Writing to an Instrumental - Michelangelo Technique - Day 5

Songwriting Exercises
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Building a Boneyard
Today, we will take the mood, primary image, and theme from yesterday’s exercises and freewrite things that come to mind associated with them.

What you will do is take the mood, primary image, and theme from the last exercise and write down things that come to mind when you focus on them. It helps to have the track playing in the background as it may subliminally trigger something.

My preferred technique is to do this three times (based on the length of the track, that should keep you below ten minutes) at different points in the day. Maybe once right when you wake up, another after lunch with a full belly, and another when you are pretty tired and ready for bed. Your brain and energy being in various places throughout the day may lead you to come up with different things.

I usually do this on paper with my big idea words at the top of a sheet, and underneath I make columns with “nouns”, “verbs”, “descriptors” (adjectives/adverbs), “images”, “lines/phrases/images/etc…”. That is harder to do in this forum, so feel free just to list what comes to mind.

At then end of this exercise, you should have a lot of random things written that all associate back to your mood, theme, and primary image. Remember, we are just building up some associated vocabulary that we can use when we put together the song. It doesn’t have to make sense, we just need some words that we can pull when we are writing.

Here is a link to the same instrumental from the previous exercise.
Instrumental Track - Building a Boneyard

This instrumental is made by HoliznaCC0, it is a public domain dedication, and here is a link to HoliznaCC0: Free Music Archive - HoliznaCC0

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Mood - Pensive/Contemplative : question, reflect, predict, hunger, thirst, wonder, meander, inspect, think, pensive, contemplate, lost, curious, poetry, library, art, stretch (one’s mind), retention, satisfy, clarity, clear, muse, meditate, introspective, dream, study, survey, observe, consider, imagine, create

Primary Image - Floating down a river, surrounded by nature : row, overflow, paddle, boat, inner-tube, stream, drown, drink, water, river, nature, connect, leaves, rustle, stick, swim, wet, moist, damp, wind (noun), animals, squirrels, fish, flow, deer, tread, rush, whitewater, rapids, waterfall, sink, beauty, resonate, creek, creak, wood, tree, dirt, mud, stick, limb, forest, shore, shoreline, sunburn, sun, shine, cloud, rain, deluge, flood, wander, listless, canoe, raft, insects, chirp, squeal, spider, web, spin, weave, oar, cattail, reeds, stalks, dam, wave, ripple, sweat, fresh, heaven, swell, firmament, ocean, passion, release, submerge, cruise, sail, gravity, weightless

Theme - Thinking about where we are, where we are going, where the river will take us. : road, path, way, wind (verb), lost, searching, direction, seek, answer, fear, relief, past, present, future, time, learn, lessons, continuous, growth, little, inferior, cycle, universe, journey, destination, origin, hell, action, motion, perceive/perception, destruction, regret, hope, discretion, relief, travel, destiny, fate, passage, forgotten, foregone, former, between, now, then, afterwards, await

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Mood: Lonely and missing home: Nostalgia, grey, wonder, barren, longing, solitary, hermit, hiding, dreary, clouds, memories, ghosts, friends,

Primary image: Walking alone in a foreign city on the other side of the planet: Strangers, uncomfortable, prey, eagles, closed, unwelcoming, clamped,

Theme: The world is big, we are small, home is where the heart is: Wilderness, ocean, mountains, expand, horizon, sunrise, sunset, gaze, awe, remote, vast, forest, fields, stars,

Will come back and add to this palette throughout the day as suggested!

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I really like the words you have begun associating with the big ideas. Unwelcoming, hermit, and expand really catch my eye!

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