Songwriting and Such - Creativity After Being Silent So Long

I had a webinar yesterday with music therapy interns. We spent some time going over some of the silly techniques that I have to break myself out of creative ruts and still have to make new music with clients. We did a bit of songwriting last evening, and it helped me find some creativity.

One of the things that we did was develop a chord progression. Here it is:

iii I iii I vi IV V I

Now it is time to figure out what I am going to do with this progression. I like the way it sounds, so I will write it down and figure out something to do with it. 

That's often the way that these things happen - something strikes a chord (pun intended) with me, and then it becomes a constant quest to finish it up. With a chord progression, it can fill so many different functions just by changing the pattern of the changes or the accompaniment.

How do you write music? I don't attempt to write a permanent song without a post-it note, a pencil, and a piano.

Oh dear, now I need to explain what a permanent song is rather than an improvised song - I find that when I improvise, I come up with great songs that I just cannot remember after the session. I have decided that these songs are meant to be enjoyed in the moment and not become permanent. So, when I set out to write a permanent song, I am focused on writing the song rather than just experiencing it.

I love improvising, but there are times when I want to replicate a song, so I write it down. I use a variety of styles to write down my ideas - most of them tend to include solfege and abbreviations and a variety of chicken scratch stuff that I can translate into music but I'm not sure that others would be able to... I've never tried to see if others could figure it all out. 

ANYWAY - I use the piano to figure out the melodies. I could do it with the guitar, but that takes more brain power than I usually have available for songwriting, so I go to the keyboard. Once I have the melody noticed and notated, I work on the harmonic progression. The last thing that I do is rhythm notation - primarily because I can hear it, but I can't really notate it very well. That's where my notation software comes in handy. I can hear when things are not correct and the play function on that software helps me make the rhythms work. If I can't get to my software, I just keep repeating the song until I can transcribe it.

There are so many different ways to be creative.

I showed my audience one of my secret creativity weapons - a cheap, old coloring book that I bought at the Dollar Tree a very long time ago. It is not something that I use often, but it has some very random stories and pictures in it. It is a great inspirational tool for writing silly songs. I also use magazine pictures that I've pasted in a book and I know that some folks use Pinterest to collect visuals. I don't usually do that - I have too much already - but it is a great place to gain some visuals to create around. If you are a visual learner (like me), then having a picture to help you structure your creativity is invaluable when you have a creative block happening. 

I am going to spend some time making music today - just for my own edification and pleasure. I'll do that in between movies and snuggling into my bed. We had a 3 1/2 hour electricity outage yesterday, so I will need something to do if my movies can't run the way I'd like them to - it is snowing again, so there is the possibility that our electricity will go out again today. If so, I am ready. I have my keyboard, my flashlight, my pencil, and an unbelievable number of post-it notes available for use. Time to start this snow day #3.