So how should lyric sheets be formatted? This would seem like a good question, right? Well, in all the years I’ve been in the business I can’t think of a single time anyone ever asked. I’m not 100% positive there is an exact way to format lyrics but I do know a very simple, easy to follow, concise and professional format that’s widely accepted and appreciated by the industry. Follow along:

Fonts:

Always use Book Antiqua as your font. It’s a very pleasant font that’s ease to read.

Font Sizes:

• The title line should be 20 points.
• The songwriter’s name line should be 14 points.
• The body of lyrics should be 12 point when there’s enough room to get the entire lyric on one sheet. Use a smaller font size of no less than 9 point if you must to get the entire song on one sheet. If you can’t get the whole song on one sheet, it’s probably too long to start with.
• The contact line at the very bottom of the page should be no less than 8 point.

Tabs Are Our Friend:

• Title line and songwriter line is left justified.
• Verses are full left aligned along with the title line and songwriter name line.
• Choruses are in one tab only.
• Bridges are in two tabs only.
• Outros are aligned one tab in with the bridge.

What To Do:

• Only the Title Line should be bold.
• Use small caps for the title line only.
• The entire page should be justified left.
• Only include your First and last name on the songwriter line which is just below the title. If there are co-writers involved, simply use a ” / ” between each name.

What Not To Do:

• Do not have anything bold except the title line.
• Do not use italics for anything.
• Do not use caps on the entire lyric.
• Do not use center justify for anything.
• Do not use section titles like “verse, verse 1, chorus, bridge” . This is what the tabs are for.
• Do not use quotation marks for anything.
• Do not use any color font other than black.

Contact line:

Only include your name as you want to be known and with no initials being used, your phone number, and your email address. Don’t put your snail mail address or website address because I can all but guarantee you no one is going to write you a letter or take the time to go to your site. We (the industry) will either call or email our response to you.

Heres a quick example:

I have a more comprehensive guide available if you’d like a copy. Just let me know and I’ll be happy to email you one. And remember, we’re always looking for new original songs to place in the industry.

Rick Dean
The Dean Of Music Publishing Group
Nashville Tennessee
ASCAP, BMI & SESAC Affiliated

A day doesn’t go by that one or another of the songwriters we work with contacts me to know if I have “any good news” for them. This translates to “Has my song been picked”? On the extremely rare chance that I did just get the news of a hold, or better yet, a cut, the very moment the songwriter asked…. well, you know where this is going, right?

Let me get to the point. If you write a song that a publisher likes and thinks he or she can make something happen with it, don’t stop writing and take up guard post on this one song. Move on to the next and then the next. With the current landscape, the chances of a song becoming a cut is pretty small. The ones that are successful are what I call the cream of the crop, of the cream of the crop. What gets a songwriter to this pinnacle is nothing other than practice. And the only way to practice writing songs is to write more songs. So what are you waiting for? Asking if we’re there yet doesn’t get us there any sooner. It just frustrates the driver.

On any given day recording artist, music producers, professional publishers, label executives, and other industry decision makers are surrounded by great voices. They work with the best of the best and have their ears tuned to the best of sound. I’ve written songs most of my adult life and, even though my friends and family love my voice, rarely do I sing my own demos. Hiring the right demo vocalist and matching the best voice with your song can be the magic ingredient that makes the difference of having success or failure when it comes time to pitch your songs to the industry.

A professional demo singer can sing just about anything and be very convincing when it comes to the “sell” factor. They are professional singers and they will sing whatever the words are in a way that will make you want to “buy” whatever it is they are singing about. Hopefully, that is your song they are singing when that sale is made. Wouldn’t that be cool? It is the whole point of a great demo and exactly the end result you want when you pitch your song.

In the studio our company uses we see the demo vocalist we hire walk right in, take the lyric sheet and song chart and usually go right into singing as if they actually wrote the piece. You’ll see them write notes on the lyric sheet as they go. They’ll go over the lyrics a couple times usually humming the tune as they go. They then walk right up to the mike and start working with the song as the engineer is setting up the sound on their voice. Keep in mind however, they may have never heard this song before in their life. Professional demo singers are usually very comfortable in a recording studio. They’ll always ask what the songwriter or producer has envisioned vocally for this recording.

What you’ll end up with is usually a work that could easily be played right on the radio as is, and one that will certainly catch the attention of anyone who listens for licensing consideration. Depending on the engineer your pick of demo studios uses, you’ll have a sound recording with superbly balanced vocals and music which is important to anyone listening.

Not all songs written should be demoed. As a publisher I see an average of about ninety percent of lyrics submitted that aren’t ready for the demo process. And since demoing a song has a cost related to it, not to mention the likelihood of success potential of a given song, we only produce demo sound recordings for the ones we feel “has legs” meaning, are worth spending resources to professionally demo. This should be something you as a songwriter work close to your publisher with. As a mainstream publisher I’m always brutally honest with songwriters who work with us. I’m this honest to avoid pitching less than stellar songs to the recording artist and other decision makers. I also try to help our writers avoid unnecessary spending for demos of songs that are less than stellar.

The choice is ultimately yours but I assure you the chances are likely that you need to hire a demo singer to compete in todays complex music business atmosphere with such a narrow window of opportunity for successful pitching.

~ ~ ~

Rick is a songwriter turned publisher and owner of the now successful Dean Of Music Publishing Group in Nashville Tennessee. Being a native of Nashville and having worked in or around the music business for most of his life, Rick realized he had more than enough industry contacts and knowledge that success would come, and it has.

Rick’s company’s online industry-only portal, http://www.deanslistmusic.com, provides songwriters in and outside of Nashville with access to virtually every mainstream industry decision maker in the music, film, TV and advertisement industries. Rick’s company also provides songwriters access to some of the very best session musicians and vocalist available to create the best demos possible in a legendary Nashville studio. It all starts here at http://www.yourtunespace.com where already almost 400 songwriters have gathered to find their success!

You can find Rick on LinkedIn here: http://www.linkedin.com/pub/rick-dean/28/48a/37

The gate keepers or, major labels have, to some extent, been vanishing. It’s just hasn’t happened like some have said it would. And in all honesty, I’m glad it hasn’t. You see, in a paradigm where you have no gate keepers you also have no one to regulate what’s worthy or who get’s paid. I think about this every time I take a trip across town and get behind one of the thousands of pick-up trucks, in every city mind you, pulling trailers full of riding mowers these days. It came to me one day, as I sat behind one at a light, how every single one of them looks exactly the same. And not a single one has ever stood out in my mind for any reason. There is absolutely no regulation over these men and their machines. 

Driving down these same roads we share with men and mowing machine you’ll see lawns that are at various states of manicure. Some look super great while others seem neglected even though having been recently trimmed. Think about this, how nice would every lawn look if there were gate keepers in the lawn mowing industry who regulated the quality therefore producing only top mowing acts who would make every lawn look fabulous? 

My point is this. When there are no industry gate keepers, there will be no one who keeps the quality up, no one who collects tickets, and there will be no receipts from the gate. The end result for songwriters and artists would be no income, no fun, and quite frankly, no future…

~ ~ ~

Rick is a songwriter turned publisher and owner of the now successful Dean Of Music Publishing Group in Nashville Tennessee. Being a native of Nashville and having worked in or around the music business for most of his life, Rick realized he had more than enough industry contacts and knowledge that success would come, and it has.

Rick’s company’s online industry-only portal, http://www.deanslistmusic.com, provides songwriters in and outside of Nashville with access to virtually every mainstream industry decision maker in the music, film, TV and advertisement industries. Rick’s company also provides songwriters access to some of the very best session musicians and vocalist available to create the best demos possible in a legendary Nashville studio. It all starts here at http://www.yourtunespace.com where already almost 400 songwriters have gathered to find their success!

You can find Rick on LinkedIn here, http://www.linkedin.com/pub/rick-dean/28/48a/37

To be able to make it work a producer may have to get involved with the technical stuff and help the recording engineer out. Or you may have to get the singer to make the vocal track work with the song by changing the lyrics, changing the melody or give some vocal pointers. It may also involve rewriting part of the music by changing chords, adding samples and sound effects and creating a complete new drum rhythm from scratch. And there are a lot of other situations where a good producer needs to take charge and show why he (or she) is the producer.

Being a producer can involve:

Getting into the music (music theory)

Getting into the songwriting process and learning about songwriting and sequencing

Knowing some things about recording

Being able to work with musicians and artist and get the best out of them

Working with a recording engineer and other studio owners

Using sound effects, samples and other techniques to make song sound different and unique

Mixing and editing the song

Mastering the song

In today’s music the producer is usually also a songwriter, a musician and recording engineer. This makes the job both easier and more difficult. In this course we’ll cover it from both perspectives.

By the way, how do you find a publisher who’s willing to listen to your songs? Believe it or not you’re already closer to one than you can imagine! This very blog that you’re reading is posted by one of the most open door publishers in the industry, The Dean Of Music Publishing Group in Nashville Tennessee.

We’ve also built this really cool songwriter association that’s open to all songwriters regardless of skill level and genre. And by registering as a YourTuneSpace.com member you’ll have direct access to me, the publisher, and you’ll love the innovative way my company, The Dean Of Music Publishing Group, get’s your pitch-ready songs to the industry with our industry-only portal that caters to the music, film, TV show and big advertisement industries who are always looking to find new material for their various projects. Registration is currently free and will be for a very short time longer. All you have to do is click this link, www.yourtunespace.com, and answer a few simple questions. We’ll get back to you and quickly approve your membership then send you an e-mail letting you know. That’s all there is to it, and we’ll get the ball rolling for you! We look forward to have you as part of our growing family of songwriters! 

Rick Dean
The Dean Of Music Publishing Group
Nashville Tennessee

Today, the recording industry has two kinds of producers: executive producer and music producer; they have different roles. While an executive producer oversees a project’s finances, a music producer oversees the creation of the music.

A music producer can, in some cases, be compared to a film director in that a music producer’s job is to create, shape, and mold a piece of music. The scope of responsibility may be one or two songs or an artist’s entire album — in which case the producer will typically develop an overall vision for the album and how the various songs may interrelate.

In the UK, before the rise of the record producer, an A&R man would oversee the recording session(s), assuming responsibility for creative decisions relating to the recording.

Rick Dean
The Dean Of Music Publishing Group
Nashville Tennessee