Musicians: How To Retain Good Song Ideas

Countless times I've nearly hated myself for allowing what at the time seemed to be a remarkable idea, find it's way into my mind only to see its existence merely vanish as quickly as it appeared. Sadly it happened and happened to the point where I arrived at the realization that I just wasn't that committed to being a serious writer at the time. Time after time of this failure to capture my thoughts, I devised simple but effective techniques to capturing my ideas and never again letting them slip away, at least not until I've had enough time to at least attempt building a song around my idea. Here are some ways you could capture your next hit:

1. Digital pocket recorder: So you're at home, on the road, in the shower (I believe there may be waterproof devices but if not please beware) or anywhere else, take a second and record your thoughts, whether it be a melody, a quick chorus, a guitar chord sequence or any other creative moment, be sure you capture it! iphone users can do what I do and truly leverage the voice recorder which works tremendously well to get ideas down. In three months, I've managed to record nearly 60 ideas ranging from 30 sec. to 5 minutes. The neat thing about iphone's recorder is the ability to pause, gather your thoughts, and resume recording in relatively great audio quality!

2. Digital Audio Workstation (DAW): Products on the market today have revolutionized the music industry by empowering every musicians from the average hobbyist to even big names in the music industry, thereby allowing users to essentially create their art from home or a remote venue, without hiring mixing engineers or renting out studios. Such tools have also allowed people who have gone from being single dimension musicians (i.e. guitarists only) to learning how to single-handedly incorporate drums, keyboard, bass and more thru MIDI technologies, requiring modest investments. With this widely available and inexpensive technology, musicians can now insert tracks (i.e. vocal, MIDI or instrument) into a new session, which takes about 30 seconds to create. Once your track(s) is/are created you can immediately begin capturing your idea, regardless of quality. Remember we are simply preventing idea loss at this stage. Save your session and now you are ok to walk away and return at anytime to work on your idea.

I've shared my approaches to idea retention but I'm sure others have developed valuable techniques that I would love to know about. What's important is to find one that works for you and use it! It's a shame to let good thoughts go.