How Music Really Works The Essential Handbook for Songwriters, Performers, and Music Students (2024)

This book provides in depth, visually oriented, easy to understand text and graphics covering every important aspect of music making and lyric writing.
The book has 4 major divisions.
I: The Big Picture
II: Essential Building Blocks of Music
III: How to Create Emotionally Powerful Music and Lyrics
IV: Making a Living in Music
I: The Big Picture
1: why music is such an emotionally powerful way of communicating.
2: Major genres of Western music.
II: Essential Building Blocks of Music
3: Harmonic series, how the various types of musical instruments work (including the voice), and the emotional effects of pitch, loudness, and tone color.
4: Discusses the emotional effects of various types of intervals. Topics include scales used in the West
5: Covers the major and minor modes, and more
III: How to Create Emotionally Powerful Music and Lyrics
6: Introduces a simple visual method of working out beautiful, original chord progressions.
7: The role of memory in music, then discusses each element of rhythm (beat, pulse, meter, etc.), how they all relate to each other, and how to manipulate the various elements to maximize emotional impact.
8: Differences between vocal melodic phrases and structural phrases, and the central role of binary form.
9: Melody. The chapter presents 10 specific techniques a songwriter or composer can use to create emotionally powerful tunes.
10: Detailed blueprint for writing lyrics that communicate emotional meaning in the strongest, most effective ways possible.
11: Signature sound and style, stage fright and live sound mixing.
IV: Making a Living in Music
12: How the Music Business and Music Entrepreneurship REALLY Work.