There are a lot of reasons – particularly on the business side – why it’s tough to be a songwriter nowadays.  But today I’m going to celebrate 7 Reasons why it’s a great time to be a Songwriter; all having to do with one thing – FREEDOM.  In the entire history of popular music, there’s never ever been a time of more creative possibility for songwriters.

1) Lyric freedom

You can write about whatever you want to – very few songs are censored anymore because of language and subject matter.

In terms of rhyming, there’s tremendous creative power going in opposite directions.  On one side, rap has exponentially increased rhyming possibilities, at its best taking rhyming to an unprecedented level of creativity and expressiveness.  In the other direction, rhyming has loosened up tremendously.  Given microphones, powerful P.A. systems, and the fact that you can turn up a vocal on a recording as loud as you want, there’s no need anymore for things to always rhyme, or rhyme perfectly (though you may still want them to – but now it’s a choice, not a necessity). Not rhyming at all, or very little, is much more of an option, as is rhyming loosely.  (Of course this has led to a lot of lazy rhyming, but we’re not talking about that right now.)

These forces moving in opposite directions (in all directions, really) has made a wider playing field than ever before for lyricists.

2) Melodic freedom

We’ve moved away from always using ‘boxy’ 2, 4, 8, and 16 bar melodic phrases.  Nothing wrong with them, but it’s hard to do it better than George Gershwin or Lennon and McCartney.  Listeners’ ears are open to hearing all kinds of phrasing – uneven, over-the-bar-line, bars with odd meters…  Music has cross-pollinated worldwide too, which has helped – many areas of the world have never used the even-numbered phrases as much as ‘first world’ music has.  This has also  brought a greater variety of scales and modes to popular music melodies.

3) Harmonic freedom

Now we hear everything from songs with one or two bar loops (which have always been with us – ‘Louie Louie’ anyone?) to songs with all kinds of chord changes, and even with sections that rarely repeat.

4) Recording freedom

Everyone knows this – you can record your album in your living room.  Will it sound as ‘good’ as something recorded in 1959 at Columbia’s 30th St. Studio?  Unlikely!  But… you can record your album in your living room.  After putting in some time learning about recording, a songwriter can make professional-sounding recordings on their own, without a band, recording studio, arranger, publisher, record company, etc.  This is incredible.

5) Arranging freedom

You don’t have to have a backbeat.  You don’t have to have a bass instrument.  You don’t have to have chords.  Put in what you want, leave out what you want.  It won’t sound any weirder than a lot of very interesting (and successful) stuff out there.

6) Sonic freedom

Again, sounds from everywhere in the world have become part of popular music.  And many of those sounds are already on your computer (of course this doesn’t mean you know how to play them… but that’s not always a bad thing either, if you’re intrepid… and talented).  The Beatles really opened this door, but now it’s wide open to almost anything from anywhere.

7) Promotional freedom

It’s still incredibly hard to get noticed amid the din, but you can actually put your own songs in the ‘store’ (the internet) yourself.  You don’t have to spend years (or even decades) not putting out your music because you don’t have ‘a record deal’ or ‘a publishing deal’.  Remember, people with record deals have always had a hard time getting noticed too.

I’m sure there are many things I’ve missed here.  Please help your fellow songwriters out by adding your thoughts in the Comments section below.