Activity

Hey there campers. I’m your guitar counselor, Michael, from Happy Camper Live. Today I’m going to teach you how to write a song. I’m going to teach you song structure and song writing. First, I’m going to play a song for you and describe the components. This song starts off with a little bit of an intro. After the intro, I added a little bit of a solo in the key that the song is in. Then, I went back to that intro, which is the main chord progression throughout the song. A chord progression is when you play several chords that repeat throughout a song. In this particular song I used A, C# major, and D major. The next part of the song is the first verse. In a lot of verses you’ll hear words that change. Verse one might have words that are different than verse two. That’s because a lot of songs tend to tell a story. However, you can also choose to have the words of a verse repeat, like I did in this song. After the first verse is the chorus. The chorus is like a short refrain, or answer that repeats throughout the song. The chords during this chorus change from A, C#, D to A, F# minor, E, A. After the chorus comes the bridge (or break). The bridge is where you follow the same chord progression from the chorus back down. The bridge gives your song a little bit of a break (or bridge) from a solo or chorus back to a verse. Here, the chord progression is: A, D, A, F, E, A. This gives the song a little bit of a sweeter sound towards the ending. Since this is a bright and happy song, you want it to end on a bright note. This often means ending it on a major chord instead of a minor one.