Hi David,

I hope that you and your family are keeping well. This is just my humble take on your question.

I agree with Tangmo. Music stands alone. I suspect that that's why classical composers are still enjoyed by many people. The successful ones have somehow managed to tap into pysches and captivate people's imaginations. Lyrics, on the other hand, are often not strong enough to stand alone as poetry. As Tangmo has pointed out, good lyrics are those that support the musicality of the song. For me, all the sonic lyric devices (such as rhyme, assonance, consonance, repetition, onomatopoeia, syllabic stress, etc.) are important to the production of the final presentation.

My own style of writing used to be just melody and accompaniment. I had no idea how to fit words to music. Then, in the early 2000s, I met Pat Pattison. I attended many of his seminars, and through his teaching, I learnt many strategies for putting words together. These days, most of my songs start with words. I often create a verse and a chorus before I start thinking about melody and chord progressions. Sometimes I do this with drums playing in the background, and sometimes it's just the rhythmic flow of the words' stressed and unstressed syllables. While I'm working with words, I find the rhyming sequences usually develop as well.

If I initially start creating a song from lyrics, when I start setting the words to music, lyrics and music go hand in hand. Because I notate all my songs, lyrics, music and chords often change as I zigzag my way to the final product.

Recently, I set a poem to music, Elizabeth Barrett Browing's "How Do I Love Thee" (Sonnet #43). Out of respect for Barrett Browning (1806–1861), I tried to keep the first verse poetically accurate. In the end, I found that I added a word that Barrett Browning didn't use. After the first verse, though, I used fragments of the poem's words along with my words to create a song. It was an interesting experience.

As I said, this is just how I do things. I don't know whether or not it's useful information.

All the best,
--Noel

MY SONGS...
Audiophile BIAB 2025