In praise of Simplicity....

[Tidwells@aol.com]

Here's your inspiring quote of the day which I feel applies strongly to songwriting and composing. Steve Jobs said, “That's been one of my mantras—focus and simplicity. Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it's worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains”.

If I remember correctly from reading his biography, Steve said this in the context of inventing the iPhone. But it sure applies to my songwriting: I struggle and wrestle and revise 15 or 20 or more times trying to discover/create the simple, beautiful "masterpiece". I say "struggle", but in truth I don't struggle with songwriting as much anymore. As I mentioned in another thread, when I get "stuck" I just walk away and come back later with a fresh frame of mind. It's more a matter of patiently "waiting it out" until I finally find the simple, beautiful "solution". Here's to simplicity and to those who work hard to create it!

Doug

[stubbsonic]

Thanks for sharing this thought. It's fascinating.

I really enjoy complexity-- and especially enjoy hearing it-- but in a dynamic way where complexity is like the tension, and simplicity can be like the release.

But another thing is that when I compose something that is "intense" in terms of complexity, there is something about the craft that is to present it with clarity-of-purpose. That clarity is like simplicity in a way.

[Tidwells@aol.com]

Sometimes simplicity is the foundation for complexity. Years ago, I worked on a recording project with a friend who had written very simple children's songs with very simple melodies and basically only 3 chords in his original arrangements. I was surprised to discover that the simplicity of his writing allowed me to really "stretch" the final arrangements with many surprising chord progressions and modulations. It was eye-opening for me...

So, maybe want I really want to say is that I now aim for simple song-writing/compostion, which allows for the fun of "going bananas" and creating an arrangement/recording as extravagant and complex as possible! I agree that I do enjoy listening to complex arrangements!


Doug

[stubbsonic]

Sometimes we say a song has "good bones" because you strip away stuff and the basic structure is nice.

I remember hearing some Men at Work songs acoustically and really liked hearing the songs without any production.

You make a cool point about whether complexity is structural or added later.

[James Steele]

It's seems almost a given that if you can take a song and reduce it down to a vocal and a guitar/piano accompaniment and it's STILL engaging... you have a great song. Obvious example: practically anything Beatles. Drives me nuts to this day when I run into people who proudly proclaim "I don't care for The Beatles." Yeah... okay.

[Tidwells@aol.com]

Yeah, stripping a song down can be revealing. I try to take it a step further sometimes. I write my songs while playing a nice grand piano sound on the keyboard. But i've found it helpful to test the melody and lyrics by trying to sing them acapella while walking around the neighborhood. If it sounds good with no instrumental music, the melody really has "legs" and can walk on its own...I guess you could call it the "Melody Walking Test".

Doug

[stubbsonic]

One of my guilty pleasures is a show called "Glow Up" which is a make-up artist competition. The person who did the music made creative use of sounds/samples. There's one musical cue that has a staccato vocal sample, and one of the melodic phrases ends on the #4 of the IV chord. It's such a lovely whimsical moment that matches the strange creativity that's going on in the make-up. Fast forward to the current season 5, and whoever is responsible for the underscoring or editing decided to remove most occurrences of my favorite note. Sounds like nothing now.

[mikehalloran]

It's seems almost a given that if you can take a song and reduce it down to a vocal and a guitar/piano accompaniment and it's STILL engaging... you have a great song. Obvious example: practically anything Beatles. Drives me nuts to this day when I run into people who proudly proclaim "I don't care for The Beatles." Yeah... okay.

Paul still likes to say that, because neither he nor John could read or write music, they had to come up with songs that were easy to remember after they wrote them.

I don't agree with their reasoning as to why (been reading since I was 7) but do with the result. I like to work out the basics of any song in my head, usually while driving, and if I still remember enough of it later, then I will write it down and finish.

[Tidwells@aol.com]

Interesting approach, Mike! Seems like I read that Paul McCartney claimed he wrote songs in his head, and if he couldn't remember it later to write it down, it must not have been good enough to keep. I understand the concept, but am not that confident in my memory!

Also, I'm afraid I'll come up with something that's ALMOST GREAT and could become great with a little more refinement, but isn't great enough to remember! So if I wake up in the middle of the night with an idea, I sing it into my iPhone's voice memos, or if it's a lyric idea I dictate it in an email to myself. I set my iPhone mail settings to automatically cc me on every message sent from it, so I don't have to type my email address to send it to myself....I just leave it blank and hit send and it's in my Inbox the next morning.

Doug