Career Songwriter

Songwriting can be an isolating process at times. When we’re just starting out, the idea of sharing our ideas with someone else can be a daunting task. We might think, “what if my ideas aren’t any good? What if the co-writer takes the song to a place I don’t like? What does a co-writing situation even look like?

A large percentage of the songs we hear on the radio and on the releases of our favorite bands and solo artists are co-written. It’s not too difficult to figure out why, either, since co-writing has a long list of benefits. In a good partnership, we have someone else whose strengths and weaknesses compliment our own. We have someone to bounce ideas off of, and someone to share ideas with us when we’re at a stalemate. We expand our writing style, our network of industry connections, and grow our catalog of material faster. We also find out where our real strengths lie, personally, and professionally.

But co-writing isn’t without its challenges either. Finding a good partnership can take awhile, and so we often have to learn how to push forward despite a mismatched co-writing session. It’s a precious thing when we find a co-writer who we develop with over the length of our career. Many relationships in life follow a cycle, an ebb and flow of closeness and drifting further away. It’s no different in the co-writing relationship.

Co-writing situations can look a variety of different ways. In Nashville, where I spent the first 8 years of my career, writers made appointments to get together well in advance. Many times my publisher would pair me up with writers that enjoyed my style, and vice versa. Other times I would meet writers at shows, parties, industry functions, etc, and find we had a good connection personally. Feeling comfortable around one another is the foundation of a good union. I rarely accept a co-write with someone I don’t feel comfortable around, considering half our day will be spent creating art together.

The typical Nashville co-write involves sitting in a room with a guitar or keyboard, and trading ideas. Some writers prefer to start with a title idea or a melody, or a general theme. Others come in with no preconceived idea and simply start the day chatting about life. From there, we begin to construct a few ideas, starting anywhere we like. I like to start from the beginning, the first verse, and work my way towards the chorus. When I’m writing with an artist, it’s very important that I understand how the artist prefers to write. So in those cases, my approach may be different than with a writer who is writing for other artists.

There is no wrong way to co-write, and so finding a style and a pace that keeps the ideas rolling and results in a song you both enjoy is the only prerogative.
Writers in the pop markets often begin with a track that might consist of a beat, some harmonic movement, and instrumentation. In these cases, my job as a co-writer is to add melody and lyric to compliment the track. Again, if I’m writing with or for a specific artist, learning what that artist wants to say is of pivotal importance.

Co-writing sessions can happen over the internet, trading snippets of music via email, or exchanging lyric ideas. Songs can take 2 hours to create, or 2 months. When writing in the commercial markets, most of my songs are finished in a matter of days, with the demo soon to follow. The industry moves fast, especially the LA markets, and so being able to take an idea from start to finish in one or two 3-hour sessions, sing the vocal track, and finish up the record-quality demo and have it back in the publisher, label, or artist’s hands quickly is an asset.

The standard split between two co-writers is 50/50. That means that each writers owns half the writer share of the song. For more information on song ownership and publishing information in the United States, refer to http://www.ascap.com/
It’s a great idea to carry with you to a co-writing session a song split sheet. This is a sheet for your records, signed by all co-writers, that details the song title, date it was created (doc), co-writer names and publishers, and percentage of the splits. If there are 3 co-writers involved, the standard is 1/3 ownership to each writer.

You may have heard some horror stories out there about a writer who was somehow erased from the credits. Filling out the song split sheets will enable you to keep records of your own songs and co-writers, should you have any confusion over ownership in the future. For professional writers, the song split sheets help us remember songs that we’ve taken part in. After you write a few hundred songs, it’s sometimes difficult to remember just upon listening having written the song and who you wrote it with.

It is completely up to you and your co-writer to determine how to split the percentages of ownership. All professional writers have been in situations where they’ve written most of the song while their co-writer simply smoked a cigarette on the couch. Many of us have also been the co-writer who simply didn’t add much due to lack of ideas, or some other very real and disappointing fact of life. Instead of splitting hairs, I prefer to assume that the song would not have taken shape as it did without the chemistry of the situation that day. I also recognize that the opportunity for me to grow my career depends on the networking opportunities afforded me by my co-writers. So in the end, I try to simply do my best and write with those who I believe are also putting forth their best. That way, I have no problem splitting the fruits of our labor down the middle.

You might find co-writers online, perusing myspace, or visiting songwriting sites like Just Plain Folks, Muses Muse, or Share My Lyrics. Getting involved in your local music community serves many purposes, and is very fertile ground for linking forces with a songwriter, artist, or player who needs your talents and you theirs.

One of the most paralyzing fears of co-writing is winding up with an idea you loved upon bringing it into the session, and walking out with a song you hate. There is something you can do to handle this situation. Before sitting down to write, talk about each of you walking away with your respective ideas intact. That way, if you bring in the initial idea, you can take it to someone else later on who you feel will better develop it. If you simply can’t convince your co-writer to give you your idea back, then I suggest letting the argument go. When we view each song as the last great idea we’ll ever have, we’re on a fast train to proving ourselves right. Career songwriters learn that ideas come and go. We’re constantly growing and writing new and more relevant material. And we never know when a song we wrote 5, 10, 15 years ago suddenly gets recorded, catapulting our career forward once more. Don’t get hung up on old songs, but keep moving forward.

It takes time to find co-writers you enjoy working with. Stick with it and don’t be afraid to throw out the question “would you like to try collaborating?” when you hear someone you like. Then, bring a few ideas to the table and don’t take it personally if nothing seems to catch their ears. Keep trying, and keep pursuing those you believe will be the next forerunners in the niche you love.