GETTING STARTED WITH

MUSIC WRITING
Reflecting on your creative
process
Scaffolding music writing
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Getting Started with Teaching Music Writing
One of your greatest assets you can offer your students is your
own experience as a songwriter. But have you ever thought
long and hard about the processes you go through when
writing music?

Try This First

Think about a song youve written or co-written, and ask
yourself these questions:

1. When did I first get the idea for this song? Where was I
and what was I doing? Which part of the song came to me
first was it the hook, was it a lyric, was it a beat? Was it
inspired by an event, a feeling, an image, a person? Was I
writing the song to fit certain qualities for a contract job?

2. What did I do next? Did I flesh out the melody or chord

structure first? Choose the lyrical theme and go from
there? Did I work alone or go to my co-writers? Did we
jam together or work more systematically? How many
people did I collaborate with?

3. Did I pay tribute to any particular style with this song?

Jazz, blues, hip-hop? Was I inspired by any other artists?

4. What was unique about the process of writing this song?

Did it come together very quickly or did it take many
different revisions? Did I cut out sections of the song and
merge them with another song? Did I have any aha
moments when a chord or lyric fell into place?

When youve reflected on these questions, try presenting this

information to the students.
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 Scaffolding Music Writing
These are some ways you can help beginning music writers
through their songwriting process:

Give them a starting point, like a key or a chord

progression. The G-Am-C-D progression has produced
hundreds of songs as we all know!

Help students with ideas that they came up with, and

can communicate to you in some way, but arent able
to fully form them. If they know that a bridge is
supposed to have contrast, but dont know how to
structure the chords, you can give them an example.

Playing chords for the students that fit their melody,

or that help them to come up with new melodies.
Giving a chord progression for the pre-chorus can get
them on to creating the melody.

Adding instruments or beats to students singing that

encourage students to develop the song further. A
contrasting instrumental break can open their ears to
whats possible.

Sharing what you know about music styles to help

students create a song that makes sense to them
from their own experiences. If they love reggae, help
them with those standard characteristics of a reggae song
(a chord progression and strum, for example).

Encouraging students when you hear interesting

melodies coming from their group giving your
approval will build their confidence.

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 Helping students by singing along with them when a
student has an idea that is more complex for other
members of the group.

Resource
Wiggins, J. and M. Medvinsky (2013). Scaffolding for student composers.
In Kaschub, M. and Janice P. Smith (eds). (2013). Composing our future:
preparing music educators to teach composition. New York, Oxford
University Press.

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GETTING STARTED WITH
LYRIC WRITING
Acrostic
Kenning
RAP
Who, What, Where, When, Why
Mind Map
Songwriting and Performance
Competitions
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 Writing lyrics can be one of the more challenging aspects of
songwriting for young musicians after all, lyrics usually reflect
feelings and life experiences. This could explain why so many
school bands stick to instrumentals! Confidence with using
language comes into it as well.

A few examples of well-written and straightforward songs can

help students understand that lyrics dont have to be overly
complicated to be effective. Pick a song students know. I
usually point to Take It Easy by Stan Walker as a good
example.

Here are some great exercises to help beginning lyric writers.

Acrostic:1
An acrostic is taking a word, and building new words off of each
letter, and is also the theme of the poem.

Heres an example using the word Extinction. Notice the

students altered the spelling of the word but it doesnt
matter.

Evolution, evolution, evolution

Xcited that things have changed,
T-Rex has been and gone
Invisible and unexplained
Not here or even there,
Our past has ceased to exit
Time just isnt fair
Neglect continues to persist

Verse 2
We are trying to think clear
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1Writers Unblocked. From Personalising Extra-Curricular Music Activities for 11-18 Year
!!

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Confused with the changes
Things just disappear
Everything rearranges
Leave the past behind us
The future is ours to use
People need to trust us
No rules, no dos, no don'ts
Extinction
Chorus
What's left is yours and mine
The futures our design
If we work together
Maybe we'll survive

Kennings:2
Kennings are poems where the last word of each line ends in
er. Here the Mentor combined it with an Acrostic of her name.
She instructed the students to do the same with their own
names and only to use positive statements:

Super swimmer
Open speaker
Photograph taker
Happy laugher
Incredible singer
Excited life liver.

You can try these with a word that isnt a name: an action
(OVERFLOW) or a concept (BELIEF).

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2!Writers Unblocked. From Personalising Extra-Curricular Music Activities for 11-18 Year

Olds, Section 2, p. 7. Musical Futures, Leeds.

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 RAP: Rhyme Association Poem3

This activity creates lyrics around the endings of lines. From the
first word, choose one that rhymes:

Light (First word)

Fight (R)

Then ask for a an association with fight What do you think of

when you hear fight?

Club (A)
Scrub (R)

Continue in the same way:

Clean (A)
Green (R)

Papers (A)
Vapors (R)

Then students use each of the words as an ending to a line.

Here is my poem:

Why are we turning away from the light

All I see these days are folks wanna fight
What they dont realize is were in the same club
Trying to escape, trying to scrub
Off the residue of our hearts til theyre clean
Walk into the sunlight the blue and the green
Dont believe the hype that you read in the papers
All that talk is nothing but imaginary vapors

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3!Presentation by Michael Cirelli at Hip Hop Ed Forum Aotearoa; 5 September 2014,

Waipapa Marae, University of Auckland.

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Who, What, Where, When, Why:
I saw Tyna Keelan use this activity in March 2014. This is
brilliant if students have a theme in mind but need to generate
more ideas. Take the students topic and have them answer
Who, What, Where, When, Why:

Student topic: The beach

Who My best friend

What Barbecue and fishing
Where Near my grandmas house
When The last day of school holidays
Why Because we want to be free
and have no worries

Mind Map:

A mind map builds words off of other words. In this

example, illustrated by Angel, the theme is friendship.
Angel thought of food, which she wrote in the bubble at
the top. Food made her think of coffee dates and raiding
each others fridges. She did the same with other words,
and now has a lot more ideas to draw from for her
lyrics.

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Songwriting and Performance Competitions

Entering a competition is a good motivation to write a quality

song. Tell your students about some of these.

Sponsored by The NZ Music Commission and MENZA (Music

Education New Zealand Aotearoa), Hook Line and Sing-a-Long
is a songwriting competition for students. The winners get to
record their song in Auckland, which is sung in schools all over
New Zealand during New Zealand Music Month, and win a
variety of prizes for themselves and their school. The deadline
for entry is in Mid-March.
www.hooklineandsingalong.com

The Play It Strange Trust sponsors songwriting competitions

throughout the year. Find out about themes and deadlines at
www.playitstrange.org.nz.

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 University of Auckland School of Music sponsors the Secondary
Schools National Songwriter Awards. For information contact
info@nationalsongwriter.co.nz.

The NZ Ukulele Trust holds three competitions each year with a

lot of great prizes and categories for primary and secondary
schools. Find out more at www.nzukulelefestival.org.nz.

Caritas Aotearoa New Zealand works for a world that is free of

poverty and injustice. Their songwriting contest is for entries
that suggest how we might help change things to improve the
lives of those living in situations of poverty, oppression,
injustice or hopelessness. Entries are due in late April.
http://www.caritas.org.nz/schools/singout4justice

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Smokefree Pacifica Beats and Smokefree Rockquest are
national school band competitions supported by the NZ Music
Commission. Soloists, duos and bands can enter for the
chance to win prizes, performance opportunities and band
mentoring.
www.smokefreepacificabeats.co.nz
www.smokefreerockquest.co.nz

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