Music: Practice & Theory Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for musicians, students, and enthusiasts. It only takes a minute to sign up.
Sign up to join this community
I want to compose a song. I have composed some music harmony and lines. I need to write some lyrics but I have a question:
When creating songs, generally we write the lyrics and then compose a suitable harmony and music or do we have a harmony and music and try to write suitable lyrics for it ?
That depends on you. Just write first what comes natural to you. If you grab your guitar/play piano and you see that you can work your way in a harmony you like, start with that.
If you are thinking some lyrics without having any harmony, write them down.
There isn't any specific order in which to do that. Usually when I write a song, I first write the melody and then the harmony, but I have written songs the other way around.
So, just do things the way they come to you. You can do the other part after you've finished the first one and it'll be fine.
Αlso, another thing I have noticed, is that when I write the second part, I usually make changes to the first part I have written.
@Shevliaskovic is correct. It's really up to what works best for you. Whenever you have an idea for lyrics, you should write them down. Whenever you find a harmony, melody or chord progression that sounds cool to you, write that down too.
You can try to write harmony to match the words you have or write words to match the music you have. If you've written down a lot of both, you can try combining them to see what sounds best to you.
If you get really stuck and can't find a progression that appeals to you from fiddling around, don't be afraid to steal! This is what artists do (though it's not always conscious or intentional). Pick your favorite song, figure out the chord progression and write your song based on it. Make sure you make it your own though. mess with the tempo, the melody, and the words. If you make it your own, its not really stealing, it's drawing inspiration. Nothing comes from nowhere. Good luck writing and post what you make!
There's no correct answer here. Different songwriters have different processes and many songwriters within their own body of work chop and change what comes first.
Take whatever inspiration you get and run with it, and don't worry about the order in which things manifest.
