Great Lyrics - Examples of and how to write them

[grahambop]

I'm not sure of that. Sheet music is notorious for containing errors, both musical and lyrical. (Early on, sheet music was not meant to represent 'what the name player played' but rather, 'what the amateur should be able to play at home'.)

This has changed somewhat in recent years----especially for those who want dead-on transcriptions of specific recordings, and are willing to pay for them as portions of a book---but in general, sheet music of forty-fifty years ago was often inaccurate. (Less often in the case of simple lyrics and simple melodies, but "Lush Life" was neither.)

It's available with lyrics from Sheet Music Online for a couple of quid, the preview shows it is published by Tempo Music who are Strayhorn's accredited publisher for Lush Life by the look of it. Would be interesting to see what they have as the lyric.

Songwriters Hall of Fame - Billy Strayhorn Detailed Song List

[matt.guitarteacher]

Man, I'm a sentimental dude, I guess. That's probably my favorite tune. Beautiful, sweet melancholy. Great chord melody tune. I love the pairing of the lyrics with the feel of that melody.

I've never even listened to anyone else sing or play it. Great old tune.

Ha, just realized I was thinking of another song with a train reference, although, I do really like this one as well. :-)

"P.S. I Love You" was the one I was thinking of . I don't know that there's anything special about the lyric, but I love the general sense of the way it's really conversational - trying to sound casual and mundane in conversation, but unable to really convey how much you miss someone. The conversational tone of the lyric reminds me more of the later singer-songwriter type tunes than the typical GASB stuff. Little more sense of irony than you'd think typical for the era.

[destinytot]

Man, I'm a sentimental dude, I guess. That's probably my favorite tune. Beautiful, sweet melancholy. Great chord melody tune. I love the pairing of the lyrics with the feel of that melody.

I've never even listened to anyone else sing or play it. Great old tune.

My favourite vocal versions are the great 1939 recording of Mildred Bailey singing with Benny Goodman and his orchestra, and a great Maxine Sullivan recording (Chris Flory on guitar):

This is a great site for - er - classic jazz on-line. A Jazz Anthology MP3 Choose listen download MP3 tunes jazz artists

[destinytot]

These are the lyrics to what has become my favourite song:

If Mrs Vanderbilt invited me to dine
And tempted me with pheasant and the rarest wine
Then if you clled up and said you had some coffee and some cake
I'd tell Mrs Vanderbilt to go jump in the lake
I'd rather be with you

If Mrs Whitney asked me to a swell soirée
Where I could hear the celebrated Kreisler play
Then if you said brother Willie just composed a masterpiece
I'd forget Fritz Kreisler and his famous Waltz-Caprice
I'd rather be with you

Oh, I'd give up every chance
Of getting in the blue book
And wouldn't even care
Just as long as I could glance
Into your 'I-Love-You' book
And find that I'm the only one there

If Mrs Astor should invite me on her yacht
To cruise around and visit every swanky spot
Then if you should ask me down to Coney Island for a stroll
And all we could afford was a hot-dog and a roll
I'd rather be with you

[Lazz]

How about the on-line OED?

Thanks for that - so disappointed with on-line resources that I had never even considered it.
But they are constantly at work trying to make the daunting project current & comprehensive.
So, with the subscription service, we get regular updates of all the latest bon-mots.

For $295/mo. I'll have to take your word for it. :-)

That is actually the price for one year.
The monthly option is $29.95

30 bucks every month is still beyond the comfort of my pocket but, prompted by destinytot's post, I discover that my university library has a subsciption (of course they do - duh!) which allows me access from home and removes my screaming need of a magnifying glass for the small print.

Feels like a birthday or something.
Thanks.

[fep]

Growing up I really like the lyrics of Robert Hunter who was the lyricist for the Grateful Dead. He was a master of the 'one liner', so many of them in his tunes. I often didn't know what the lyrics where about, didn't really care, they just seemed very 'cool' and musical.

If my words did glow with the gold of sunshine
And my tunes were played on the harp unstrung
Would you hear my voice come through the music
Would you hold it near as it were your own?

It's a hand-me-down, the thoughts are broken
Perhaps they're better left unsung
I don't know, don't really care
Let there be songs to fill the air

Ripple in still water
When there is no pebble tossed
Nor wind to blow

Reach out your hand if your cup be empty
If your cup is full may it be again
Let it be known there is a fountain
That was not made by the hands of men

There is a road, no simple highway
Between the dawn and the dark of night
And if you go no one may follow
That path is for your steps alone

Ripple in still water
When there is no pebble tossed
Nor wind to blow

You who choose to lead must follow
But if you fall you fall alone
If you should stand then who's to guide you?
If I knew the way I would take you home

[MarkRhodes]

This ran through my head earlier, probably because I've been reading about Cole Porter.

Blossom Dearie singing "I'm Always True To You In My Fashion". (Was this from "Kiss Me, Kate"?)

(Cole Porter)

If a custom-tailored vet
Asks me out for something wet
When the vet
Begins to pet
I cry "Hooray!"
But I'm always true to you, darling, in my fashion
Yes I'm always true to you, darling, in my way

I've been asked to have a meal
By a big tycoon in steel
If the meal
Includes a deal
Accept I may
But I'm always true to you, darling, in my fashion
Yes I'm always true to you, darling, in my way

There's an oil man known as Tex
Who is keen to give me checks
And his checks, I fear
Mean that Tex is here
To stay
But I'm always true to you, darling, in my fashion
Yes I'm always true to you, darling, in my way

From Ohio Mister Thorn
Calls me up from night till morn
Mister Thorn once cornered corn and that ain't hay

But I'm always true to you, darling, in my fashion
Yes, I'm always true to you, darling, in my way

From Milwaukee mister fritz
Often dines me at the Ritz
Mister fritz invented schlitz and schlitz must pay

But I'm always true to you, darling, in my fashion
Yes, I'm always true to you, darling, in my way

Mister Harris, plutocrat, wants to give my cheek a pat
If the Harris pat means a Paris hat, okay

But I'm always true to you, darling, in my fashion
Yes, I'm always true to you, darling, in my way.
I'm always true to you, darling, in my old old fashion way

###

It doesn't get any more clever than that bit about Mister Harris, plutocrat: "If the Harris pat means a Paris hat, okay!"

[Lazz]

This response of mine comes admittedly late in the thread, but I hope Ken (or anyone) may be disposed to reply. Especially regarding the two topics re-iterated at the end i.e. – craft and inspiration.

I'm sorry you have such a bad attitude. Where is this coming from?

I usually blame my parents.
On the other hand, I might just naturally be a bad person.
A miserable and insensitive brute.

But it may also result from recent encounters with a more youthful cohort who have an earnest penchant for writing poetry (which must be encouraged) and a dominant conviction that they are in consequence already great and unknown songwriters. They have strong desire but no interest in discipline nor concept of architecture. They seek recognition, approval, and encouragement, just for being their joyously irrepressible selves. It’s easy to give them what they want. That’s the business model for happy campers. But that is not necessarily what they need.

Being awake to the rhythms of language, for example. Your description of prosody, Ken, is most apt and eloquent but, despite speaking and joking in their mother-tongue for all of their years, these guys were as yet unable to see it as an issue of any relevance – while my hope and approach is that, by herding them towards a problem, they will find or innovate appropriate solutions.

Pat Pattison could have done better, had the blighters yet reached for melody in tentative performance.

As if drunk in my sleep, my rant was at that generality of briefly accumulated frustrations. And I wrongly misappropriated your friend’s alleged practice as representative for all I see as ills. The purpose was not to cause upset, nor provoke insult. Please convey my regret to your friend.

How do you deduce that my friend's writing did not grow from tradition?

Simply by taking your (mis)representation of his lights at face value.
My mistake – my regret – but your statement.

My questioning of how a person might become adept in a creative endeavor through the study of one single practitioner remains valid, I think.

As does that gnomic utterance from Salvador Dali (“Salvage”, to his mates).

Who do you write for? How do you do it?

This reads to me like a thrown-down challenge of credentialism to which I am not much inclined to respond. I write for anyone who asks. Identities are irrelevant. I suspect none will likely be known to you anyway. And they have absolutely no bearing on the intrinsic substance or value, or lack of it, to any idea or technique or chosen principle under discussion.

How do I do it? It varies.

Oftentimes it starts with a call. The caller tells me what they’re looking for. At the very least, we get a style, a feel, a tempo, and an emotion – a place to start. But nonetheless, ultimately I own-up to an audience of one. Whoever the client might be, the result has to satisfy my own personal aesthetic even while serving the wishes of another.
Other times I might target a singer or a particular performance style where I have knowledge of what they like and what they want, on the off-chance I can pique their interest.

In all cases, I formulate projects as design-problems. Starting from a design-brief, I apply expertise to finding an appropriate problem-solution. The actual nuts and bolts of how I actually go about it in the moment will vary a great deal depending on the nature of each individual beast of a challenge.

So, add something to the conversation. Tell us how you create masterful works without inspiration.
Some great songwriters have admitted the difference between when they were inspired and when they were simply crafting a song because it was required. Pros can do it either way. How do you do it?

I sincerely admire and appreciate the juicy barbs of your nuance.

I am a humble striver, aiming for my work to approach the standards of those I admire, just another regular pygmy clambering across the shoulders of giants.

And I only have one way of writing – and that’s by gathering all my skills together and applying myself to the job – sweat and work rather than waiting around for the magical and mythical touch of inspiration.

But maybe I misunderstand what is generally mean by the term “inspiration”

Let’s take Fran Landesman’s “Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most” as example (I’m not going to breach her copyright by reproducing the lyric here. It’s a standard which I presume you already know.) It sprung from her asking the hipster clientele of her club for their translations of the famous “April is the cruellest month” and working onward from there.

So, if we are claiming this as inspiration, the source is T.S. Eliot’s “The Wasteland”.

But odds are that whoever it was came up with the winning quote re-interpretation may have had no other knowledge of the poem. Certainly, other than that tenuous connection to the title, the song contains nothing else that draws upon it.

Instead, I see the cool title “Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most” more as a tool which provided Fran with both a place to stand and a means of levering her way into the construction of the entire lyric.

She had small truck with inspiration.
She worked at her art.

such a bad attitude

Quick reprise of this bit, Ken, if you don’t mind, just to say that I disagree with your assessment. Mine are not bad attitudes at all. They are good and discriminating in recognising different idioms with different orders of existence.

And I would also still be most interested in getting your help in making sense of this:

See what I'm saying? Great craft only guarantees a mediocre song.

Because I don’t see that at all.
And I’d also like you to tell me more about the role of “inspiration”, as you see it, with some examples.

Thanks

[Jonah]

Then if you said brother Willie just composed a masterpiece
I'd forget Fritz Kreisler and his famous Waltz-Caprice
I'd rather be with you

Interesting that from such a ditance the style and repertoire of Kreisler (meaning small pieces) seem to me actually close enough to the style of this song

[Jonah]

Guys,

to be true I always feel a bit confused when there's argument about there should be inspiration or it should be labour and skills...

Obviously, inspiration is in - spirit... art when it's convinicing - even in lowest forms - is an expression of personal intimate soul.. and for me there's not doubt it is spiritual process... that's what inspiration is in my undertanding.
It's there if it's real anyway...

Skills and labour are what human being is... if you do it daily you have to learn to control it, to elaborate approach.. it may take time though... but after all.. as Ingmar Bergamn used to say: I have plenty of demons but I made them work for myself...

People are different: some ponder for years and then work for months and then again get frustrated...
Some work non-stop and get a lot of average pieces between master pieces...

It's not about need of skills or inspiration.. it's just about the way different persons oorganize their creative activities

But you cannot build a cathedral without skills, and you also cannot build without spirit...

Artists are persons (not always nice and sage), they speak (and not always necessary to listen to what they speak)... when they say it's only skills etc. often it's protection from being too vulnerable in public, in other cases it's the way of self-discepline, it often depends on eviroment, on the notions of the epoch too...

Greats could convert even lazyness into creative idea...

Sometimes you really have to wait... the problem is you never know if it was a waste of time or not.

And I never know what to say to yound kids... of course it seems to be reasonable to tell him: Don't wait for inspiration, work hard and it will come...
But in the other hand I saw potential talent killed with working hard instead of wainting a bot for real thing to come...
You never know. It's his choice

I think artist is the most risky occupation, emotinally, nervously - because you always have to make choices with no guarantees.. and by the way jazz is the most risky of all.. because you have to do it real time

I remenber that until certain moment I was afraid to forget ideas but then I had an interesting experience.. I always believed that there should be only one right choice if you have options, but once I felt that I have a few options and all of them are good, nevertheless I had to make choice.. but how? Well I did... and when I did I also felt that it's ok to forget ideas.. they are just as good as the others that will come and stay

I think it could be a good sample of how inspiration elaborates practical approaches

[MarkRhodes]

Talk about inspiration reminds me of the famous interview William Faulkner gave The Paris Review in the '50s.

INTERVIEWER

You mentioned experience, observation, and imagination as being important for the writer. Would you include inspiration?

FAULKNER

I don’t know anything about inspiration because I don’t know what inspiration is—I’ve heard about it, but I never saw it.


Paris Review - The Art of Fiction No. 12, William Faulkner

[mrcee]

Guys,

to be true I always feel a bit confused when there's argument about there should be inspiration or it should be labour and skills...

Obviously, inspiration is in - spirit... art when it's convinicing - even in lowest forms - is an expression of personal intimate soul.. and for me there's not doubt it is spiritual process... that's what inspiration is in my undertanding.
It's there if it's real anyway...

Skills and labour are what human being is... if you do it daily you have to learn to control it, to elaborate approach.. it may take time though... but after all.. as Ingmar Bergamn used to say: I have plenty of demons but I made them work for myself...

People are different: some ponder for years and then work for months and then again get frustrated...
Some work non-stop and get a lot of average pieces between master pieces...

It's not about need of skills or inspiration.. it's just about the way different persons oorganize their creative activities

But you cannot build a cathedral without skills, and you also cannot build without spirit...

Artists are persons (not always nice and sage), they speak (and not always necessary to listen to what they speak)... when they say it's only skills etc. often it's protection from being too vulnerable in public, in other cases it's the way of self-discepline, it often depends on eviroment, on the notions of the epoch too...

Greats could convert even lazyness into creative idea...

Sometimes you really have to wait... the problem is you never know if it was a waste of time or not.

And I never know what to say to yound kids... of course it seems to be reasonable to tell him: Don't wait for inspiration, work hard and it will come...
But in the other hand I saw potential talent killed with working hard instead of wainting a bot for real thing to come...
You never know. It's his choice

I think artist is the most risky occupation, emotinally, nervously - because you always have to make choices with no guarantees.. and by the way jazz is the most risky of all.. because you have to do it real time

I remenber that until certain moment I was afraid to forget ideas but then I had an interesting experience.. I always believed that there should be only one right choice if you have options, but once I felt that I have a few options and all of them are good, nevertheless I had to make choice.. but how? Well I did... and when I did I also felt that it's ok to forget ideas.. they are just as good as the others that will come and stay

I think it could be a good sample of how inspiration elaborates practical approaches

Someone once said that jazz musicians are among the world's most insecure people. I don't know if I completely agree with that. But if you think about the historical lifestyle and current lack of public support not mention the uncertainty of the improvisational process and just the height of the bar being set, there's at least a little truth to the statement.

[Jonah]

Talk about inspiration reminds me of the famous interview William Faulkner gave The Paris Review in the '50s.

INTERVIEWER

You mentioned experience, observation, and imagination as being important for the writer. Would you include inspiration?

FAULKNER

I don’t know anything about inspiration because I don’t know what inspiration is—I’ve heard about it, but I never saw it.

Faulkner is one of my favourite writers, I mean one of the few...

But as I said... talking, talking... he is one of the most inspirited authors ever...
hi was not even writing, he was puting down...

[Jonah]

It reminds me also an old existentiola joke:

Two farmr-workers sitting on the kerb of the road in silence looking in the field for while:
- hey?
- yeh?
- do you see the groundhog?
The other one keeps looking the same direction..
- No I don't...
The first one sighs and answers slowly:
- Neither do I... but it's there.

[MarkRhodes]

It reminds me also an old existentiola joke:

Two farm-workers sitting on the curb of the road in silence looking in the field for while:
- hey?
- yeh?
- do you see the groundhog?
The other one keeps looking the same direction..
- No I don't...
The first one sighs and answers slowly:
- Neither do I... but it's there.

I hadn't heard that one. I like it!

I wouldn't deny the existence (or influence) of inspiration, but at the same time, I don't feel the need to talk about it relation to lyrics I admire.
To be clear, though, are we using the term in the sense of impetus (-"What inspired you to write so-and-so?" which is from the same vein as 'where do you get your ideas?') or of quality (-"that line was inspired!")?

[MarkRhodes]

A Gershwin tune sung by Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong. Great fun.

~https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ppFVmnmpGz8

~They All Laughed

(As performed by) Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald




The odds were a hundred to one against me
The world thought the heights were too high to climb
But people from Missouri never incensed me
Oh, I wasn't a bit concerned
For from hist'ry I had learned
How many, many times the worm had turned



They all laughed at Christopher Columbus
When he said the world was round
They all laughed when Edison recorded sound
They all laughed at Wilbur and his brother
When they said that man could fly
They told Marconi
Wireless was a phony
It's the same old cry

They laughed at me wanting you
Said I was reaching for the moon
But oh, you came through
Now they'll have to change their tune
They all said we never could be happy
They laughed at us and how!
But ho, ho, ho!
Who's got the last laugh now?



They all laughed at Rockefeller Center
Now they're fighting to get in
They all laughed at Whitney and his cotton gin
They all laughed at Fulton and his steamboat
Hershey and his chocolate bar
Ford and his lizzie
Kept the laughers busy [laughter fizzy?]
That's how people are

They laughed at me wanting you
Said it would be, "hello, goodbye."
But oh, you came through
Now they're eating humble pie
They all said we'd never get together
Darling, let's take a bow
For ho, ho, ho!
Who's got the last laugh?
Hee, hee, hee!
Let's at the past laugh
Ha, ha, ha!
Who's got the last laugh now?"
© GERSHWIN, IRA / GERSHWIN, GEORGE
For non-commercial use only.
© Warner/Chappell Music, Inc., IMAGEM U.S. LLC
For non-commercial use only.

[Jonah]

wouldn't deny the existence (or influence) of inspiration, but at the same time, I don't feel the need to talk about it relation to lyrics I admire.
To be clear, though, are we using the term in the sense of impetus (-"What inspired you to write so-and-so?" which is from the same vein as 'where do you get your ideas?') or of quality (-"that line was inspired!")?

hey Mark,

I agree...

But I also thought that when we speak of inspiration today, we mostly operate with Romatic notion of it mostly because we are still in post-Romantic era...

During romaticism it was quite sommon and even mandatory for an artist to speculate about inspiration as of a special unhuman source of his art, that fsuited perfectly the romatic - extremly poetic - concept of art as special sublime acivity which only the chosen could prosecute or comprehend.
In late romatic period as it usually happens the crisis of notions came... the artist became often especially critical about inspiration, they began to underline the role of labour, study, personal efforts first of all to the contrast of the inspirational concept which did not seem to be vibrat enough any more.
Using this word sounded too patheric.

Onlly Bruckner - this pure and naive soul - in that late period could inscribe his symphonies 'To my dear God' without provoking awkward feeling...

So it's become common to oppose labour etc. to inspiration. It was ok I think as a reaction.

But that made sence only in this opposition. When people say how much work they have to do to produce piece of art it presumes that they want to say ' it's not just inspiration' even if they do not use the word.

So the word 'inspiration' in this context means not an inspirited soul in direct and almost religious sence (how it could be for Blake for example - it was not just a word, it was reality)....
But laziness, idleness, vanity.

On the other hand I thin that we can separate one from another with good analysis and discuss inspiration quite productive if we really discuss inspiration (not opposition to hard work).

And I should note that today I see that 'down-to-earth aesthetics' also comes to crisis... ironic post-modernist remarks begin to sound fake themselves and among young people more often I can see those who do not feel ashamed to say that what they do is about love and beauty and inspired... they do not have to cover it under mask of indifference as had to do their fathers or grandfathers to stay true to their art to avoid pretenciousness...

Even the greats like Faulkner had to... I can name only few who had enough naiveness to say it directly like .. Chaplin, Chagall or Saint-Exupery maybe...

And also speaking about labour in arts became also kind of cliche...
sometimes people speak so intensively about work and sweat in their art that you begin to think: if you like labour and sweats so much you could go mining probably? or athletics?

(not meaning anyone here for sure!)

[MarkRhodes]

hey Mark,

I agree...

But I also thought that when we speak of inspiration today, we mostly operate with Romatic notion of it mostly because we are still in post-Romantic era...

Jonah, that was an especially thoughtful post. I appreciate that distinction between labor and inspiration, and yes, when not in opposition to one another, it is not so clear what they mean. Perhaps the emphasis on "craft" helps because it implies that this is an activity in which one progresses and that a "master craftsman" brings something singular to his work, a mix of experience and sensibility that bears his own impressive stamp.

I wonder how others here---who wish to talk about inspiration, and maybe even some who recoil from the term, define it or understand it.

[destinytot]

Interesting word, 'inspiration' - I see it as related to 'spirit' (as in 'life') and 'breath'.

Much as I love art, and for practical reasons, I rather suspect even the great songwriting partnerships were 'inspired' - enlivened, energised, motivated - as much by money as by anything. By definition, a 'hit-machine' has to work PDQ.

I think Britain's Tony Hatch was 'inspired'.

[Jonah]

Great Russian poet Alexander Pushkin once wrote:

We cannot sell an inspiration,
But we can sell a manuscript.


I think it says it all.

[Jonah]

By the way in the same poem he calls 'the inspiration, a sign of God..' )

[MarkRhodes]

Interesting word, 'inspiration' - I see it as related to 'spirit' (as in 'life') and 'breath'.

Much as I love art, and for practical reasons, I rather suspect even the great songwriting partnerships were 'inspired' - enlivened, energised, motivated - as much by money as by anything. By definition, a 'hit-machine' has to work PDQ.

Sammy Cahn---who wrote many great lyrics---when asked 'Which comes first, the lyrics or the music?' answered, "The check!"

[fep]

Inspiration... I don't care for the concept as it relates to songwriting.

Leonard Cohen spent several years working on the tune Hallelujah. How's that for inspiration. Definitely not a mediocre effort.

Inspiration, reminds me of 'faith' or 'knowing' as it relates to religion. Something intangible that people believe in but can't be proved.

[destinytot]

A good title can 'inspire'.

[Jonah]

Leonard Cohen spent several years working on the tune Hallelujah. How's that for inspiration. Definitely not a mediocre effort.

why not? inspiration does not mean it should be quick... by this logics all the novelits sgould have no inspiration

besides the fact that it took him so long to complete this does not mean it was an effort... it just means he needed time for some things to come

in my opinion of course


and also...
Mozart composed three greatest symphonies for less than one summer... i mean really greatest

I respect Cohen and love this song... but was really worth while? (kidding... )