Beyonce Knowles and Britney Spears in their OWN words

[mzncb 332]

Again, my warning from the moderator was" to not make inflammatory remarks about Britney or Beyonce and to not make threads that disrespect other artists, like Beyonce."

It is an impossibility for either instance to exist in this thread since this very notable contrast is based on their OWN WORDS AND ACTIONS:

Remembering that EVERY LADY GAGA FAN AGREES THAT SONGWRITING=MELODY+LYRICS ONLY...

Let's get this thread started:

""... Like with ['three note'] 'Everytime' I wrote the whole thing from scratch on the piano. Musically there was no track or anything. I was just at my house and I did the whole thing by myself. And then I went and I played it for [Guy Sigsworth] and I just basically told him exactly how I wanted the song to sound. And he was so amazing because there's a lot of producers you tell them things and they don't get it. And you're like oh, that's not the right way. He got it just right. He was amazing. And so that song specifically, you know, I did everything."

https://web.archive.org/web/20100105101345/http://www.hiponline.com/3276/britney-spears-interview-2003.html

As for Everytime's co-writer, until we see her create her own melody on the piano, she certainly doesn't deserve any benefit of the doubt...

(1:50) 

 

 

 

[Borislshere 52,615]

you again.

Don't you ever get tired of this same tired argument? Is it that impossible for you to praise Britney Spears without dragging any of her peers? 

11 minutes ago, mzncb said:

Remembering that EVERY LADY GAGA FAN AGREES THAT SONGWRITING=MELODY+LYRICS ONLY...

Speak for yourself. 

[Pennywise 34,704]

[weed 66,857]

I lose a year of my life every time I'm finessed into seeing that Everytime video

[PsychoMaxcara 814]

Not entirely sure what the question is and I'm not a professional musician, but from what I've gathered over the years of following various pop stars and watching interviews and behind the scenes footage, the creative process behind the inception of songs is pretty chaotic and all over the place, and as far as the word "songwriter" is concerned, I think it's thrown around quite loosely and no one really agrees on what the exact requirement(s) of being classified as one is/are.

Basically, first you have the record label and there are some producers that have a deal of some sort with the label. Artists signed under the label are usually hooked up with the said inhouse producers, and the producers offer them songs to record. These songs come from huge catalogues of instrumentals, beats, and songs that they have created. Occasionally, they might play the artist a beat that has no lyrics or vocals, but most of the time -- they will have a nearly finished song ready aka a 'demo,' that has vocals and everything. The demo is usually sung by the writer of the song, the person who came up with the lyrics though not always -- e.g. The-Dream, who has in many cases collaborated with Bey, usually functions as both songwriters AND producer. Here's a demo of 1+1: 

Beyoncé is credited as a songwriter and producer on this song, but it's clear judging by the demo that the song was pretty much finished. The same goes for Irreplaceable (Ne-Yo) and If I Were a Boy (BC Jean & Toby Gad). Beyoncé is almost always credited as a songwriter/producer on her songs, but from my understanding, she is given songs that are more or less finished and she creates her own harmonies and vocal arrangements (which counts as 'songwriting' in the music industry) and changes some minor details in the production of the song. 

Anyway, in order to shop a song around to other artists (either new or established) a demo is usually created and the rudimentary vocals are laid out by the writers, e.g. here's a demo of Rude Boy done by its writer Ester Dean:

This is what was most likely submitted to Rihanna by her label when she was looking for songs to include on her album Rated R. Note the absence of the bridge which Rihanna received a songwriting credit for. Lady Gaga also worked with producers before her career took off, hence demos like "Superstar" (submitted to the Pussycat Dolls) and "Quicksand" (Britney).

This is probably a very simplified version of what actually happens and I believe that artists may be more involved in both writing and production, and that writers might also produce etc. Any combination is possible. We know that Gaga is capable of writing a song from scratch at the piano and laying the vocals in one go, but I'm sure there were instances where she was given a beat that she didn't compose and came up with the lyrics, or she was given a nearly finished song and switched a few things around...

Y'all must remember that this is the music BUSINESS and artists/writers/producers function as businessmen. It'd take years and years for an artist to compose & produce a full length album all by themselves with zero help. Trends in music change rapidly and there's only so much time, so all of this was established to compile polished & current sounding collections of songs as fast as possible. Some artists just have songs submitted to them, others are more involved. For some artists, the creative process is different every time. The definitions of the various roles are kind of blurred and artists often have to function as both singers and writers or producers....