{"id":13165,"date":"2016-03-28T17:42:08","date_gmt":"2016-03-28T17:42:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/?p=13165"},"modified":"2017-11-16T20:15:39","modified_gmt":"2017-11-16T20:15:39","slug":"songwriting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/songwriting\/","title":{"rendered":"Songwriting"},"content":{"rendered":"

Songwriting<\/h3>\n
\"Jason

Throwback. Jason and I working on the bridge for Work Remix. He came up with the melody. I came up with the lyrics. True teamwork!<\/p><\/div>\n

It’s been a while since I’ve written a song. It’s been over a month and to me that is way too long. That’s the struggle when you have writer’s block. It can get frustrating at times, especially when you have the desire to write but nothing comes to you. Writer’s block gets me emotional at times because of how bad I want to write some good songs but I’m just stuck. I often think to myself, “Is this the end of my songwriting days?”. Then again, that might just be me being over dramatic.<\/p>\n

It’s has been an amazing discovery for me to know that I have a natural songwriting ability. I never knew I had it in me. It started with one song and since then it’s been getting better and better. I just take it one song at a time. Some songs I can write in a day, two days, weeks, it can even sometimes take months to write. You may start something, get stuck and have to come back to it at later time and that’s completely okay. I used to be intimated by the idea that I couldn’t write a full song in 20 to 30 minutes like other songwriters. I had to accept and embrace the way that I write. Once I understood that I’m not going to do it the same way that everyone else does, it became more enjoyable for me. I was then able to grow as a songwriter and develop a genuine passion for it.<\/p>\n

I’ve had a lot of individuals express to me the importance of writing for myself sometimes. When I finally decided to tap into that side of my musical journey, it revealed to me the difference it made when creating a full production. If someone else writes for you, without knowing who you are as an artist or even which direction you want to go with a song, it is going to sound completely different from you writing the song yourself. When you write your own material it’s a completely different sound when you execute it in the studio. People can really feel you and feel the true melodic vibe of the song because the deliverance is on a different level. You write it, you believe it, you feel it and you deliver it; as oppose to just singing a song just because somebody wrote it for you. There is singing the song and then there is delivering the song.<\/p>\n

Now I’m not completely against getting a songwriter sometimes or collaborating with other writers.\u00a0I personally would prefer to do that more often if the opportunity presents itself…until that time comes I’ll have to get the job done. I truly believe collaborating with other songwriters helps you to expand your creativity, it adds fuel to the fire, and can lead to the creation of something dope. The other writer(s) might be able to hear something that you can’t which can give the song the umph that it needs to be a hit. If you choose to just get a writer and not part-take in the writing process then at least know what you want. You need to communicate with the writer the concept and direction you want to go in with the song. This way they can feel you and write in a way that you can relate to. You can make it authentic when it’s time to lay the vocals down.<\/span><\/p>\n

Okay, back to the purpose of this blog. I went a little too deep with my perspective on songwriting. The original purpose of this blog is to give you an idea of what to do if you have writer’s block. It worked for me and it might work for you. I’ve noticed that if I have writer’s block and I change my environement, my writer’s block vanishes. Anytime I change my environment all these thoughts, concepts, and lyrics come to me. I haven’t written a song in over a month and now that I’m in Miami International Airport the lyrics just started to flow. I was just sitting here at the gate relaxing listening to a track and before I knew it I was writing down lyrics in my notes.I love how it just flows and picks up a momentum. It gets me so excited! I just want to jump in the studio immediately and bring my words to life but it doesn’t realistically work that way, it requires practice.\u00a0I’m heading to Trinidad with a new song written and that was so not planned. So if no other writer’s block remedy works for you change your environment. There are elements out there in the world that could spark your writing abilities.<\/span><\/p>\n

Once I get bitten by the writing bug there is no stopping me. I start to get in a zone. I just wanted to share my thoughts with you. Back to writing I go. \ud83d\ude0e<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Songwriting It’s been a while since I’ve written a song. It’s been over […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13166,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[84,83,85],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/jason_imani_songwriting.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13165"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13165"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13165\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13167,"href":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13165\/revisions\/13167"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13166"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13165"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13165"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imaniray.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13165"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}