Song Critiques: Why You Need Them, Why You Should Do Them
There are two crucial steps that many amateur songwriters overlook in their quest to improve their craft and take their songs to the next level. First, they fail to subject their songs to a critique by other songwriters, and second, they fail to critique their peers’ songs. Many songwriters are also singers and/or musicians, and often spend months or even years studying music and practicing their instrument of choice. But when it comes to the art and practice of songwriting, many potential songwriters don’t realize that the same amount of study will improve their ability to write great songs. That ability can be honed, in part, by having your songs critiqued and critiquing others’ songs.
Why You Should Have Your Songs Critiqued by Other Songwriters
It will save you time, money, and energy. Before you shell out big bucks to get a song professionally recorded, or before you even present it to a wider audience, it’s important to run it by other people. If your song is not getting the response you would like, there is likely some work that still needs to be done. If you are made aware of your song’s weak spots, you can find solutions to make it stronger. One person’s opinion is easy to dismiss, but if three or more people all point out an aspect of your song that they believe makes it weak, you should pay attention. No song is perfect, but even your best songs can be tweaked and finessed before you invest in having them professionally recorded, mixed, mastered, and distributed. Plus, you’ll discover that different people often have radically different opinions about your song - knowing what kind of people appreciate your work will help you focus your promotional efforts better.
Your song is being compared to professional works. When you are presented as a songwriter to a wider audience, the expectations are a lot higher. Anytime you play a gig (even an open mic) or submit your song to someone in the music industry for consideration, your song is being compared to professional songs in the audience’s mind. Professional songs released by a record label have already been scrutinized and reworked - sometimes by dozens of people - before they are marketed to the general public. You usually only have one opportunity to catch someone’s attention with your song. If people don’t like what they hear the first time around, they won’t bother to tell you why, or suffer listening through revised editions. You’ll simply be ignored and left to sort out on your own why your work is not commanding more positive attention.
You are biased about your own work. You naturally “critique” your own song as you go through the process of taking it from a nebulous idea to what you consider to be its completed form. You tweak your melody, edit your lyrics, and basically make sure you’re not embarrassed by your own work. But you have a blind spot when it comes to your song: it may have taken you hours, days, weeks, months, or even years to write it. You may have agonized over the perfect lyrical phrasing, the best chord progression to fit your melody, and whether or not to include a harmonica solo or a gospel choir between the chorus and the bridge. Any shortcomings your song has will be subconsciously diminished in your mind by how hard you have worked on it. You also know exactly how you felt and what you meant with each note you played and word you sang. But you have to play it for others to know if you really have communicated your musical and emotional ideas effectively.
Your friends and family are biased about your work. Don’t get me wrong, friends and family are a crucial support system and often your most devoted fans, but they are not usually in a position to offer unbiased critiques of your song. They are predisposed to like your song, or at least give it a fair listen, because they like you. They probably don’t view you as a professional songwriter (yet!), so they are more likely to be impressed with whatever you produce. What’s more, if your friends and family are not audiophiles, songwriters, or musicians themselves, they will not be able to express an informed opinion. Let’s face it, most people don’t know their brass from their oboe, so the response will likely be limited to either “I like it” or “I don’t like it.” And while those opinions may give you an emotional high or low, neither response really gives you the kind of feedback you need to improve your song.
The producer, sound engineer, and studio musicians you hire are biased about your work. Why? Because you are paying them. Many producers will often suggest ways to make a song better, but at the end of the day, the person who pays is the person who has the final say. They’re not going to suggest major changes to your song and then wait two months for you to do a rewrite when they could have money to pay their bills now. Besides, it’s not their job to make you a better songwriter. Their job is to make the songs you bring them the best they can be in terms of arrangement and sound mixing. They’re not going to turn away work just because they think your song is mediocre. And they are not likely to say anything negative about your song at the risk of you taking your business elsewhere.
It makes you grow a thicker skin. It can be intimidating and emotionally draining at times to have others objectively scrutinize your work. After all, your song is a tiny representation of you and your creative energy, and therefore is dear to you. But your fellow songwriters are offering their thoughts on your song to help make it stronger. If you can take feedback from those who are genuinely trying to help, you’ll develop a thicker skin. And a thick skin is essential in the music business, where many people don’t have the time or desire to help, and don’t care if you succeed or not.
Why You Should Critique Others’ Songs
It creates good karma. You can’t expect others to critique your songs if you aren’t willing to help them in return. While you can avoid critiquing others’ songs by spending $30 or more getting your song critiqued via on-line review sites and self-proclaimed specialists, that stage usually comes after you have produced a good quality recording. If you want people to critique your songs before you invest heavily in recording what may turn out to be a “beta” version, you need to return the favor. Nothing in life is free, but reciprocal song critiques are a lot cheaper!
You become more aware of your own weaknesses as a songwriter. When you critique someone else’s song, you’re not emotionally attached to it, so it’s easier to notice all the little flaws and inconsistencies. But the more you notice the flaws in other peoples’ songs, the more you’ll soon recognize it in your own work as well. And you’ll start feeling like a hypocrite when you point it out to someone else when you know you’re guilty of the same sort of transgressions.
It helps you overcome your genre biases. You may have a soft spot for country tunes, an affiliation for aggressive punk rock, or prefer industrial death metal bluegrass, but studying songs in other genres will help you discern what makes a song work no matter what genre it fits under. Furthermore, you’ll begin to incorporate these universal principles of good song writing into your own work as you are more easily able to recognize them regardless of genre.
It hones your ear to discern what really makes a song work (or not). It’s easy for a casual listener to be deceived by slick production, flawless musicianship, and powerful vocals, but a great song will still stand on its own even when it’s stripped of all those other features. Sure, a song’s delivery contributes to its overall effectiveness, but the best vocalists, musicians, and producers in the world can’t redeem a weak song on performance alone when the problem dwells in the very fabric of the song. As you critique more songs, your judgment will no longer be clouded by these peripheral elements. You’ll no longer confuse flawless delivery with excellent songwriting.
It expands your knowledge of different kinds of songwriting. When you are exposed to songs by people who write in different genres and have different perspectives, styles, and approaches to songwriting, you’ll gain a wider perspective which you will then bring back to your own craft. Whether you’re impressed with another songwriter’s beautiful lyrics, unusual chord progressions, or syncopated rhythmic motifs, studying others’ work can further inspire you to take your own craft to the next level.
It trains you to really focus on the problems so you can offer solutions. Remember when I mentioned that most people won’t be able to articulate a response to a song other than “I like it,” or “I don’t like it?” Well, when you really critique someone else’s song, you can’t say that (or you can’t say only that). In fact, your own personal opinion about the content or genre of the song is irrelevant. You must articulate what you feel works toward strengthening the song, or weakening it. Naturally, if you can find concrete examples of what you think works or doesn’t in a song, you can often find the solution to help improve the song. And as you start approaching all songs with that mindset, you’ll be able to view your own work in the same light.
In conclusion, both having your songs critiqued by others and critiquing others’ songs makes you a better songwriter. Listening and studying your favorite artists’ best songs can be educational, but those songs are usually subjected to many critiques before reaching your ears. You were not privy to the process of finding the initial problems and working out solutions, and critiquing songs that are still works-in-progress will help you develop that skill. Good songwriting appears to be effortless. It’s only when you study your own and others’ attempts that you realize it’s a process of editing and refining with the help of several people’s ears and input.
Playing to sold out stadiums, having #1 hits on the Billboard Charts, climbing the stairs at the Grammys to receive accolades… these are often daydreams that enter the thoughts of up-and-coming artists. But for Pacific Northwest singer-songwriter Nate Manuel, his dreams come true not with notoriety but in a kind of anonymity where the music makes the listener feel something deeply even if the writer is unknown. His vision of success is simply “to play smaller more intimate venues every now and then and have my music played in movies” because, as Nate explained, “ hearing music during movies always leaves a lasting impression… all the emotion can be captured and bottled in a short scene.”
Nate’s early exposure to music created a varied soundscape that suits his aspirations to capture the wide range of human emotion through a backdrop of music. “My earliest experiences in music involved a lot of The Beatles and Simon & Garfunkel from my Dad, and Iron Butterfly and Black Sabbath from my Mom. Led Zeppelin was also a favorite of hers along with Aerosmith. My dad was a softie, while my mom was more into the heavier rock at the time.” He went on to say, “Mom tells me she got this from when she grew up in the Philippines. She and my brothers lived down the street from a bar where lot of sailors would be singing Karaoke.”
Unlike writers who knew from an early age that writing or music was a passion, Nate reflected, “To be honest, I never once dreamed about writing music when I was little. The only singing I’d done was at church and during the Karaoke gatherings my parents would have from time to time.”
Though Nate started writing music in high school while playing bass for a band, he offered, “I never really shared any of my music at the time because it was too personal, and I didn’t want to get shunned for my style of music when the popular music at the time was Punk and Indie rock. I kept all these pent-up songs in secret for over six years, never sharing anything publicly, until the girl I was with encouraged me to do an open mic show at the local Edmond’s Tunes. There I was given 20 minutes to showcase my songs and got a really good response from the listeners.”
Now an active performer and honing his own songwriting craft, Nate says he, “writes songs as a vent for emotions and to cope with the daily struggles of life and love. My inspiration comes from my unsaid emotions. I tend to be passive-aggressive in a lot of situations and never express emotion in a healthy way other than through music. It’s a very obvious cliché, but music has helped me get through a lot in life.”
One of his favorite examples, “Ode to My New Low” is one Nate says he, “can always relate to… it has to do with the songwriting process in general because I’m usually in a state of darkness when I’m writing, and instead of shunning it and treating it as taboo, I’ve learned that sometimes the writing is welcome to help cope with my emotions.”
Nate went on to explain, though, that music has also, “taken a lot from me because I usually write during a low time of my life… revisiting a memory or still handling a current one. So it takes a lot out of me because it’s like putting all my problems on a kitchen table and forcing myself to eat them and enjoy it.”
As Nate works through those complex emotions musically, his writing process is both instrumental and experiential. “I usually start my writing process from either just messing around on the guitar, or trying to figure out other songs for the most part. Sometimes I’ll hear or say something that I like out of the blue, or out of hearing a conversation, and try to sing it into any sort of melody.”
Though Nate continues to grow as a performer and songwriter, like most artists, self-doubt looms in the background. “My greatest challenge as a writer is accepting my music without over criticizing it. I feel like I’m constantly looking for acceptance whether it’s from me or from the audience. As a performer, I never know what to say or how to say things given the pressure of performing and entertaining the public. Trying to make music my life will always be a challenge because there’s so many other great musicians I feel deserve a spotlight, and I never want to take it away from them.”
Nate encourages other writers wishing to grow to follow a simple piece of advice that he applies to his own writing. “I would suggest to never be satisfied easily with your songs. Try to hone your best lyrics and melodies and don’t be afraid to return to them if they’re not exactly what you want them to be. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve rewritten songs because of this, but I am happy with the end result.”
Another resource he found helpful was Songwriters in Seattle. He explained, “I’m not trying to brown-nose, but this group has helped me hone my performance skills at the open mics and showcases. I’ve gotten to collaborate with other musicians and listen in on other musicians who have helped me with my own songs. It’s also been a comfortable group of people who are very supportive during your sets, building your confidence and giving you positive feedback when it comes to your own songs.”
Looking to his future, Nate sees, “more recording and also hoping to help inspire other musicians to keep doing what they love even if they aren’t selling out shows or playing in front of millions of people. I haven’t done any of that but am very satisfied just playing in front of supportive people and also being supportive.”
That desire to be in a supporting role will serve songwriter Nate Manuel well as he continues to seek ways to become the subtle musical soundscape for the complex emotions of characters and conflict in the cinematic genre. And as to how that will unfold, as Nate expresses through his own favorite Mill Davis quote, “If you understood everything I say, you’d be me.”
As the Seattle Times wrote about her in an article in 2014, “Debby Watt can harmonize with a dryer”. We are lucky to be able to offer our members a workshop with vocalist extraordinaire, Debby Boland Watt. Singing and teaching others to find their voice is her entire life mission.
“I love every sound. It can be dogs, it can be birds, it can be just your hands — and we start with that, we build from that,” said Watt, who leads monthly jam sessions at Dusty Strings, and a type of improvisational singing in which Watt provides vocal structures and participants follow before breaking into harmonies and improvised riffs. It’s a model of making music that defies traditional judgments like “good” or “bad”. Instead, every voice is considered a natural extension of the self. Even Watt considers herself less of a singer or vocalist and more of a “resonant being.”
Debby began experimenting with folk, spiritual, blues, jazz and free jazz before discovering circle singing. This style of vocal training was Founded by Bobby McFerrin with the creation of his improvisational Voicestra in 1986. The form is just beginning to become popular in the Northwest. Watt has made it her mission to bring the musical form to the public, and has personally studied under McFerrin.
“In the U.S. we have people that we assign as singers and we put on our headphones and listen to the professionals,” she said. “We don’t have a culture that supports people getting together under a tree and making our dinners and taking care of our babies and singing our stories. It connects people to people on a really dirt, ground level.”
At a recent jam session at Dusty Strings Music Store and School in Fremont, about 20 people contributed to what can only be described as harmonic cacophony. Watt gave different groups in the room parts to sing and improvised on top before ceding the spotlight to someone else. At some points the music became more rhythmic; other times it swelled and flowed. The resonance of different voices coming together buoyed moods, soothed anxieties and turned a group of strangers into a spontaneous community.
The upcoming workshop will be a guided group singing class, created with singer-songwriters in mind. Part exploration and part master class, it emphasizes ease and happiness as you learn what’s needed to produce your best possible sound. Confidently connect with your voice through structural and tonal exercises and ear training, and by learning about the physical components of singing. In the second half of class, play through songs you’re working on and receive a gentle critique from Debby on vocal performance with constructive ideas of what to work on next. Whether you sing for enjoyment or have a particular goal in mind, learn to create harmonies, and enhance your vocal tone when performing your original music.
The event is scheduled for Sunday, May 21, 2017, 2:00 PM to 4:00 PM, at the Phinney Neighborhood Center - Room 35. 6532 Phinney Avenue North, Seattle, WA
Mark your calendars and do come out for this wonderful vocal learning opportunity.
The owl, in ancient traditions, is symbolic of wisdom…a guide to see beyond the obscuring veil of deception and illusion. The spirit of the owl is associated with an ability to see beyond what is hidden to most. And thus, it comes as no surprise that the journey of Seattle songwriter Tobias the Owl is one filled with deep revelation and insight, both personally and musically.
“I often wonder what makes music such an inherent part of the human experience,” he mused. “Songs become the soundtracks of our hearts and minds, and our brains feel sort of ‘hard-wired’ to resonate with music. Alongside the earliest cave paintings of humanity, there are patterns of attrition and attenuation on stalagmites, suggesting that tens of thousands of years ago, early humans may have been rhythmically beating on these structures in patterns creating early expressions of music.”
Tobias the Owl’s own expressions of music began in early childhood. “I’ve always had melodies and songs in my head as long as I can remember. I remember being a toddler, watching other children play, and writing melodies in my head. Music has always felt like it’s in my nature, as a listener and as a musician,” he noted.
That early love of music did not correlate with an early start as a performing musician however. “As a teenager,” he stated, “I was always working. I never had the time or resources to focus on making music. I paid my own way through school without taking any loans. As a student, I grew to love physics and the sciences. There really was never time to pursue music in any serious way. I was also very transient in my youth, and I never kept a musical instrument. It wasn’t until my twenties that I really had my own guitar.”
A health crisis a few years later became a catalyst to bring that guitar to the forefront of his life. “I was diagnosed with cancer. I wanted to play some of my songs before I underwent chemotherapy. The show that I played was with Jonah Tolchin, who started covering one of my songs. After I convalesced, Jonah had become very successful, and my song was on his album. I’ve always felt tremendous gratitude to Jonah and other folks who have spread my music,” he reflected. “It was really because of Jonah’s success with my song that I had the motivation and momentum to pursue music in a more serious way.”
That pursuit led to a writing process that is liquid. “Sometimes a melody is really compelling. Sometimes a phrase is really resonant. So my writing process is a little different for each song. Some of my songs are built around a lyrical idea or theme. Other songs are built around a skeleton of a melody. Some songs are finished within minutes. Others take months to evolve.”
“The only consistent aspect of my writing process,” he commented, “is that I record songs as soon as the inspiration hits me. I write down any lyrical notes right away. I try to at least make some recording of each musical idea immediately as well. I think capturing inspiration in some recorded way as soon as it hits is immensely valuable.”
Since his first shared show, Tobias the Owl has experienced the blessings of working in community. “Music is a very communal form of artistic expression,” he said. “My songs may start in my head, but each of us has a musical journey that I think is meant to be shared with others. I was also very motivated by hip hop artists. There’s a really strong sense of collaboration in the hip hop community on regional and national levels. I’ve felt like inviting others to participate in my musical expression has been a huge part of the process of finding a home for my music.”
Though he is well accepted and appreciated by his fellow songwriters across many genres, Tobias the Owl shares the challenges many creatives face. He reflected, “I’m sure every artist has paroxysms of intense self-doubt. For me, those moments of insecurity and doubt have been really acute and very frequent. I think that I would have pursued music more seriously and sooner, if I weren’t so frequently petrified by such intense self-doubt.”
Outside of the writing process, performing his music also comes at a steep cost. “As a performer, some of my insecurities manifest as really intense anxiety whenever I perform. In fact, I used to throw up before almost every performance. I would often avoid any meals on the day of a show so that I didn’t vomit. I now take beta blockers in order to dull the anxiety that I feel before performing,” he elaborated.
With such a high personal price to pay for persevering as a singer-songwriter, Tobias the Owl identified the factors that keep him moving forward in his creative endeavors. “Although I’ve found that the pursuit of music is really rewarding, it’s also been really arduous. People have often asked me what my goals are in pursuing music, and for a long time, I didn’t really have an adequate answer. The answer finally came to me in an email that I received from a fan in Germany---someone that I’ve never met,” Tobias explained. “He told me that he was going through a difficult time and that my music really helped him in facing his challenges. Because there have been times that I’ve heard a song that seems to ‘fit’ in my mind like a key in a keyhole, knowing there is someone in the world who will have that feeling with my songs keeps me motivated when the journey gets difficult.” He further elaborated, “I’ve come to realize that there are a lot of measures of success that are really elusive, but I’ve found my purpose in knowing that my music fits in the soundtrack of someone’s life somewhere. For me, having a sense of purpose has sustained me through some of the moments of self-doubt that I’ve had.”
In his own life, Tobias the Owl has a “soundtrack in my mind is a really dynamic landscape,” and “maybe the song ‘Murmurs’ is particularly poignant to the themes that I try to focus on. I write a lot of songs about what it means to be human in a universe that seems to overwhelmingly dwarf the scope of our existence, and ‘Murmurs’ is a nice encapsulation of that sentiment. It’s a song about feeling overwhelmed by the vastness of the universe, and feeling anchored by human connection.”
Tobias the Owl is reluctant to offer any advice to other writers because of the uniqueness of each writer’s journey. But he did offer that, “One important thing is to capture every moment of inspiration. Find some way, as portably and as easily as possible, to record every idea that you have.” Additionally, he stated, “I think it’s really important to figure out what you want to express with your musical voice. What is the unique lesson that you want to teach the world? What is the unique aspect of your experience that you want to communicate? I think, for each of us, honing our unique perspective on our place in the world is an important part of developing our voice.”
Using his own background as an example, Tobias stated, “I try to write a lot of songs that are born out of my passion for the sciences. We’re lucky to be living in a period of prolific discovery. We’re uncovering so many more dimensions and parameters of the universe that previous generations of humanity never could have imagined. I feel like my voice as a musician is in delving into the spiritual and philosophical ramifications of our expanding view of the universe.”
Building on his own rich experience with collaboration, Tobias the Owl reiterated its importance. “I would encourage young artists to build relationships with other musicians and friends. Don’t let your bedroom or recording studio become a dungeon of solitary confinement. Figure out ways you can evolve and grow in a community, and figure out what you can do to help your community evolve into a fertile soil for other artists.”
His advice is rooted again in his experience. “There are a ton of people that have connected to my music and have helped with the journey,” he said. “My co-artists, colleagues, listeners, and friends have been the most helpful, most rewarding part of my life as a musician. I often try to reflect on the fact that every note is a wave, and a wave has to be fixed at two points or nodes in order to oscillate. Music has to flow from a creator to a listener, and no song is finished until it’s been shared with someone else.”
Tobias the Owl’s latest release, “Every Eye is a Universe” has now become part of that wave of creativity flowing to the listener. He considers this album, “the best composition that I’ve produced.” But the universe continues to flow, and so does his creativity. “I’m writing new songs, and we’d like to make one more album. But at the moment, I still feel like our new album is very fresh. We did an initial tour in support of the album, but since its release, we’ve made a lot of new fans around the world. In the coming months, I’m hoping to do some further touring to some of the communities that have really embraced our new album.”
Steeped in his early love of the sciences and ever searching for wisdom and insight, Tobias the Owl finds himself musing on a quote from Georg Cantor: “The least particle ought to be considered as a world full of infinity of different creatures.” And now that ‘least particle’ is being examined with the eye, the mind, and the spirit of the one creature whose wisdom has been noted from ancient times to the present: Tobias the Owl.
CAVEAT EMPTOR - Following are some thoughts and rambles on my approach to songwriting. Outside of my two girls, it’s my life’s biggest passion. I don’t pretend that these thoughts are unique, or even unified, but I hope that some part of them may be useful to you.
THE INSPIRATION - I’m a “wait for the inspiration” type of songwriter, not an “every morning at 5 AM sit down and write for 2 hours” type of songwriter. I’ve tried that. No, I’ve thought about trying that. I don’t have the discipline. There’s nothing wrong with, and everything right about, composing during “banker’s hours”, as Stravinsky referred to his 4 hour daily regimen. But that doesn’t mean I don’t take the original inspiration and sweat hours of cracked vocals and callouses on it. And time-wise I’m as likely to be working it from 11 PM to 5 AM as from 5 AM to 7 AM.
TRAPPING THE INSPIRATION - When trapping elusive fur animals (I wouldn’t know personally) trappers set their traps and come back later to check on them. As we know, that ain’t happening in songwriting! Get an idea, save it now or lose it forever. I’ve lost many awesome hook ideas because I had to make a left turn in traffic or push my cart up to the checkout at QFC.
TRAPPING TIPS - When a great idea drifts by and I can snag it, I keep repeating it over and over (and over again if necessary) until I get it either recorded or written down. Otherwise it’s gone forever. I keep my cell phone with the recording app handy.
Later on, when playing back melody or word ideas where I didn’t have an instrument available, sometimes it’s hard to tell why they seemed so good to begin with. If they don’t sound immediately memorable upon playback I erase them. Couldn’t ‘a been much good in the first place. I save the good ones in Evernote.
My best ideas most often occur just in my head sans instrument; with rhythm, melody, harmony, and sometimes key changes, all at once. Four years at Berklee helps. I’m not talking about a whole song, just the original inspiration. It could be one beat, one bar, or sixteen bars. The good ones, even years later if they’re still waiting to be used, I never forget.
SONGWRITING - When I decide to start work on a new song it may or may not be the latest idea I’ve recorded. First I’ll pick the genre. For instance: if I’m going to do a co-write or want to write something to send to a certain publisher, I’ll go back over my favorite files, saved by genre of course, and maybe take an hour or two to kick the tires.
After picking an idea I get the equipment out. One or two guitars, a keyboard, desktop computer, and cell phone. That’s my usual setup. Depending on the genre, a guitar, my voice, and the recording app on my cell phone may do the initial grunt work, up to and including a super rough version for a co-writer (but not a publisher!). I can record a better version on my Tyros 5 keyboard. It’s got great vocal and guitar effects and can do simple overdubs. But if I want a full demo, I’ll do it in Pro Tools on my desktop. I’ve got a pair of Focal CMS 65 near-field monitors and AKG K701 reference headphones. Super good. And sound deadening material on the walls. Mostly I’ll work on the music, all the way through.
RIPPING SOMEONE OFF - Then, if the music feels really special, sometimes I’ll wonder if I’ve copied someone’ s melody. I’m pretty sure they can’t nail you for a chord progression? I’ll spend hours, or even days (not all day long!) searching to see if I’ve ripped somebody off. Usually not. But sometimes!
Once I came up with an awesome melody and harmony, a perfect ballad. Turned out it was from a Tom Jones song, note for note. Took me weeks to find out. Bummer. I threw that idea away.
I would never intentionally copy anyone. But say I did, unintentionally. Who’s seriously going to come after me, at my level? It’s not like I have huge record sales and am picking their pockets. And another thing…
COPYRIGHTING - I’ll copyright the songs I send out. Just the old standby, sending registered mail to myself and then not opening it. If the song’s going to be successful, the publisher’s going to copyright it for themselves anyway. Until that point I’ll tell them it’s fully copyrighted.
But will someone really steal my song and turn it into a hit? Of course they will! NOT!!! You can probably count the famous cases on the fingers of both hands, over decades.
I read somewhere if you find that someone is making money off of a song of yours that you didn’t copyright, once you prove and copyright it you’ll get the royalties from then on. But you’ll lose the royalties from before. I can live with that. Personally, and only if it wouldn’t be recorded otherwise, I’d give up all my royalties on a hit song I wrote. It would give me the cred to work in the big leagues on my next hit! I would put it down to paying my dues.
ABOUT ME - For me, music is the easy part. It goes fast. It’s what I love.
Words have always been a struggle. I can write decent lyrics when push comes to shove, but I don’t enjoy that fight anymore. I’d rather work with a lyricist or a songwriter who writes great lyrics.
I made my living playing music for eight years. I’ve had one song published and won 2 songwriting awards. I’m still trying to write my best song, still trying to have my songs published. I’m still trying to get them performed by recording artists. There’s a long way to go, a big leap. But I have this passion, the same way you have this passion, for music.
