BLUEPRINTING YOUR SONG

Something that has changed my songwriting in a radical way is a technique I call blueprinting your song. With this technique, I’ve developed into a much better communicator with my lyrics, and it has cut my writing time in half (writing fast is not a goal, but it doesn’t hurt to save time). It also stops me from ever getting stuck when I’m trying to write verse 2 and it helps me get all of my co-writers aligned if I’m writing with other people.
By using this technique of blueprinting your song, or mapping your song, if you learn to do it well, I predict you will experience the same results.

Before I began the blueprinting technique, I often struggled to complete a song in one session. Co-writing often felt like herding cats. Someone would throw out a line late into the co-write, and I would say, “I don’t understand how that line goes with what we are saying.” It would turn out that my co-writer(s) and I had been writing different songs all day. They might have completely different ideas about the storyline than I had, and we were having a hard time because we did not have a clear, shared idea of where our song was going.
 
Enter blueprinting. Once I started using this technique, I was able to get everyone in the room on the same page before we started writing. That’s why we wrote faster. We were all writing the same song. The idea behind the blueprinting technique is that you come up with ONE big idea for each section of your song.
The big idea for an example song generally goes into the chorus. The big idea for this song is, “I must be doing something right because I’m getting good feedback.” So, we had to think about how we wanted to set that idea up in verse 1. We decided on the idea, “Women are hard for men to understand.” We thought that idea set up our chorus idea really well.
 
So, our blueprint began to take shape.
Verse 1: Women are hard for men to understand.
Chorus: I must be doing something right because I’m getting good feedback.
Then, the writer had to think about where we would go in verse 2 to take our big idea even further. The job of the second verse is to take the big idea and either run with it or take it somewhere new. So the writer decided that our lovable, bumbling man in the song was just going to ask her what he could do to be a better lover. So, the big idea for verse 2 was born and our blueprinting looked like this:
Verse 1: Women are hard for men to understand.
Chorus: I must be doing something right because I’m getting good feedback.
Verse 2: Show me how to love you better.
 
The blueprint for verse 2 takes the song deeper. In this song, it’s deeper because he’s not content to be a decent lover, he wants to be a GREAT lover. That idea, it turns out, really appeals to women. Each section is in the same “voice” that the song is in. In verse 1, we’re making a general statement. Then we start talking TO her in the chorus and it remains that way throughout.
Those are all important factors. As you practice the blueprinting technique, be sure to give yourself the five-point checkup and make sure your blueprints meet each of those criteria.
 
Give the blueprinting technique a try. Practice with some of your titles and give thought to how you want to develop each section. Do it well and you’ll know what verse 2 is about before you even get there.