Plan out your music

Plan out your music. If you’re making a song, plan the structure of it before you start putting the ideas into place. Plan out the form. Write a quick note of what the form will be. It’ll give you some guidance for how to write the music and you’ll be able to write a more well thought out song.

Just making a simple plan of how long each section will be and where they’ll end up harmonically, where each section lands will help the music feel like it has some direction. You’re thinking ahead while you’re writing and that’ll be reflected in the music.

You’ll plan to make the music end in those places. It won’t sound like transitions were just thrown together afterwards. They’ll sound thought out, because they were.

The plan doesn’t have to be long. It doesn’t have to be detailed. It could be as simple as deciding to write a song whose form is AABA. It could be as simple as deciding to write a rondo with the form of ABACABA. That’s all it needs to be.

Having that plan can add a lot to your compositions because you’ll have a better idea of the finished product and have a bigger picture of the song before you start putting ideas together. It’ll be easier to tie things together and make sure that each section is both interesting and related to the previous music.

Plan out your music.

ISJ