How to write a song: a step-by-step guide for beginners

Most songs start smaller than people expect: a line you hum in the shower, a phrase someone says that sticks, three chords that feel good together. Learning how to write a song is mostly learning what to do with that first scrap so it turns into a verse and a chorus you can play for someone.

This guide takes you from that first idea to a finished song in seven steps: the idea and the title, the shape of the song, the chords, the melody and the words. It answers the lyrics-or-music-first question, then shows how to write the song down in MuseScore Studio, finish it and share it on musescore.com. A free printable worksheet and prompts for when you get stuck come with it.

To write a song, start with one idea you can say in a short line; that line often becomes the title and the chorus. Choose three or four chords, hum a melody over them, and fit your words to that melody in a verse and chorus shape. Then write it down and play it for someone before you rewrite it.

What you need before you start

You need very little: a phone to record ideas, something to write on, and either an instrument you can play three chords on or none at all. Readers with no instrument can use the free chord progression player on this site, which plays the chords for you in any key. To write the song down, get MuseScore Studio, the free notation app, from musescore.org. You don’t need to read music to begin; the app plays back whatever you enter.

The worksheet below gives each step a box to fill in during your first session. Print it and keep it next to you as you work through the steps.

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Step 1: Find the idea and the title

A song works best when it is about one thing, a single feeling or moment. “Love” is too big; the night you waited at a bus stop in the rain is the right size. Write that one thing as a short line you could sing, six to ten words at most.

That line is usually the title, and the title is usually the line the chorus is built around. This is known as writing to your title: once you know what the chorus says, every verse has a job, which is to lead the listener to that line. If no line comes, spend ten minutes writing a list of possible titles without judging them. Phrases people say in conversation make good titles, because they already sound natural out loud.

Decide, too, who the song is talking to. A song sung to one person (“you”) feels close; a song about someone (“she”, “they”) tells a story from the outside; a song to yourself sounds like a diary. Pick one and keep it for the whole song, so the listener always knows who is speaking and to whom.

Step 2: Choose a song shape

A song is made of sections, and each section has a job. The verses tell the story and change their words each time. The chorus carries the title and repeats, so it is the part people remember. A bridge, if there is one, comes once near the end and changes the view. The map below shows a full pop song and the shorter shape to start with.

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The table gives each section’s job and a common length. Treat the lengths as a starting point; plenty of good songs break them.

Most pop songs follow the top row of the map, and the pre-chorus is what makes the chorus feel like an arrival: its melody climbs or its chords change, so the ear expects something bigger. For a first song, use verse, chorus, verse, chorus. Add a bridge only when the song needs something new before the last chorus. A method book can walk you through the other sections once this shape feels easy. The Hal Leonard Songwriting Method by Tom Hambridge follows the same path as this guide, from inspiration and structure to lyrics, melody, rhyme and chord progressions, with online audio. It does not ask you to read music.

Step 3: Pick a key and three or four chords

The key is the home note the song returns to. For a first song on guitar, the key of G or C keeps you on open chords; on piano, C keeps you on the white keys. The guide to key signatures explains how keys work if you want to move a song later.

Most pop songs loop three or four chords. You don’t have to invent a progression: the four loops in the table carry thousands of songs, and each one sounds different. Play each loop in the chord progression player, pick the one that matches your idea, and keep it.

The minor-chord start of vi–IV–I–V sounds more wistful; I–IV–V sounds rowdy and bright. It also helps to open the sheet music of a song you love on musescore.com and look at its chords: you will often find one of these four loops under it. The guides to chord progressions on piano and on guitar show how to play them on your instrument.

If you don’t play an instrument, the chord progression player does that part. Choose a loop, set the key so the melody sits comfortably in your voice, set a tempo, and let it repeat while you hum. When a key feels too high or too low to sing, move it up or down a step in the player; the loop sounds the same, only higher or lower.

Step 4: Hum a melody over the loop

Set your loop playing, on your instrument or in the player, and hum over it. Don’t aim for words yet; sing nonsense syllables, or just “la”. Record five takes on your phone, one after another, without stopping to judge. Then listen back and keep the two or three bits that make you want to hear them again.

Good melodies repeat. Take a short idea of three to five notes and use it again, a little changed, rather than writing a new idea in every bar. In “Here Comes the Sun” by The Beatles, the title phrase comes back again and again, and that repetition is what you remember after one listen.

For the chorus, lift the melody. Start it higher than the verse, or hold its longest notes on the title words, so the listener hears that this is the main line. If you don’t know the tempo of a song you are using as a model, the tap tempo tool finds it from a few taps.

Step 5: Fit the words to the melody

Now replace the “la” syllables with words. Give each section one idea: the verse says what happened, the chorus says what it means. Use concrete details the listener can see, a cold cup of coffee, a kitchen floor, a bus stop, instead of words like “sadness” or “forever”.

Count syllables so the words fit the notes you already have. Then check where the stresses fall. In most songs in 4/4, beats 1 and 3 are the strong beats, and a word sounds right when its stressed syllable lands on one of them. The guide to note values and time signatures explains strong and weak beats. Here is an example verse written for this guide. The syllables that fall on strong beats are in capitals.

• MORN-ing LIGHT on the KIT-chen FLOOR,
• COF-fee COLD by the O-pen DOOR,
• HUM-ming SONGS in the QUI-et HALL,
• COUNT-ing DAYS till the LEAVES will FALL.

Each line has eight syllables, and the four stressed ones land on beats 1 and 3 of two bars. Rhyme lightly: here lines one and two rhyme, then lines three and four. A near rhyme, such as “home” and “alone”, is fine when the true rhyme would force a word you would never say. Read the finished lines out loud at normal speed. If you stumble or have to squeeze a word in, the line needs fewer syllables.

Lyrics first or music first?

Both work, and songwriters do both. Either way, you finish by fitting one to the other.

Music first:

1. Choose a loop and hum melodies over it.
2. Keep the melody you like best and sing it on “la” until you know it.
3. Write words that match its syllables and stresses.
4. Change notes where a word won’t fit, rather than forcing the word.

Lyrics first:

1. Write the chorus lines and a verse as plain lines on paper.
2. Read them aloud and mark the stressed syllables.
3. Find a loop whose mood fits the words, and speak the lines over it until a melody appears.
4. Cut or swap words where the melody wants fewer or more syllables.

Many writers start with words and music at nearly the same time, and adjust the lyric once the melody exists.

Step 6: Write it down in MuseScore Studio

A voice memo saves the sound of an idea, and a lead sheet saves the whole song. It is the melody on one staff with the chord names above and the words below, enough for anyone to play your song. MuseScore Studio makes one quickly.

1. Start a new score, choose Voice or piano as the instrument, and set the title, key and time signature in the new-score window.
2. Enter the melody: click the first bar, press N for note input, pick a duration with the number keys (4 = eighth, 5 = quarter, 6 = half) and type the note letters. The handbook page on entering notes and rests has the details.
3. Add the chords: select the first note, press Ctrl+K (Cmd+K on a Mac), type the chord name and press Space to move to the next note. Press Esc when you are done.
4. Add the words: select the first note, press Ctrl+L (Cmd+L), type a syllable, press the hyphen key for the next syllable of the same word and Space for the next word.
5. Press Play. MuseScore Studio plays the melody and the chord symbols, so you hear the song even if you can’t play it yet.
6. Export it from the File menu as a PDF to print and an MP3 to send.

The picture below shows the example verse from Step 5 engraved in MuseScore Studio as a lead sheet, with its eight bars of melody, the chords and the words.

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Hear the same eight bars played back from MuseScore Studio. Listen for the stressed syllables falling on beats 1 and 3, and for the I–V–vi–IV loop in the first four bars.

If you sing, record the vocal on your phone while the MP3 plays in your headphones. That gives you a demo good enough to share.

Step 7: Finish it, rest, then rewrite

Finish a full draft before you fix anything, even if one verse is weak. Weak lines are easier to fix when you can hear the whole song around them. Then leave it alone for a day. When you come back, you will hear which lines are filler and which melody notes feel forced.

A simple test tells you whether the song stands up: play it with just your voice and one instrument, or your voice and the MuseScore Studio playback. If it holds together that bare, it is ready. Then play it for one person you trust and watch where their attention drifts. That is the line to rewrite.

Share it on musescore.com

Once the song is written down, you can publish the score to musescore.com straight from MuseScore Studio, signed in with a musescore.com account. Open the Publish tab below the menu bar and click “Publish to MuseScore.com”, the path the MuseScore Studio handbook gives. On musescore.com other people can open your score, hear it play back and leave a comment, which is a quick way to get feedback from other musicians.

When you’re stuck

Every songwriter runs out of ideas. These prompts get you moving again:

• Take a song you love, keep its chords and write new words to them. Then change the melody until it is yours.
• Pick a title from your list and write only the chorus, nothing else, in ten minutes.
• Write a verse about one object in the room you are in.
• Change the loop: if the song is stuck in I–V–vi–IV, try starting it on vi.
• Write with someone else. A co-writer often has the line you are missing.

When the prompts you know are used up, a book of new ones helps. Songwriting Breakthroughs by Shane Adams, from Berklee Press, is 88 pages of strategies and prompts for developing song ideas and shaping them into finished songs.

Frequently asked questions

How do I write a song for the first time?

Pick one feeling or moment and write it as a short line; make that the title and the center of the chorus. Choose a four-chord loop such as C, G, Am and F, hum a melody over it, then fit words to the melody in a verse, chorus, verse, chorus shape. Finish a full draft before you fix anything.

Should I write lyrics or music first?

Either works. Writing music first makes the words fit the rhythm more easily; writing lyrics first keeps the story clear. Most writers end up adjusting one to fit the other, so start with whichever comes to you first.

How do I write a song if I can’t play an instrument?

Use a chord progression player to play a loop for you, hum over it and record your ideas on a phone. You can also write the melody in MuseScore Studio, which plays back the notes and the chord symbols you enter. You don’t need to play an instrument or read music to start.

How long should a song be?

Most pop songs run about three to four minutes: two or three verses, a chorus after each, and sometimes a bridge. A first song can be shorter. Verse, chorus, verse, chorus is a complete song.

How do I know when a song is finished?

When it works with just your voice and one instrument, and every line says something the song needs. Leave it for a day, cut what sounds like filler, then play it for one person. If you keep changing the same line without making it better, the song is done.

Start with the chorus tonight

A first song needs one idea, a short line that becomes the title, four chords, a melody you hummed and words that fit it. Open MuseScore Studio, type your title as the score title, and write the chorus first. When it plays back the way you hear it in your head, add the verses around it.