When writing for a specific market, whether it's country, pop, or Bolivian folk music, the choices you make in word usage, syntax, and grammar can affect your success as much as your storytelling and melodic skills. Paying attention to every line, every word of your song, as well as the overall flow and style, can bring rich rewards. Ignoring these things can assure you a permanent place as the best songwriter in the whole produce department, maybe even the whole grocery store.

Vocabulary Choices

An important choice faced frequently by songwriters is picking exactly the right word to fill a spot. Colorful words can help a lyric stand out and make a song more vivid, but make sure to use words that are understandable to your target market and are appropriate to the song. For instance, some publishers tend to shy away from songs with words like “cogitate,” “fuchsia,” and “Australopithecus.” Instead, try “think,” “pink,” and “missing link.” Use words that are natural to the kind of person who would sing or listen to your song.

If you're not sure the listener will understand a certain word, the way in which you use it may help explain it. Many people didn't know the true meaning of the word “ironic” when Alanis Morissette's song of the same title came out. In the song “Ironic,” Morissette writes about situations with the question of whether they were ironic, and further reinforces the explanation by the use of simile (it's like …) and metaphor (it's a …) in the “B” section.

Colloquialisms and Vernacular

Colloquialisms are common sayings with an informal tone. Vernacular is an informal mode of speech. Both are used frequently and successfully in songs. “I Fall to Pieces,” “God Only Knows,” and “Somethin' in the Water” are all song hooks made from colloquialisms. Vernacular speech is particularly useful in a song where a conversational feel is needed.

Syntax and Grammar

Used well, “bad English” can make for a great song. You may come under fire from your mother or the English teacher/amateur songwriter down at the local songwriter's association, who insists that, “Proper grammar and syntax are the building blocks of any good song.” Thank them for their advice and politely ignore it. Look at the following line: “Although I have made repeated attempts, I cannot obtain any gratification whatsoever.”

Technically correct? Yes. Does it read like a hit lyric? No! It just sits there. It feels stuffy and old. However, if the line is made more conversational with a double negative, and some redundancy is added for dramatic effect, the results are golden — you get the hook to “Satisfaction” by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards.

Now, take the line “We shall not retire until the sun rises.” It just doesn't have the punch of the Garth Brooks classic “Ain't Goin' Down ‘til the Sun Comes Up.” Though there are errors made in grammar (ain't), diction (goin'), and it ends with (gasp!) a preposition, the line has a conversational tone that's appropriate to the song, a catchy rhythm, and a great contrast between “up” and “down.”

What matters is that your song is authentic to its genre, that the language feels natural, and that you get your point across to the listener as precisely as possible. Use bad English if, and only if, it makes your song better. If it does, use it without guilt or remorse. Remember, the primary object of a lyric is to communicate to the listener. Whatever does that best for a particular song is the right way.