Song Exploder
by Hrishikesh Hirway · Radiotopia
Interview podcast in which musicians take apart one of their own songs piece by piece, playing isolated vocals and instruments while explaining how it was written and recorded. Listeners hear how melodies, lyrics, arrangements and production choices develop from first idea to finished song.
More resources on Songwriting
hooktheory.com
Hooktheory is an interactive music-theory platform for learning chords and harmony. It offers theory lessons, chord-function explanations, and an extensive library of pop-song progressions with interactive diagrams to analyze and create progressions.
RhymeZone
Searchable rhyming dictionary that also returns near rhymes, synonyms, homophones, and words used in existing song lyrics and poems. Lyricists use it to break out of obvious rhyme choices and find alternatives that fit a line's meter.
Ultimate Guitar
Community-maintained archive of guitar tablature, chord charts, and bass and drum transcriptions for hundreds of thousands of songs, with user ratings marking accuracy. Useful once you can hold chords and want to learn specific repertoire by ear and eye.
Songwriting: Writing the Lyrics
There’s a songwriter lurking somewhere inside you, peeking around corners, wondering if it’s safe to come out. Now it is. This course is an invitation to let your inner songwriter step into the sunlight. All it takes is a simple “yes” and you’ll be climbing that windy hill, marveling at the view. If you haven’t written any or many songs, this course will show you an efficient, effective process for tailoring songs to express your ideas and emotions. If you have, you’ll look at your process differently, taking control of aspects of the process you may have not noticed. The course will start by examining the tools available to you, all revolving around the essential concept of prosody. You’ll learn to use your tools to enhance your message—to work compositionally at the same time you’re developing your ideas. You’ll be working both lyrically and musically, though musically it’s not necessary that you either read music or play an instrument. If you play, great, and you’ll be encouraged to play and record your musical responses to the assignments. If you don’t play, the course offers you a number of musical loops to work with. All you’ll have to do is sing your melodies over the loops. Assignments will ask you to post something for peer review—sometimes lyric lines or sections, sometimes melodies, sometimes both. None of it has to be polished. The course is about writing, not performing. Most important, you’ll have a lot of fun.
Songstuff
Songwriting site running since 2000 with articles on lyrics, melody, structure, recording, and the music business, plus discussion forums. Members post works in progress and get peer critique on drafts before finishing them.
Sodajerker On Songwriting
Sodajerker On Songwriting is a programme devoted to the art and craft of songwriting. The show, created and hosted by the UK songwriting team Sodajerker, features interviews with some of the most successful songwriters and musicians in the world.