The Complete Guide to Songwriting with Simon Rushby

Next-level composing with an industry expert.

In this 10-episode course, follow along with Simon Rushby as he composes a song right before our eyes and invites you and your students to join in. Simon covers topics like writing effective melodies and lyrics, what we can learn from studying music of different genres, how much repetition you can get away with, various chord harmony options and how to modulate without sounding cliché.

Course outline

  1. Course Intro - The Art of Song
  2. Episode 1 - Anatomy of a Song
  3. Episode 2 - The Ingredients of a Song
  4. Episode 3 - Tunes That Get Stuck in Your Head
  5. Episode 4 - Writing a Melody - Rinse and Repeat
  6. Episode 5 - Getting Lyrical
  7. Episode 6 - Two-, Three- and Four-Chord Wonders
  8. Episode 7A - Don’t Bore Us, Get to the Chorus (Part A)
  9. Episode 7B - Don’t Bore Us, Get to the Chorus (Part B)
  10. Episode 8 - Stand Up for the Key Change
  11. Episode 9 - The Fully-Fledged Song

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The Complete Guide to Songwriting with Simon Rushby was created by

Simon Rushby

Music Education Expert, Performer, Composer, Songwriter and ABRSM Examiner

Simon Rushby is a music education expert, teacher, performer, composer, an ABRSM examiner, and author who taught music in schools across the South-East of England. With over 30 years of experience in leading UK schools as a Director of Music, he’s worked with many students of all levels. He’s published several educational resources, including Discovering Music Theory, an ABRSM exam prep series.

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The Complete Guide to Songwriting with Simon Rushby

We’re so excited to bring you this next-level songwriting course taught by Simon Rushby! While this course is a natural follow-up to Tim’s 4-Chord Composing Course, this course can easily be taken on its own. Simon covers topics like writing effective melodies and lyrics, what we can learn from studying music of different genres, how much repetition you can get away with, various chord harmony options and how to modulate without sounding cliché. Follow along with Simon as he composes a song right before our eyes and invites you and your students to join in!

About Simon Rushby

Simon Rushby is a music education expert, teacher, performer, composer, an ABRSM examiner, and author who taught music in schools across the South-East of England. With over 30 years of experience in leading UK schools as a Director of Music, he’s worked with many students of all levels. He’s published several educational resources, including Discovering Music Theory, an ABRSM exam prep series. As a composer, Simon has written songs that have charted for artists in Europe and Asia, and compositions that have been used worldwide for TV shows and commercials, including BBC, ITV, Sky and BT Sport in the UK. As an arranger, he’s been the lead on two albums for Alexander Shulgin, which have topped the charts in Russia. As a performer Simon remains busy as a pianist and keyboard player and has been musical director for productions of shows such as Sweeney Todd, Carousel, The Producers, Les Miserables, Anything Goes and West Side Story. He also plays keyboards in a number of highly respected pop, rock and jazz bands and has conducted performances of a vast range of choral and orchestral music, both with student and adult ensembles and choirs.
Click this link to join our TopMusic Tuesday Toolkit, a forum-based learning cohort where you can work alongside other TopMusicPro members as you go through each episode of this course.

How to begin

Are you ready to get started? Just click the Enrol in course button below to activate your course. Then click Start Course to begin learning. If you’re on our app, click the Start Course button to enrol in the course and then Start Course again to begin the first lesson.

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