English lyrics for non-English native speakers...
One of the things which continually blows me away in my teaching is the courage I see from my non-native English speaking students, challenging themselves to write lyrics in English. I wanted to share some tips to those of you reading who might find this helpful:
Give yourself credit for the courage:
Expressing oneself artfully in one’s native language is hard enough! Doing so in a foreign language takes real bravery. Most of your native English peer group won’t have ever tried this, or experienced the vulnerability it takes! So firstly, make sure to give yourself credit and recognise that this is a challenging thing to do.
Give yourself permission to be simple at first:
Sometimes there’s a pressure which can creep in to the writing, where writers may “over-write” a little to compensate for an insecurity with the new language. This might mean using overly flowery/long words when not totally sure of context/meaning. It serves sometimes as a kind of disguise to try and cover over a lack of confidence with the language. But you don’t have to. Allow yourself to start with simple, clear expression to get the feel for writing in another language. Confidence will naturally grow from a solid foundation as you listen and write more.
Lean on English speaking friends….
if there are words or expressions which you’re not sure you’re using correctly, take a native English speaking friend for a coffee and go through any questions you may have with your lyrics. Ask them if there are any things which jump out needing refinement. Look out for instances where you may have used the “correct” word, but tonally are conveying something other than you had imagined via that word choice.
Be open to happy accidents….
You may not have considered this, but remain open to the possibility that you phrase something in a highly imaginative way that an English native never would! Call it a “good mistake”. I see this a lot. You may stumble on some real poetry or imaginative use of language, coming to it fresh.
Prepositions…..
On a more technical level, a common issue I see is either an over or under use of prepositions ----“to” “ the” “but” “and” etc. With the overuse, this can come from a desire to make things as clear as possible. As far as underuse, English is a particularly difficult language to gauge in certain situations where a preposition is needed vs where it isn’t. Be open to word delete or word add in this area. Another thing you can always run by a native speaker.
4 Pillars: lyrics / news / talk radio /poetry…..
Spending time with the English language in different contexts will give you a tremendous acceleration with your writing. As a songwriter, spending time with English lyrics is of course key. Print out the lyrics for several songs you love, and look at the language from various points of view. How are things expressed? Where is rhyme used? Where are things poetic and more plain spoken? How does the language used convey a particular tone? The news carries real clarity of expression with both narrative and factual information. Talk radio (where callers phone up to discuss a given sporting or political topic), gives real insight in to modes everyday speech. And last but not least, reading/listening to poetry will give you ideas in experimenting with language in creative ways.
The key thing here is to have fun, and whether writing an abstract mood or more story based song, start simply and economically. You can build from there.
