Skip to main content

Is Your Songwriting Inspiration-Dependent?

Is Your Songwriting Inspiration-Dependent?
Is Your Songwriting Inspiration-Dependent?

by Kapa Freeman

Talent may be keeping you from your songwriting goals, but not in the way you think.

There's an idea in the songwriting community that's really harmful. It's the idea that you have to have "talent" to write songs that people love. I know, because I used to think that too. It was crippling.

When you run into negative feedback on your songs, you feel like you should quit because you "Just don't have the gift.". We get this idea because hit songwriters make it look so easy, but watch any documentary on a hit songwriter's life and you'll see how many bad songs came before their good ones... and how many drafts went into the classic ones.

Talent can actually be a songwriter's handicap if it's not combined with skill.

The talent-only songwriter essentially relies on inspiration to give them songs that people connect with, but inspiration can be a crutch... a pretty unreliable crutch... and it comes and goes when it pleases. And when you don't have it, you simply can't write a good song without it.

Why?

Because you can't control it. In other words, depending on inspiration is basically writing songs on accident. Great songs aren't written on accident. There's an exception to every rule, but do you really want to bet that you're going to be the exception?

The alternative to being a talent-only songwriter is being a skilled songwriter. The talent-only songwriter writes great songs on accident, but a skilled songwriter writes great songs on purpose.

  • They know how to write lyrics that connect emotionally.
  • They know how to format melodies to make them memorable.
  • They know how to combine the two so they flow naturally.
  • They know how to use harmony to make a chorus explode.
  • They know how to use rhythm to ramp up energy.
  • The skilled songwriter has full control over their songwriting process.
  • They don't wait for inspiration to give them permission to write a great song. Inspiration takes orders from them.

Talent will only take you but so far. Skill will take you as far as talent can take you, and far beyond.


Check out all of the posts related to Music Marketing: 


Kapa Freeman is the Founder and Songwriting Coach of The Intentional Songwriter, whose goal is to help musicians become publisher-ready songwriters so they can access songwriter-only income streams that pay more money for less of their time.

After taking an "assembly line approach" to songwriting, Kepa added consistency to his songwriting and went from song rejections to publishing deals over the course of a year. Now he uses this same approach to help musicians go from beginning to publisher-ready songwriters in a matter of weeks.

https://www.prosongsonpurpose.com/




Tags:

Popular posts

"Set Free" by Kristin Ambuhl: Naming Your Real Enemy

What battle are you really fighting today?   Some enemies wear a smile. Kristin Ambuhl calls this out in her song “Set Free”. The song calls these enemies a “favorite shadow” who’s “throwin’ words like daggers” while “hiding behind your laughter.” This is much more than a person who is being difficult. Kristin wrote this song about the daily spiritual battles we face as believers — battles found in arrogant people, dark influences, and forces that work to pull us away from who God made us to be. Whether it’s small fights or big ones, she’s naming them all.  The song doesn’t stay stuck in the shadows. Kristin declares, “I’ve been set apart, I’ve been set free, from my enemies, against dark powers, rulers, and authorities.” Part of that line echoes Ephesians 6:12: “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” W...
More >>

"Come Alive" by Joel Lane: Finding Life Where Emptiness Used to Live

What if nothing you chase can truly fill the emptiness?  Emptiness has a way of following you around, no matter how fast you run. You chase a feeling (or things you believe will get you higher up “the ladder”), land on it for a moment, and then watch it slip through your fingers again. Joel Lane captures that feeling of restlessness in the opening lines of his song “Come Alive”: “Emptiness, chasing a feeling, trying to fill the void inside.” Sound familiar? Most of us have spent years searching for a purpose that felt just out of our reach.  Joel sings about how something happened that put everything in a different perspective. “You opened my eyes, now I see the light, I’m never going back.” That’s not a small statement. That’s a complete change of direction, a different way of living, a change the kind that can only happen when God steps into the picture.  The apostle Paul writes about this change of direction in Ephesians: “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the...
More >>

"Great Is Thy Faithfulness" by Gethsemane Instrumental: Finding Steady Ground in the Storm

God’s mercies are new every morning — do you notice? “Great Is Thy Faithfulness” by Gethsemane Instrumental is one of the tracks in John Long’s upcoming instrumental project. Gethsemane Instrumental is a space for prayer, a quiet room where listeners can sit with Jesus without distraction. Hardships visited John more than once. He also went through Ministry seasons that tested him in ways that could have hollowed him out. But something kept pulling John back to the same conviction: “He is faithful.” Not faithful when convenient. Not faithful in the easy seasons only. Faithful “through every storm,” standing “unmoved and unwavering” while everything around him shifted. “Great Is Thy Faithfulness” is the first single off John’s upcoming Hymns Devotional Vol. 2 project. This song has been a staple song for him throughout his entire walk with Jesus.  That kind of steadiness isn’t new. Thomas Chisholm penned the original song in 1923, sitting in Baldwin City, Kansas, worn down by frai...
More >>