From the course: Introduction to Songwriting

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The fundamentals of songwriting

The fundamentals of songwriting

From the course: Introduction to Songwriting

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The fundamentals of songwriting

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- [Instructor] Let's look at the fundamental elements of a song. These are melody, lyrics, rhythm, and harmony. As a reference, we can take the song Happy Birthday. The melody of a song is the individual notes that are played and or sung in a particular order and timing. It's the uniqueness of a song's melody that first and foremost distinguishes one song from another. To that point, when I sing, (hums Happy Birthday) you know immediately what song it is, even without hearing the lyric. But let's talk about lyrics too. The lyrics are quite simply the words that are sung over a song's melody. For example, ♫ Happy Birthday to you. Lyrics are related to poetry, in the sense that they often rhyme and have an inherent rhythm to them, but the words in a lyric have to not only tell a story or convey an emotion or both, they also have to sing well, and just as importantly, sound good being sung. Next is the rhythm of a song. As it pertains to songwriting, rhythm can be everything from the…

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