Essential Guide to Lyric Form and Structure: Tools and Techniques for Writing Better Lyrics by Pat Pattison

by Pat Pattison

Veteran songwriter Pat Pattison has taught many of Berklee College of Music's best and brightest students how to write truly great lyrics. Her helpful guide contains essential information on lyric structures, timing and placement, and exercises to help everyone from beginners to seasoned songwriters say things more effectively and gain a better understanding of their craft. Features examples of famous songs for study, Be Still My Beating Heart * Can't Fight This Feeling * It Was a Very Good Year * Tickle Me * and more.

Genres: Music, Writing, Nonfiction, Reference, Education

Paperback

First published December 1, 1991

Reviews

[Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a songwriter, I hated repeating myself. I would have the verse-chorus-verse-chorus structure musically, but repeating a line or singing the same chorus made me feel like I was cheating the listener, or being stingy with my words, something of the sort. But my most successful song is undoubtedly the one that does repeat its chorus, and is the least fun to play and most boring for me in general, and really, is anybody surprised by that? I found a lot of relief in this book for the guilt I felt on repeating myself or using those tricks, because there are ways to make very deliberate, intelligent decisions to intentionally repeat oneself.

There are people out there who are finding out what yesteryear's musicians succeeded at, and realizing that those successes were probably unintentional. Then these people try to recreate the success by analyzing the possibilities of what made it work (prosody? structure? balance?), and then turn those diagnoses into an intentional replication of that success. "Whether or not he intended this or that is irrelevant; what's important is that YOU CAN intend it." The thing that eludes some people is that it just so turns out that a lot of success comes from spontaneity and newness. I don't know if diagnosing previous success and cloning it engenders success so much as really risking failure can do so. But I can tell you right now I do not want to write the next "Be Still My Beating Heart."

The book is not wrong, and rest assured there's a lot of advice in here that will inspire the kind of playfulness and focus on intent that is tantamount to good songwriting. It'll bring intuitive information to the forefront in a good way. But the next thing to do is to take all the advice about structure and prosody, and all the new opportunities to experiment and play with that rigidity, then take it to the next level. Don't let the rubric make you myopic or slow the inspiration, because you'll end up writing to placate an invisible instructor. Incorporate the tools into the toolbox and blast off from there. Heed the advice, but be inspired. Don't narrow yourself to it. Transcend it. Make yourself the subject of a revised chapter to the book. These are my words of bullshit inspiration for the day.

Or just do the right thing and heed the guy's advice. Risk is overrated; he knows what he's doing after all.

[Dawn Lennon · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a very useful workbook for songwriters, especially for those who do not have a background in writing, particularly rhyming forms. There is a significant amount of time spent on stressed and unstressed lines, balanced and unbalanced sections, and song forms, the latter being of particular interest to me.

I found the inclusion of a wide range of actual songs lyrics very informative as illustrations of the basic concepts. These examples are very useful for those just starting out with lyric writing and those who have been at it for some time.

My frustration with songwriting books is that there is plenty out there to help you write compelling lyrics--the words of the song--but virtually nothing on how to determine and create companionable melodies and rhythms.

As usual, materials provided by Berklee instructors are always of great quality.

[Sami Al-Khalili · Rating 5 out of 5]

The first book I’ve ever read on songwriting.
It gets an automatic 5 star even what’s written is pretty useful and applicable in the long run.

[Joseph VanBuren · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have been a songwriter for over 20 years, and this book still taught me a lot about lyric form and function. Some of the material made no sense to me, possibly due more to my self-taught style than to the readability of the book, and some of it was kind of "duh" to me. But the nuggets of "aha" in there were like boom - instant inspiration!

I read this while taking Pat Pattison's course Songwriting: Writing the Lyrics. They complement each other nicely, with the book getting far more detailed than the course. But I would agree that Pattison's weird sense of humor and artistic vision comes through better when he is speaking. The book comes off as a bit drier. Still, I think it's an excellent resource for any songwriter looking to expand their toolkit. I learned a lot that I was able to apply to existing songs and was also inspired to write a few new ones. I plan on reading more in this series.

[Laura Gabelsberg · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pattison gets into all of the technical work of crafting songs. I took his Berklee Online course for songwriting and enjoyed his sense of humor and the way that he provides practice to apply what he is teaching. This book is not one that is easy to read however, he is much better as as a speaker/teacher. I found reading this book quite difficult and not sure I would have ever read it if I had not been taking his course, which brought the material to life. I actually decided not to read the whole thing because of that.

[Hillel Familant · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the second book I've read by Pat. It really helped drive home some of the concepts I read in "Writing Better Lyrics" - another fantastic book. The exercises are fun and really help to internalize the concepts he is discussing. If you are interested in improving your Songwriting skills, read this.

[Ran-Solo · Rating 3 out of 5]

More like 2.5 stars. The way the exercises are structured don’t really allow for the book to work on it’s own without an instructor (or maybe a songwriting group) to give feedback.

There’s good content here but not enough to do self evaluation on the exercises.

[Norman · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's a good guide. Basic and a bit genre specific. I suppose it's helpful for people to churn out songs - that IS the idea of form isn't it?

[samaadda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great Read

This is the best I really believe I have a great handle on writing lyrics I really appreciate the break down!!

[Cristian Herrera · Rating 1 out of 5]

no answers

To many assumptions. If it had answers to examples, then it would help to follow the content. I had tried to use it many times.

[Sabne Raznik · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a workbook to expand your writing possibilities into all the various songwriting forms and to teach meter within the context of songwriting. There is a lot on stressed/unstressed syllables and how the English language works. This is useful for both songwriting and poetry. The exercises are wonderful for grasping the point and generating ideas both lyrically and melodically.