David Longstreth Quotes

I don't write poetry and then strum some chords and then fit the words on top of the chords.

It's hard to decide how to match words to music. It's not like it's twice the work. It's always difficult for me to explain to the composer what I'm looking for. I'm not a professional; I lack even basic knowledge about writing music.

For me, making music just starts with a simple melody, and lyrics will come sometime after that.

The very best thing you can do is to try to write a song that has some sort of impact.

Composing music is hard work.

Yes, basically, like you said, I'll work out a chord pattern and work out the lyrics over that.

The first thing that inspires any song is a chord progression. When I have one I really like, I get into the lyrics even more.

But then you have to write a song, so at that point, I picked up the reins and started to write lyrics.

It's very rare - and it does happen on occasion - where I'll take a piece of lyric and I'll just sit down and purposefully craft that melody around that lyric because I think the lyric is the wellspring for the song, without question.

That's what I like to do, I like to make songs.

The bass line is the anchor for me. I started with the bass, and either doubled that and then added the harmonies, or sometimes added my own harmonies that I've always wanted to sing on the song. And then it just went on from there - singing violin parts and trumpet parts and just trying to emulate the sounds of the instruments.

The composition of a single melody is born out of a bit of text, perhaps the first line, but it can also be the entire strophe; it can even be the poem's overall form.

It's never easy to write a song. It's the most difficult thing I do.

I've written many extra verses to songs that I learned to sing - an extra verse about a friend, or just add some verse - and that led to writing my own songs.

That is what intrigues me; songwriting and song structure and expression.

I always begin to compose the melody first.

When I hear the piano played in a compositional way, like in a songwriter's way in a compositional way, there's a certain arc to that that I love.

There's no magic for getting into the groove... just banging away at it. Sometimes the lyrics come first, sometimes the music.

I'm good at melody - I'll write the top-line melody and ideal words I want to go with it. But I'm not that good at writing lyrics. I bounce those back and forth with songwriters or someone who can sing.

I start with the subject matter I want to write about. Then I make a musical base for that and create an atmosphere with the music. Once I've done that, the lyrics come last.

I know what my job is: I write the songs, I sing them, I play them on the piano.

With 'Light,' I collaborated with a lot of different producers and musicians I respected, and we all wrote and worked on material which I then took to an old-school producer, David Kahne, and we put it all together. The lyrics came first - they were written before the music.

I actually write more on guitar than I do on piano.

I had a really pleasant time composing music for 'Raaga.'

I wouldn't sit down and work at writing a song like a novelist or something.