Books on songwriting / producing?

[everlight44]

I suppose that this is somewhat of an odd question, but are there any recommended books on the subject of song writing and producing?

 

The reason I ask is that I have all these tools and equipment and very little knowledge of how to put it all together. I've got Reaper, ezdrummer for drums, an elaborate guitar setup, a synth, among other things. I'd just like to learn how people go about putting songs together. Reaper is somewhat challenging and probably needs its own book, too.

 

If I doodled for a few days I could produce something decent, but I'd like to learn some tips and tricks from the best before I start. That way what I do produce is a little better quality.

 

 

Thank you,

 

Sean

[grace_slick]

I know NOTHING about producing!! I just keep creating new songs by doodling and fiddling and playing around.

 

I find the first step should usually be creative-based and not technical or production-based...

 

Once you find guitar sounds, drum sounds, keyboard sounds, whatever sounds to inspire you and get your creativity flowing, and then when you're ready to record and then piece together your ideas...then the production side comes in. Are you at that stage yet?

[everlight44]

Well, sort of. I always have tunes in my head and can put them down on paper with guitar. Organizing them and actually capturing / producing them is a different story.

 

Ideally what I would like to learn is how to make good backing tracks that I can play over.

[rockinrobby]

This never ceases to amaze me... That people think they can "teach themselves?" To write or produce music?

 

It's like thinking that you can read books about basketball and then be drafted in the NBA? Because you've read the books, and studied "hard..."

 

No...

 

The guys who get drafted? Can run faster, jump higher? Shoot better? Etc...

 

I'm sorry, but my feelings are, it's either in you trying to get out? Or "it isn't"

 

I personally don't believe it can be "learned."

 

Other's believe differently? And that's fine? These are my opinions.

[grace_slick]

You mean either you're just naturally that way inclined, Robby? That some people find it more instinctive to produce and arrange music? And others who have to learn and read about it will never be able to? I agree, but I also think those people who read and learn CAN be ok at doing it after a while...but it just takes a lot longer and is a lot more work.

 

And Robbo - listen to my new songs will ya? One is Whose Hair Am I Eating, and the other is The Old Gar Tree (written by my partner, not me. I just did the vocal)

[rockinrobby]

I'm going to listen :-) I just don't want to OD, so I have to enjoy you "in moderation?"

 

And yes, those are my thoughts... I believe people are born to do this? And we can improve on our natural abilities? But I Think 90% of it is "innate..." I could be wrong? Heck, I always show my 12 inch tool in a mirror that says "object in mirror may be closer than they appear?" (it's a monkey wrench...)

 

But I think there are some things you cannot teach? Some things are nature, "not" nurture...

 

Me? I can't read music? I've never had a lesson? But I'm a f'ing genius when it come to music? There are people who've spent 10s of thousands of dollars on an education who will never have the ability I have? And I understand this? It's something "I was born with?" It's something you were born with?

 

I believe (personally) it can be improved upon? But you can't make a silk purse from a sow's ear... You cannot create a musician/song writer from someone who is not "born" to do it? I could be wrong? But I believe people are born to do this... And "I'm usually not wrong?"

[grace_slick]

I think I was born a creative weird person who is naturally musical, but also unfortunately lazy.

[blue2blue]

Count me on the nurture side.

 

Obviously, like any other set of skills, some folks find various aspects of making music and producing recordings easier than others do. But I don't think there are many skills that can't be learned with patience and effort. I'm kind of dyslexic, but I learned to read and write. At least two different music educators declared me completely devoid of musical talent when I was a kid -- and learning to play was very difficult.

 

Heck, learning to tune a guitar was very difficult. I couldn't tell which pitch was higher and which lower until they were fairly far apart. And my pitch memory was all but nonexistent. (There weren't such things as affordable guitar tuners, then. It was pretty much a pitch pipe -- which was all but useless to me because even when a guitar was the same pitch as a pipe, I didn't 'get' it for various reasons. I finally found the key for me (no pun intended) was to use a tuning fork; the more pure tone was easier for me to translate.)

 

I tried and tried as a kid, but didn't have the perseverance and determination to get it then. It wasn't until my second year of college, when, 'scared' by a vision of being an academic poet the rest of my life while the cool guys serenaded girls out on the quad with guitars, that I finally just pounded on it, playing the same two chords, back and forth for weeks and then months before it finally started 'sounding like music.'

 

But by then, I was determined that, no matter how hard it was for me or how much it made me feel like an idiot, I was going to learn to make some kind of music.

 

It seemed all but impossible for me to learn other people's songs, so I concentrated on writing, pathetically simple and stupid songs at first -- which was a trial, since I considered myself a decent poet and had some success there in the eyes of others, yet found myself writing complete doggerel. (Rhyming... it did not come natural to someone who grew up thinking rhyming poetry was for nursery rhymes and greeting cards.)

 

I go on because I really sort of felt like if I could sort of learn to make music, anybody must surely be able to. It wasn't easy, and it certainly wasn't quick, but, in time, I got a lot farther than I ever dreamed I would.

 

I still have my challenges. I still can't read standard notation -- though, given enough time -- I can kind of decipher it. But I'm moderately facile on guitar -- much, much more so than I ever dreamed I could be, even when I'd been playing a few years. Singing remains a challenge, possibly because my ear has improved enough to hear how bad I can be. But I used to do the folkie thing in front of audiences, and do OK at it. On a good day, I don't even hate to hear myself sing.

 

I probably did better on the technical side. I always loved gadgets and gizmos (old guy talk for high tech gear) and fell in love with tape recorders the first time I saw one -- although they didn't become affordable for some time. By the time I was a teen, I was doing little 'radio' skits and what not -- although making music -- which I wanted to do so bad, continued to escape me.

 

 

And, actually, before I got good enough to bother recording myself in my early 20s, some jagoff stole my tape recorder and I didn't really end up recording myself much until I was in my late 20s. When I was 29, desperate to get my first wave punk band into some kind of recording studio, I started a commercial recording program at a community college.*

 

I mostly just did it to get access to gear -- since all I had at home was a cassette deck and a boombox (which I amused myself doing ultra-lo fi 'bounce' style overdubs on). I felt I could learn how to do it, with access to gear -- but it certainly helped that there were a few experienced studio recordists around to learn from.

 

Recording gear at that point was very expensive -- this was before there was much of a home recording market -- but I cobbled together a low end rig built around a well used old four track reel deck, and an incredibly tinky little mixer -- and I plunged into studio recording (yes, Virginia, there were still recording studios back in the early 1980s).

 

 

So, the musical side was painfully hard, the tech side, for me, less so. But I've seen people with precious little technical inclination learn how to record on tape and later on computers (I took to computer recording like a duck to water, even in the 1990s when there were precious few doing it at home, but by then I felt quite confident as a recordist).

 

If you want to learn, and you have some discipline and you persevere, you can. It may not be easy. You may not reach the heights of genius in a give aspect of the endeavor -- but if you keep working at it, like anything else, you will get better.

 

 

*And classes in music production at a low-cost community college could be a very practical route for you, everlight. Mind you -- not a commercial college, like those 'recording institute' type joints -- by and large those are, like other for-profit colleges, in order to sucker people into piles of student debt, my advice is to avoid them like the plague they are; don't be fooled by their come-ons, there are enormous numbers of people recording music now; by and large recording is not a sensible career path in this era, by a stretch; so get your head on right and pursue your goals not because someone claims you'll be rich and famous -- it would be easier to win the lottery, just about -- do it because you want to make music.

 

 

_________________

 

 

PS... Now, with regard to your specific question about specific books... there are a bunch out there. They mostly didn't exist when I came up, so, aside from a big, fat, dry textbook on recording that was required for a program I was in (that I only partially read, frankly, since I was already busy in studios and which was mostly filled with stuff I already kind of knew).

 

But now there are a lot of materials out there both in book form, on the internet in the form of blogs, free courses, and even -- for preterliterate types -- in YouTube lessons, and, of course, in free forms like BBs like HC and www.Gearslutz.com.

 

Mind you, the explosion of information has, often as not, been an explosion of misinformation -- particularly on the technical side -- many who call themselves "recording engineers" are woefully misinformed with regard to the technical side, but some of them manage to turn out quite good recordings, despite some misconceptions about the actual way things work that continue to utterly astound me.

 

And there is a real tendency for many newbs to think that they should just be able to start making great recordings overnight (you can, sort of, but only in the sense that there are now a lot of 'pre-built' building blocks in the form of prerecorded loops and robots that make music for you) and there is a real tendency among many to want to be told exactly what to do to get, say, the sound of this guitar on that record, begging people to give them step by step instructions on how to mimic certain sounds -- but for someone who wants to experiment and make his own music -- for the sake of music -- there has never been a better time to learn how to make music and record it.

[rockinrobby]

"my advice is to avoid them like the plague they are; don't be fooled by their come-ons, there are enormous numbers of people recording music now; by and large recording is not a sensible career path in this era, by a stretch; "

 

Come-on's can actually be pretty fun? (depending on who's coming...) And are you implying that my future career in the music industry isn't a lead pipe cinch? Even in the midst of the Obama recovery? That's not what he's telling me? He wouldn't lie to me, would he?

[musicpeeps]

I keep creating some melody in mind and record it in to my computer so that I would not forget the tune. but I suggest book called "Song Writers Market". It is a Writers Digest book.

[blue2blue]

 

"my advice is to avoid them like the plague they are; don't be fooled by their come-ons, there are enormous numbers of people recording music now; by and large recording is not a sensible career path in this era, by a stretch; " Come-on's can actually be pretty fun? (depending on who's coming...) And are you implying that my future career in the music industry isn't a lead pipe cinch? Even in the midst of the Obama recovery? That's not what he's telling me? He wouldn't lie to me, would he?

I'm pretty sure that's not what he's been telling you. And I've been listening.

 

But if you want to pick a fight with someone about politics, that's what the political forum (The Political Party) here is all about. I prefer not to discuss politics with people who can't get their facts straight. That's a fool's fight.

[Stackabones]

For songwriting, I'd recommend you listen carefully to your own library of music. The best songwriting books are songbooks, not books on songwriting. Start stocking up on songbooks of your favorite songwriters.

 

I find that the books on songwriting tend to say the same thing, which makes it difficult to recommend any particular one. I'd use the public library and check out whatever is there. And, while you're there, get some songbooks.

[JonChorba]

I firmly believe that anything can be learned as long as one has the correct mindset. If you believe that you have to be born with something innate in order to play music and write songs, than that's as far as you are going to go. If you truly believe that you can learn the skills necessary to play music and write songs, than you will. It all starts with the mind.

 

"All battles are won and lost in the mind"

[Stackabones]

Interesting idea, Jon -- solipsistic songwriting. I don't agree with it, for the correct mindset won't always result in what actually happens in reality. Don't get me wrong -- correct mindset can be beneficial, but it isn't the only thing determining reality (or songwriting).

[Cliftonb]

From a previous thread:

 

 

I believe that in the field of music there are practitioners, craftsmen, and artists. There's a whole lot more of the first two than the last one. Most people, with a little bit of training, could learn to hold a tune or craft a basic song. Artists are different in that even with a tiny bit of training they could create something that far exceeds their education level. In many cases an artist can create high level work with no training at all. There are also those rare geniuses, but we only get probably one of those per century. Genius level creativity is independent of epoch or geography. If Bach or Mozart was given an MPC, a couple turntables, and a Macbook Pro he'd still be able to produce something most musicians couldn't even imagine. In closing I could say "Either ya got it, or ya don't", but in the end there's room for everyone of all backgrounds and skill-sets in music.

 

[rockinrobby]

Yeah? I tried to learn to play golf? I had the correct mindset? I'm no Tiger woods... But I have spit on a few greens?

[Lee Knight]

Great songwriting can be learned. Most of us are lazy so we've become accustomed to the concept of "having to be born with it." No way. Your passion drives your curiosity which in turn drives you to learn. And your passion drives you still to keep executing better and better at each pass you take.You grab it from any and everywhere.

 

If you don't' have the passion... well... yeah. That's a non-starter. But talent? Or being "born with it?" Hey, the earth is round and we aren't even in the center of our own solar system!!!!!

[Stackabones]

Lee, songwriting can be learned -- but great songwriting? Sounds like a scam.

[Lee Knight]

Lee, songwriting can be learned -- but great songwriting? Sounds like a scam.

 

I didn't say it could be taught. But anything can be learned. It's not the teacher, it's the student.

[blue2blue]

Interesting idea, Jon -- solipsistic songwriting. I don't agree with it, for the correct mindset won't always result in what actually happens in reality. Don't get me wrong -- correct mindset can be beneficial, but it isn't the only thing determining reality (or songwriting).

I think, if I were making Jon's statement, that I would amend it to read: If you truly believe that you can learn the skills necessary to play music and write songs, than you can.

 

And I would emphasize this: It all starts with the mind.

 

 

Certainly, we all have different aptitudes... each organism is a little and sometimes a lot different. And, by the time most of us reach school age, we have further been influenced and developed patterns that form foundations for later learning, but many limitations are imaginary and/or self-imposed.

 

A certain party in this forum spends a lot of time trumpeting his own talent and skill -- and there's no doubt that he's blessed with certain attributes -- but I suspect he is blind to the work he himself has done in developing those innate attributes with distinct learned skills. I also think that no matter how much 'talent' one seems to come with -- that that talent must be developed. We may be envious of someone who seems born with a pleasant or powerful voice, but unless he or she learns to make the most of those assets, they will remain squandered.

 

Over the years I've heard a lot of people who seemed blessed with innate qualities -- who nonetheless proceeded to make boring, banal, or simply irritating music. God love 'em.

 

But I'll take a Bob Dylan or a Leonard Cohen any day over some golden throat who mires himself in superficially attractive or proficient but ultimately trivial efforts.

[Stackabones]

I think your modification of Jon's statement is essentially the same thing, b2b. If I truly believe something (like becoming a starting NFL quarterback), then it can happen. It may start in the mind, but it will end with broken bones during tryouts.

 

Or, say for example, I'm colorblind (or, to be PC, color vision deficient). I will enable my correct thinking to make me be able to see olive. It ain't happening. I've never seen olive as olive and no amount of correct thinking will help out in the future.

 

Far too many examples to continue.

 

I'm not saying that it's either nature or nuture, for I'm not really an either/or kinda guy. Count me as a both/and kinda guy

[Mudcat007]

For commercial lyric writing check out some books by Pat Pattison and Sheila Davis.

 

As far as music production goes there are a bunch of options out there. The most obvious avenue is to use the users guide that came with your DAW and work through any sample projects that came with it.

[Lee Knight]

The best teacher, for me, is listening and trying to cop my heroes. Be it Bach, Jamerson or Dylan. Then teaching myself to put my own twist on it. Having said that, I've read all the books.

[blue2blue]

I think your modification of Jon's statement is essentially the same thing, b2b. If I truly believe something (like becoming a starting NFL quarterback), then it can happen. It may start in the mind, but it will end with broken bones during tryouts. Or, say for example, I'm colorblind (or, to be PC, color vision deficient). I will enable my correct thinking to make me be able to see olive. It ain't happening. I've never seen olive as olive and no amount of correct thinking will help out in the future. Far too many examples to continue. I'm not saying that it's either nature or nuture, for I'm not really an either/or kinda guy. Count me as a both/and kinda guy

It appears you're so eager to find fault with this statement that you've allowed yourself to fall into the trap of a blatantly inappropriate equation of the ability to play and write [some form of] music with the skill and ability necessary to become a starting NFL quarterback -- with all that implies.

 

It's a strikingly inept attempt at logic.

[Oswlek]

 

I didn't say it could be taught. But anything can be learned. It's not the teacher, it's the student.

 

 

I agree wholeheartedly with this sentiment. Even those atists we collectively agree are on a higher plane had to hone their craft. And trying to judge an ability to be great prior to even learning a skill is a fools errand.

 

Regarding songwriting, I found this book on John Lennon's work to be infintely valuable.

 

http://www.amazon.com/Songs-John-Lennon-Beatle-Years/dp/0634017950/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1297797824&sr=1-1

 

The writing is dry and he relies on some technical language that will be difficult for a beginner to grasp, but it was an extremely useful read.

 

I have no books on mixing to offer, but you'll be surprised how much you'll notice once you get started. You'll do a few simple tricks like panning and effects and then you'll start to notice it more in the songs you listen to. You'll then realize where those impacts end and notice other things going on, which you'll try out in your own work. Like everything else in life, you won't be good right away but once the ball starts it will take you for a ride. Frankly, sometimes I wish I could go back to what it was like listening to music when I was completely ignorant to the process.