base talk Bigger Talent: Songwriting vs. Singing

[hallucinate]

some pop girls are respected songwriters and some are respected vocalists, but the question is which talent holds more importance to you?

Edited May 2, 2022 by hallucinate

[MALAMENTE]

Both can be practiced and both can be innate so… both

[GentleDance]

Songwriting  >>>

 

Some people have both : Fiona, Joni, Kate Bush, Florence, Tori Amos...

[xclusivestylesz]

No one cares what you're singing about if you sound good ??‍♂️

[Rev8]

Why is ATRL so obsessed with "talents" and the constant measurement of it?

 

the constant ignore to the "skill" and achieving it tho ?

[Alina M]

Both are amazing talents. But songwriting feels more like art, while singing is performance skill imo.

Doing both of it is remarkable.

Edited May 2, 2022 by Alina M

[sourtwink]

songwriting tbh. anyone can be a good singer with enough singing lessons but to actually have an artistic vision and something to say is far more impressive. 

[Pheromosa]

Singing…obviously 

They are both needed though so this is a weird comparison.

 

[swissman]

This is really hard to say because they're both such different talents.

 

But if I had to pick one over the other, I would say singing slightly edges out songwriting if only for the fact that you can't "undo" singing. In the studio, sure, but singing has largely been a live art for most of music history, and to have the talent to consistently get on stage and since with precision, charisma, emotion, etc. is no easy feat.

 

Comparing that to songwriting, which is difficult and so important in order to even have something beautiful to sing, one can take their time with it, and see what works/doesn't work, adjust accordingly, edit it, make it into a masterpiece. You need talent to do it, of course, but you are allowed the space to figure it out.

 

Still, this is a very petty differentiation and they're too different to accurately compare.

[Folklore89sm]

7 minutes ago, xclusivestylesz said:

No one cares what you're singing about if you sound good ??‍♂️

I disagree. Every singing competition around the world is filled to the brim with great-excellent (often highly trained) vocalists. Why do virtually none of them make it? Because they can’t get their hands on a song people want to listen to. 
 

Vocal deterioration doesn’t tend to end careers as much as song quality deterioration. As fast as one good song can make you, one bad song/album can ruin you, regardless of how many high notes/belts/runs are in it.

 

A voice is important to bring the words to life and get the message across to the listener, but it’s the message (including the melody) that is more important.

[dirrtydiana]

singing. anyone can “write” a song but not everyone can sell it. 

[Bimbo]

Both but voted for singing

[Anna-Artdeco]

Songwriting easily. It’s easy to sing passably well but nobody cares about your voice if the music ain’t hitting. It’s much harder to tell a story and bring your vision to life. 

[Erreur2 La Nature]

17 minutes ago, xclusivestylesz said:

No one cares what you're singing about if you sound good ??‍♂️

This 

[magazine]

you can write anything you want and make it a hit

you can also easily pretend you write

 

if you sound like sh*t, you get dragged

and if we catch you lip-syncing, we make sure to let you know you're lip-syncing

 

[swissman]

I would definitely say that singing is as artistic as songwriting. It's just a different kind. There may be more limited amount of personal artistic choices to make, but as a singer you can completely reinvent a song or add subtext or emotion to it that the writer had not conceived of.

 

Certain singers like Patti LaBelle are known to often completely ignore the written song, choosing to sing melodies that come to them at the time of performing, or twisting the words so the notes changes, or adding runs that did not exist on the sheet music.

[VelvetCrush]

There's no such thing as "bigger" talent

Both can be practiced, both can come naturally and/or polished and practiced as a skill. 

What's more useful or easier varies from person to person

[SinnerCity]

Both are equally important

[terrorblade]

a unique & pleasant voice>>>

[Perfect Crime]

Amazing vocalists hold no weight without good songwriting/artistic vision (see: The Voice consistently failing to launch successful artists)

 

On the other hand, good songwriters have built careers without having good vocals (Bob Dylan, Taylor Swift, etc)

[swissman]

15 minutes ago, Folklore89sm said:

I disagree. Every singing competition around the world is filled to the brim with great-excellent (often highly trained) vocalists. Why do virtually none of them make it? Because they can’t get their hands on a song people want to listen to. 
 

Vocal deterioration doesn’t tend to end careers as much as song quality deterioration. As fast as one good song can make you, one bad song/album can ruin you, regardless of how many high notes/belts/runs are in it.

 

A voice is important to bring the words to life and get the message across to the listener, but it’s the message (including the melody) that is more important.

But this presumes that the rating of a talent is relative to the career you can have with it, or that one talent relying on the existence of another is therefore inferior.

 

I'd also argue that song quality is far more subjective than that of singing ability, where a singer either hits a note or doesn't, so the idea that a singer can get a hit by simply following a trend of an established kind with a very basic song that shows no inherent songwriting skill needed other than identifying what works on the radio kind of refutes the idea that one talent is automatically better than the other simply because one provides the content to sing.

 

It would definitely have to depend on the singer though. If you're not known for singing, then yes you ned to have great songs that make up for that. If you are a great singer, the saying goes that you can even sing the phonebook and people would adore it.

[swissman]

It's weird to think that there was a time in pop music where songwriters were superstars in their own right, and a song was more associated to the writer than to the singer who originated it, and the song itself would be covered by many singers, sometimes with multiple hit versions in the same calendar year.

It's so different than how the industry works today.

[Villanelle]

I value songwriting (good one) more because it requires intelligence. 

 

Nevertheless neither are too important for success. We have many pop girls devoid of both- Dua, Katy, Rihana etc. 

 

 

 

[Protocol]

59 minutes ago, dirrtydiana said:

singing. anyone can “write” a song but not everyone can sell it. 

Delusional. Try writing a great song then. Post it here.

[Zaram]

1 hour ago, sourtwink said:

songwriting tbh. anyone can be a good singer with enough singing lessons but to actually have an artistic vision and something to say is far more impressive. 

Isn't that literally the opposite?

some people will never sing good, but Songwriting is just a skill you can learn.