Melody first or lyrics first?

Okay, I admit we all as a songwriters have a preference of how we write songs. Some songwriters start with the lyrics first and some songwriters start with the melody first. Well, I have in the past typically started writing my songs with the lyrics. That's why I bought a lot of songwriting books on lyrics (which I will discuss in a later blog).

But recently, I was working on three songs at the same time and I noticed that while I thought the lyrics were good, I couldn't remember the melody for one song. The other song, I had a good melody but the melody was too low for a female unless of course, you're Toni Braxton. While I would love to write a song for Toni Braxton, I want my songs to appeal to more than one singer. So realistically, because the melody was low, the song would only appeal to a male artist. The problem was I thought the lyrics were better suited for a female. The last song was just alright: the lyrics were good but the melody just went nowhere. So I scrapped all three songs and started over. And it wasn't hard to start over because the melodies were not memorable, pretty, or engaging.

And it made me remember something I heard in an audio book on songwriting and that is, when you come up with a melody, come up with additional ones and then pick the best. Perhaps you as a songwriter think that the first melody that comes to you is THE melody you have to use. I know now from these three songs to test my melody and that I can reWRITE my melody. Besides songWRITING is just that, writing. So just like you can erase something you wrote, you can erase a melody and start over with a fresh one.

How do you know if you need to rewrite your melody? Test your melodies for:

1. Memorability - Do you find yourself humming the melody? Can you remember it? Sometimes you can't tell if your melody is memorable yourself because you know the melody from playing it several times so sing it for someone and ask them to repeat it.
2. Movement - does your melody move? Your melody should be memorable but not to the point that it's boring. So make it move. Try changing some of your notes. Or trying changing the rhythm. And since if writing a contrasting rhythm sounds better. In other words, if the accompaniment is slow, try writing a faster melody to see if that adds some spice to your song. Or trying going up or down a note. Use the method that works best for you.
3. Parity between vocal range and lyrics - Does the lyrics match the melody you wrote? If your melody is low and thus, better suited for a male singer, does the lyrics sound like words a man would use? And vice versa for writing for a female singer. If the melody and lyrics match the targeted singer, there is parity. If it does not, then rewrite either your lyrics or your melody.

While I hate that I had to rewrite these songs because an A & R person is waiting to hear them, I'd rather rewrite them now, knowing that I can write a hit, than to rush and submit what would only be an okay song. So it's okay to rewrite. I like challenging myself!