I will admit that I am terrible at searching on the forums. I tried search for "lyric writing program", then "lyric program" then tried "'lyric writing program'"...and I seem to get every results with "lyric" OR "program" OR "writing." Like I said, I'm terrible at in on here.

Then I thought this would probably be a good post to start in this new section for reference.

So, what are you all using for lyric writing? And pros or cons you see to your methods?

Thanks! I'm excited to see if there is something I'm missing out on!

Paper.


Pencil.


Old school.


Really.

I'm not familiar with those apps. I'm guessing IOS? You kids now days don't want to work for anything.

I will admit, I'm actually surprised that is your method. You must have A LOT of pieces of paper from over the years!

I definitely see how there is something to that! I feel more connected for some reason that way. I should use it more.

Given the year of his passing, and the approach, I thought some might find this interesting.

I mostly write using a word processor (LibreOffice at the moment) and I use tabs to indent lines so that I know what beat of the bar a line of lyrics begins at.

To polish my lyrics, I use Rhymesaurus. It's found at...

http://www.purpleroom.com/rhymesaurus-for-windows/

I find this software an incredibly powerful tool (and a great buy for US$12.95)
.
I mostly use Rhymesaurus for...


1. Finding rhymes

Mostly I stay with the "Perfect" and "Assonance" rhyme options. (See the first image below.)


2. Finding alliteration

As an example... if I want a three syllable word beginning with H that has the primary stress on the first syllable, I set Rhymesaurus as shown on the second image below.


3. Finding better words

For this I use the Thesaurus feature. What I like about this is that words are also internally linked so that navigating through a train of thought or a particular concept becomes easy.

Caaron,

I've used yellow legal pads but I like notebooks with tear out sheets best. I've written a verse on a bag because it was all I had in the car at grocery store parking lot. LOL!

On the computer, I just use wordpad. I tried Verse Perfect for a while - it's free. I've heard some people really like Master Writer but it's too expensive for me. So I still use mostly good old paper and wordpad.

I also like the free online rhyming and thesaurus instead of my weathered old paperback book when I use one.

Finding rhymes is easy.

Finding thoughts is harder.

Think about what story of your life you would like to tell. Then tell it.

My CD included a song about my sobriety, 1 about a girl I thought I might like to marry, though I am currently 0 for 3 in the marriage game, 1 telling a girl who ran away to LA to live with her dream man that she was making a huge mistake and she'd be back (she is), and the rest were songs about having my heart ripped out and stomped on.

All that is my way of saying that you need to tap into your emotions and make your songs real, or you are just writing empty, banal, "let me see how many rhymes I can find for 'moon'.... " songs.

Songs need to be three things.

Aural (pleasant to listen to)
Intellectual (something to think about)
and most important
Visceral (something you can feel).

Floyd commented on this thread. He is an outstanding writer, blending catchy melody with lyrics that alternate between making you laugh and making you cry. Find and listen to his song "Feeling Nothing At All". That's how you do it. Do what he does.

Now, that is like saying "See how that pilot landed that plane? Do it like that." It takes work. I see a lot of posts on these forums from people who apparently think this is easy and it doesn't take effort. It takes some musical knowledge, willingness to put in boring repetitions during practice hours, and it takes some general intelligence and a very capable skill set with the English language. (That's the intellectual part.) It also takes a thick skin because if you want to wade into any art form you will have critical listeners (like me) who are going to tell you when you did well as well as when you did not. It is important that you understand that in the phrase "constructive criticism" the key word is "constructive". I said in an earlier post that on your way to writing good songs you are going to write a lot of bad ones. The key is to get better on every piece, whether that "better" means a better chord progression, more cleverly written lyrics, or better song construction. Also remember that there are no rules. If you read a book on how to build furniture, all of your furniture is going to look like the stuff churned out by the guy who wrote the book. Music is subjective. Do it your way. Start a song with a chorus. Start one with a bridge. Your song, your rules. Your circus, your monkey.

Also remember that a lot of people take music VERY seriously. Some (like me) take it was TOO seriously. I attribute that to my having been in music for 60 years, including several in college where I got a BA in it. Get better every day, and I'll not only buy your album, when you come to Cleveland, I'll buy tickets to see you play. Very supportive community here. Take advantage just short of asking us to do it FOR you. We're here for you.

Gee, and the rest of us thought the question was about what software do you use...

Paper.


Pencil. Quill.


Old school.


Really Old School.

The answer is NO software. Gray matter, not software.

I always use fire, smoke and a blanket to make phone calls!

LOL!

Seriously, I looked for some for songwriters to keep organized - gave up on it - too limited or too expensive or both.

I bought MasterWriter several years ago and tried to use it but finally just stopped. Not nearly useful enough to justify the hassle and expense. I still load it from time to time for rhyming ideas. I bought Rhyme Genie for rhyming and use it occasionally. It has a quirky interface I do not care for. Nowadays for rhymes I go to http://www.rhymezone.com/ or http://www.wordhippo.com/

For writing I find nothing beats Notepad or Wordpad or similar on my phone. I just need a way to capture and store the lyrics. I will resort to pencil and paper if my phone is dead but greatly prefer something more permanent and easy to store and access.

And for recording ideas I also use my phone. Got a melody or riff idea? Ya better record that immediately or lose it 5 minutes from now. So the phone works for both lyrics and melody. One device to rule them all!

J3...

I have manila folders full of lyrics on PAPER, written in PENCIL (or pen) that date back to 1977. 40 years ago. In fact, a couple of the songs I posted this year were lyrics from those folders that go back that far - dug up treasure from the past - a little rework at times and newer, "updated" melodies - but pleased that they turned up again. If I had stored those along the way - on 5 1/4" floppies? or even 3 1/2" floppies? or my flip phone?.., it would likely be hard (or impossible) to access them now - and they would likely be lost to me. Permanence is relative. And, so too, "storage and access".... just a thought...

If I could write like floyd I'd be willing to use clay tablets and write in cuneiform.

Bud

I am confused. The topic as I read it was that the OP was asking for a program to help him actually write his songs. Now we are at software to organize them after they are written. What are you actually trying to find?

BWAHAHAHAHA.... Oh please....THAT blows my mind to no end....

Everybody's telling you just use paper and pencil and grey matter.....

BUT... get ready for this....

Every single one of them is using......BAND IN A BOX. How about you guys and gals go back to using tape and play your own instruments. (not a question....a statement) Then maybe you'll have some credibility when you say use paper and pencil to write songs.

Get real, this is 2016 going on 2017 shortly. Technology is here so use it. If you're writing a song and working on lyrics use whatever resource you have if you get stuck and need some help getting the idea for a new rhyme. You can dig out the old rhyming dictionary or you can load the app on your phone or computer website and type in a work and search for rhymes. If I give you a word and ask for rhymes, you might be able to give me 6 to 10 in a quick minute, and if you think a bit you might hit 18 or so. The computer or app will immediately list 3 to 8 full pages with primary rhymes, and then a page or two of imperfect rhymes, and then switch it to phrases and get several more pages.

So... yeah, there are free online web page writing aids as well as some phone apps. You can also look up MasterWriter and get it. I have that program loaded on my laptop and when I am writing, it's often setting there open and running since I use it to find rhyming words and phrases. More than one time, a word in the rhyme list sparked a new thought and I went back and changed the lead up lines for a whole new twist. MasterWriter has worked just fine for me....and it includes SONGUARD the 3rd party date of origin secure server.

I will use paper and pencil to scribble down an idea or aq line that comes to mind.... but when I write, it's almost always in some form of app or program. I tend to use the lyric document window in BB a lot. It's become my note pad.

And yeah, for the record, I have nothing at all against using a note pad and a pencil to work on lyrics. I have stacks of them.

If you back up, and I do, the electronic medium is never an issue. My 5-1/4 floppies? Backed up to tape or zip drives which were then backed up to CDs which were backed up to cheap USB drives which will now get backup up to SSDs! I even take my old handwritten stuff, scan it and back it up. My priorities are permanence and accessibility. I do indeed have some old handwritten stuff but find it might as well not exist if I cannot locate it!

I have never used Band In A Box to write a song. I use it to generate tracks to produce songs that are already written... written on paper with a pencil or pen. To capture the melody, I in fact, use an old Sony cassette tape recorder. Credibility comes from actually writing.

Floyd,

This is my app.

Is this what you are using???

Eddie, I don't think software exists that actually writes lyrics for you....yet. At least none I'm aware of that does. What I know about that's out there - you type your lyrics in and it's supposed to help keeping your lyrics organized, all your drafts together, writing tools, and stuff like contact files, pitching, etc., features for pro songwriters to write and keep track of everything - all in one program. If you check out Master Writer which is the most well known one, you'll see. It's expensive for me and I don't really need all of the features.

Herb, since I'm the only "gal" on this thread so far, I'd suggest you re-read what I said and not put words in my mouth. Everybody didn't say what you're implying.

Some of us like the way it feels to write with a pen and paper better than typing and there's nothing wrong with that. When you've been doing it one way for years it's hard to switch. When I use the computer to write I print the lyrics out to have an easy to read hard copy I can scribble on when I'm recording. I also print out a final copy that I keep. So it really doesn't matter if I write the song typing in the computer first or write it in a notebook first. And I plainly said I like online rhyming and thesaurus better - I just use the free ones.

Other than putting words in other people's mouths to make your point - you make some good points. There's nothing wrong with technology or clay tablets if it works for the writer.

Last I checked BIAB doesn't write lyrics for anybody.

Depends on how you write Herb. I write lyrics first. Always. The songs start as text files on my laptop. When they are done enough for music, I move them to the "shared" folder on my network. Then I go up to the studio and open the shared folder from my studio computer and there are my lyrics. Those files stay on that file server computer that lives only for that purpose, to be the shared drive computer. Spreadsheets, pictures, lyric files, correspondence.... they all have a folder on the shared drive. That drive gets backed up often.

But that's just what I do. I can't even envision sitting down with the music side of ti without lyrics in place to guide me into tempo, length of phrases, what kind of cadence the rhythm should play to match the lyrics (that buzz word "prosody" again).... I just can't write lyrics to fit music. I have to write music to fit lyrics.

Or like the old producer said, "You write the words or lyrics first?"

What confused me was this:



That made me think he was asking for tools to create the songs, not organize them. That is why my reply was "For writing you use your brain" or however I worded it.

A lot of this likely depends on your nerd level too. Apparently some of these programs have features like a contacts manager, but I just use Microsoft Access for that and keep them in a database (the 3 friends I have are all in there!) I created. My chord charts from RB is screen captured and saved as jpg files in case I have to refer back after moving to Pro Tools. That way I don't have to load RB, deal with the programs fighting over who gets use of the interface...

But again, that's just what I do. And I don't have as many songs to deal with as someone like Notes who once said he has 550 or more. Also he is a very active, very busy performer so he has club contacts, notes about the crowds for each room to tailor a set list, and if I did that the database would include a picture of the mixer so I know how to set things up the next time in. I did that WAY back to the days of Polaroids! When the sound was in the sweet spot, take a Polaroid so we know where to start the next time. Lots of ways to do stuff.

Going to check Master Writer out to see if there is a feature I might want to add to what I do now.

You might have thought I threw rocks at a hornet's nest. Stay Calm and Write Music. That first part was tongue-in-cheek.

Yeah, I could see how that might come across a bit harsh..... it's all intended to be in good fun and by now you should know me a bit better than to take offense to my posts, especially you old timers around here.

I had to go back and re-read my own post. I didn't recall quoting anyone and therefore, I didn't put words into anyone's mouth. I just found it funny that we embrace musical technology for tracking but dismiss using it for lyrics.

The point I was attempting to make was that you shouldn't dismiss technology as a viable means to writing lyrics. Yep...nothing on the market writes lyrics for you, but there's certainly a lot of useful programs and apps to make the work a bit easier.

In the first paragraph past the tongue-in-cheek part ... notice I said this: If you're writing a song and working on lyrics, use whatever resource you have if you get stuck and need some help getting the idea for a new rhyme I went on to say, use a paper rhyming dictionary, which I happen to have on my studio book shelf, or use an electronic version, some of which are free and on-line. Anything you have or need to get the job done.

I find it easy to use the technology that's available. Open the rhyming dictionary and type in the word I need a rhyme for. Beats looking in the Songwriters Rhyming Dictionary in paperback for vowel sounds that might fit.

And yes, I do use pad and pencil from time to time with just an acoustic guitar, to write a song. Most of the time however, I'm setting at the computer, with BB open, my rhyming dictionary open on my laptop, and my acoustic guitar, (or electric guitar) playing and creating as I go, typing lyric ideas into the lyric document window in BB.

"The proof is in the pudding," indeed.

And I bet that old war horse was written with a quill pen

Bud

At the very least on a Yamaha 4 track....

Wow! I was surprised at the number of comments to this question coming back from the weekend :-)

I guess to clarify I was just looking to see what people are using for their songwriting as far as lyric apps and programs.

I know there are quite a few out there but I'm not going to pretend I know what they all are. By Nature I always try to look for a better way. I find the shortcut to that is asking people who are doing what you do what they do :-)!

So I got a lot of great information and some things to try here!

As simple as it sounds I never considered a hybrid of Doing lyrics on a computer then also printing them out to be saved and folders!

There were a few other great ideas I got as well.

I thought I saw years ago a program that gave you the number of syllables per line but I don't remember what it would have been. I ended up not downloading it at the time because I didn't know the source it was coming from and I'm always paranoid of things like that.

So I hope that clarifies what I was looking to do. I can't tell you how much I appreciate all the input and continue to throw ideas out as I will continue reading and learning from this.

Thanks again you guys and gals are the best!

More of a away to organize thoughts and rhymes, etc.... FREE app from 2007.

Rhyming Dictionary

Writing is easy....pic attached. Some days, I just want to go buy a bowling ball.

I'm open to ALL tools.

I have "The Complete Rhyming Dictionary," (published 1931, rev 1991), and "Barlett's Familiar Quotations," (published 1832, revised 2002...1832..wow). Both are 5 lbs and classics, but I haven't touched them in a couple years, until right now. I use Rhymezone when I'm pressed. And I'm going to check out the site that Bob* (I think) mentioned that drills down a bit more. The names was something-dinosaur-ish (I think).

Of course, it's more satisfying when the muse just drops the whole song on you.

*Corrected - Noel

There's a older free program called VersePerfect. It displays the number of syllables of each line, and displays a list of rhyming words for the word that currently is next to the cursor.

It's got a couple of other neat features, so if you're looking for something that's easy and free, you might consider it. It's got the most self-aggrandizing splash screen I've ever seen, but... free is free.

Awesome! That's the one I was trying to think of! I've never used it, but see a cleverness to it I haven't seen elsewhere.

Thanks!

Thanks!
This looks like something that would be fun to play with.
The syllable counter is useful & scads of instantly available alternative rhymes a way to break the road blocks that happen... lots of other features I haven`t checked yet.

Wicked Cool David Thank You!!!

OMG.

This thing is seriously outrageous. It is the best thing I have seen this year. It has totally changed my life.

Man, am I gonna write some crazy stuff in 2017. David Bowie look out.

Here we go, man.



Thanks again Dave, You have created a monster.

Same thing I listed above, cool tool.

write what's in your head, and heart. Did you ever have a good relationship that went bad?, and all you could do was break it off and still remain friends with this person.

Did you loose someone in your life that was very special to you? I.E. passed away, did you have a burning love for someone who you knew was the right person, but they belonged to someone else? The point is, there are many topics to write about you just have to know where to find them.

I would suggest that you get a book called the craft of Lyric writing there is a book you can read, and a workbook that you can get. Just google it on Amazon or google, or E-Bay. very, very, good.

Oh! and instead of depending on a program to write your lyrics, do it yourself. Like Floyd said, pencil, paper, eraser, etc. This is the very best way to write your lyrics. It will sound much better if it is coming from you yourself.

I just write what the Voices tell me.

I use rhymezone and a paperback rhyming dictionary and theasaurus. I am quite keen to try master writer but not sure I can justify the expense with the lack of writing I am doing at the moment

7 Sets of Lyrics Resources for Songwriters

I use a lawnmower and seem to get great ideas while mowing the lawn during the Spring, Summer.

Got so wrapped up in a song last year I actually strayed into the next door neighbour's lawn (open plan around here) Until a deep booming voice rang out,

"Hey you get off my lawn"



Musiclover

1. Freebie McGill Rhyming dictionary
2. Several online rhyming dictionaries and tools, specifically recall a dillfrog domain name
3. Trello in iOS for organizing thoughts and phrases, then PC version when I'm at my DAW
4. Google docs for cross globe collaboration
5. Notes app in iOS for voice memos when I don't have a pen and paper with me (but I always have my phone. Weird how that works)
6. Camera app in phone to capture inspiring images

"....instead of depending on a program to write your lyrics, do it yourself."

This seems to be a running misconception in this thread. I have not seen ONE PERSON that says their recommended program WRITES their lyrics, just that their program HELPS them either organize, find rhymes, etc....

That is no different than my way, paper-pencil-rhyming dictionary....just a LOT FASTER!

BUT sometimes that is also a problem, because as I am writing down my thoughts-ideas I can go at x-speed, and no faster....and sometimes while writing things down another idea will pop in the mix and change the outcome of the line.

Now, in THAT respect I can see the argument that the program is writing your lyric......but that is a stretch.

Just a IMHO, YMMV, yada yada type of post....

Verse perfect is the same tool as the McGill rhyming dictionary I mentioned

And, after all this, what have I learned?

Old School remains my mainstay. And to you Beta-Test crowd using Quills, I retort: "CHARCOAL on CORN HUSKS!"

Seriously, though - I had a flirtation with "Lyric-generating software", then a flirtation with "a huge Excel list of phrases" and a couple macros to auto-assemble them, and many other Geeky endeavors. None really worked - especially the software. In the time it would have taken me to learn the software and get a MEANINGFUL, CREDIBLE RESULT, I could learn to play cello, and still have time to write a dozen GOOD songs the old-fashioned way.

I still maintain the Excel file, just for single-phrase Inspiration. And some other observations that I hope might help:


1. Keeping a list of phrases, as I mentioned, is a BIG help to "spark" a song idea. It's actually better than BB's "title generator", because only pre-vetted ideas are in my list.
2. After a 15-year writer's block, I recently joined a Meetup group for songwriters. That was 2 weeks ago; I've since written 3 songs. Peer pressure helps!
3. After I mentioned "I've run out of things to write about", a person suggested "Exo-Autonomous Writing" - that is, forget I'm "me", and write from another person's point of view... AND STYLE.
4. An example - I developed a tune reminiscent of the Rolling Stones.But all the lyrics I wrote just didn't work. So, I Internet-Trolled through several dozen sites with lyrics to all the Rolling Stones songs, and lifted lines of lyrics that [to me] epitomized their style. Then I assembled those lines (and re-assembled a few dozen times!] into a lyric. Which sucked, of course. But THEN my own mind took over, and started tweaking and tweazing those lines... always forcing myself "not to think like ME, but like THEM". I am very close now to a credible lyric.

Maybe you're an old Star Trek fan, and recall the TOS Episode "The Ultimate Computer", where Commodore Wesley calls Kirk "Captain Dunsell", and says "you have a great job, Jim! Sit back and let the computer do the work!"

Real life ain't like that, when you're an Artist.

Yeah not looking for an app/prog to write the lyrics FOR me. Just what people are using when they write their lyrics. Got a lot of great ideas! Thanks for all of the input!

I write my songs mainly on my Ipad in the Notes app,and then map out the chords to fit the words and the style,seems to be working ok so far!
R.