Maybe you have that catchy tune buzzing around your head or maybe you find yourself singing some brilliant lines in the shower or while you're driving through the rush hour traffic.

So what do you do? Well, if you can, write everything down there and then! Ok..maybe not in the shower!

You can bet your life you'll struggle to recreate that tune or those words when you're nice and snug at home after a busy day.

So what comes first the music or the words? I think it's really a personal choice. The best and most important thing is to get something written down or recorded as soon as possible and then the rest will flow.

For the example I'm using in this article 'I just want to stay' - I started off with an inspiring story which I'd logged away somewhere at the back of my mind. I don't even know if I had all the details right - but it didn't really matter to me that much.

The basic story I'd read in a newspaper was about a man on death row who had been on his best behaviour for 25 years and now his sentance was about to be carried out. It just stuck in my mind how his last conversation with his loved one might sound.

Once I had the story in my mind I wrote the words. Again it didn't matter too much if they would match the song structure as I could always refine them later. The main thing was to get a few verses written and  then make sure I had a nice strong chorus.

I'd also had in my mind a nice little riff which I played around with until I had a nice melancholy sound. I'd chosen the key and the chord structure (basically D, A, Em, D) around the riff and now I was all set!

I recorded the original track on my trusty Zoom MRS 1266 and then, had the final touches completed through my friends at Scamp Studio.

The final result was a nice anti-death penalty track which, to my surprise and honour, was adopted by www.humanwrites.org a fantastic prisoner support group.

Finally I thought it'd be nice to put some pictures to the words and the end result is here:-

So - thats the bare anatomy of writing a song!

Be inspired and go for it!

Graham Denny

Music Now at HMV!

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