason I think about how you can't lead your music career alone. Even if you're a solo concert pianist, you probably will need a manager. If you're a band, well, you need the other members of course. You might be able to do it alone for a while, but when you start gaining popularity, you'll need people to do things you aren't good at. For me, that's marketing, promoting, things of that nature. I can only do that to a certain point. You can't do it alone. -S

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You Will Mess Up

Sorry to say that forcefully, but you will. By this I mean you will make errors such as your work, your love life, and your driving. I will be making typos in my writing that I didn't catch (advanced apologies). If you're an artist, you will create something that you will view as an error when you look back at it. If you don't mess up in these things, then you're a robot. Even then, robots crash.

Well, that's depressing right? What's my point? I leave you with this quote:

Those who are successful fail far more than those who are not successful.

-S

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Can It All Be Done Online?

I was in a couple great bands over the years. We played a lot of venues, but I was always a firm believer that you can reach such a larger market of people online. Can it all be done online? 

The market is over-saturated. This is true for live performance, but this is especially true when you're browsing music blogs or Spotify. There are thousands of bands doing what you do.

After having a top-notch product comes promoting yourself. This is not just with advertising and getting your music on blogs, it's about making a personal connection.

So can you promote your music all online? Probably not, there is still nothing like a live connection. That's also where you rake in a lot of dough: live performances and selling merch (except doing a pay to play gig!! Worst deal ever! Read more on pay to play: http://aristake.com/?post=79) But, I do believe that ultimately you can do almost everything from selling your music online to one day performing music online at a high streaming quality. I think that's where it's going. After all, your market online is, upon last check, the world. 

S