Songwriting is an art form that allows you to express your deepest emotions, tell captivating stories, and connect with audiences through powerful lyrics and melodies. Whether you’re a seasoned musician or a beginner looking to unlock your creative potential, honing your songwriting skills can be a rewarding and fulfilling journey.
In today’s music landscape, where streaming platforms and social media have democratized the industry, the ability to craft compelling songs has become more crucial than ever. With the right guidance and training, you can develop your unique voice, master the techniques of lyric writing, melody creation, and song structure, and ultimately, bring your musical ideas to life.
To help you embark on this exciting path, we’ve curated a list of the 10 best songwriting courses available online. These comprehensive programs, offered by renowned institutions and industry professionals, cover a wide range of topics, from the fundamentals of music theory and lyric writing to advanced techniques for commercial success.
1. Lyrics Writing Course by Jacob Carter
Taught by experienced lyricist Jacob Carter, the Lyrics Writing Course is a comprehensive online program designed to help aspiring lyricists and songwriters enhance their skills and creativity. The course consists of six modules covering topics such as finding inspiration, understanding lyrical structure and style, crafting impactful lyrics, and collaborating with others. Students will gain practical insights, industry knowledge, and hands-on experience through HD video lessons, printable resources, and real-life exercises.
Key Features:
- Practical Exercises: Perform exercises to improve your songwriting skills.
- Storytelling Focus: Learn to focus your writing on storytelling and expanding rhyming and specificity.
- Song Analysis: Analyze hit songs by artists like The Beatles, Ed Sheeran, and Joni Mitchell.
- Feedback: Receive feedback on your finished songs.
Modules:
- Finding Your Inspiration: Discover creative writing methods and find your unique style.
- Lyrical Structure and Style: Learn about writing styles, structures, and formats.
- How to Write Lyrics: Turn ideas into complete song drafts.
- Developing Songwriting Depth: Use literary tools to enhance your lyrics.
- Understanding Genre: Tailor your lyrics to specific musical styles.
- Learn How to Co-write: Develop skills for collaborative songwriting.
This course is suitable for beginners and experienced songwriters alike, offering valuable insights and practical tools to enhance lyric-writing skills. It provides lifetime access to course materials, a certificate upon completion, and an option for one-on-one mentoring (additional fee).
You can check out his free guide on lyrics writing before joining his course.
2. The Art of Songwriting – The Open University (FutureLearn)
This 6-week course from The Open University on FutureLearn provides a practical introduction to the mechanics of songwriting. You’ll explore fundamental musical concepts like melody, rhythm, harmony, and the relationship between words and music. The course features insights from established songwriters and musicians like Martin Simpson, Tom Ravenscroft, and others. A unique aspect is that you’ll use specially commissioned lyrics to build a full song, setting the words to rhythm, writing a melody, adding chords, and structuring the sections.
3. Songwriting: Lyric Writing – Elevate with ICMP
This online course focuses exclusively on lyric writing for songs. Over 6 modules, you’ll analyze influential lyrics, learn about song structure, rhyme schemes, storytelling techniques, and develop your own voice through immersive exercises. The course is created by industry experts and allows you to study at your own pace with lifetime access to materials. You’ll receive a certificate upon completion.
4. Writing Song Lyrics: Create and Combine with Melody – City Lit
In this 6-session evening course from City Lit college in London, you’ll learn to generate original lyrical ideas from your experiences and combine them with melodies. The course covers techniques like meter, rhyme, rhythm, themes, and listening analysis of different genres. You’ll work towards recording your own finished song by the end, with the option for one-on-one mentoring.
5. Lyric Writing: Tools and Strategies – Berklee Online
This is one of three courses in Berklee’s Lyric Writing Professional Certificate program. It teaches methodologies and strategies for generating compelling lyric ideas and expressing yourself effectively through songs. You’ll learn tools like sense-bound writing, creating metaphors, and aligning lyrics with the emotional intent of the music.
6. Songwriting: Writing the Lyrics – Berklee Online (Coursera)
Offered through Coursera, this beginner-friendly course from Berklee explores the core concept of prosody – the interplay of lyrics, melody, rhythm and other musical elements. You’ll learn to use tools like rhyme schemes, line lengths, and phrasing to enhance your message. The course includes peer feedback on writing assignments to develop a portfolio song by the end. It’s taught by hit songwriter Pat Pattison.
7. How to Write Lyrics – The Song Foundry
This comprehensive online course covers all the essential skills for writing great song lyrics in any genre. Over 5.5 hours of video modules teach techniques like using rhyme schemes effectively, creating singable melodies, achieving good prosody (lyric-melody fit), storytelling, and more. The 32-page course pack provides additional exercises and analysis. You’ll learn to develop lyrical ideas, structure sections like verses and choruses, and refine lyrics through rewriting. Suitable for beginners to intermediates.
8. The Lyric Writer’s Workroom – Songcraft
This 6-week online course from Songcraft focuses exclusively on lyric writing skills. You’ll learn tools and strategies for generating ideas, using imagery and metaphors, mastering rhyme and rhythm, and structuring a complete lyric. The course involves weekly lessons, writing assignments with feedback, and access to an online community of students. It’s taught by experienced songwriters and aims to help you find your unique lyric writing voice.
9. Songwriting Simplified: Music Theory, Melody & Creativity – Udemy
This Udemy course promises to teach you how to write complete songs from scratch, even if you don’t read music. It covers music theory fundamentals, chord progressions, melody writing, lyrics, song structure and more for pop, rock and country genres. By the end, you’ll have written a full song by following the 5 simple steps outlined. The course uses Logic Pro X but the concepts apply to any DAW.
10. The Singer Songwriter – Berklee Online (Coursera)
Part of Berklee’s Singer Songwriter Specialization on Coursera, this beginner-friendly 4-course program teaches you to write, perform and record your own original music. You’ll learn guitar skills, singing techniques, lyric writing tools, music production basics with Ableton Live, and more. It aims to provide a comprehensive foundation for being a self-sufficient singer-songwriter.
11. Commercial Songwriting Techniques – Berklee Online
This course from Berklee focuses on writing songs for commercial success while maintaining your unique voice. Taught by hit songwriter Andrea Stolpe, it combines theory with practical exercises to create memorable melodies and lyrics that connect emotionally. You’ll learn to reproduce characteristics of hit songs, develop patterns and motifs, and enhance your songwriting process.
