Do You Need Music Theory Knowledge to Write Songs?
Here's a list of musicians who mastered music theory and those who barely knew it.

Music theory is a recurring topic that is often discussed, mainly because some people wonder if they can make music without the need to study it. Let's see, you are probably reading this article because you have the same question... so don't worry, here I will explain everything in detail.

Before you start, you must be clear that if you want to play any kind of instrument you must learn the basics of music theory. So all musicians, without exception, have at least a minimum knowledge (very basic) of music theory. The problem is that many people find music notation boring, and decide not to study it.

At first, it can be a bit tedious, music notation is extremely important. Just by understanding music notation you can communicate or express your ideas with other musicians. Remember that music theory is the language between musicians, so if you have basic knowledge, you may find it difficult to communicate.

It is the same as any discipline, for example, you may have a basic concept of mathematics, but in order to resolve complicated and advanced exercises you must focus on studying constantly. The same happens with music, to advance and perform compositions you must study.

However, many renowned artists who never liked music theory, in fact, many of them achieved success without having advanced knowledge. Here is a list of some of them:

Luciano Pavarotti

Probably one of the most important voices in Italy, Luciano was the tenor voice that would dazzle anyone. He even performed duets with Elton John, Frank Sinatra, Michael Jackson, Andrea Bocelli, Celine Dion, and Sting. But here's the funny thing, at first he couldn't read music, because he learned to read it phonetically.

Irving Berlin

Berlin was a composer who marked a before and after in the history of music. He was born in Belarus but soon became a naturalized American citizen, and managed to start his career as a composer on Broadway, where he became famous. Believe it or not, Irving never learned to read music, he only knew the basics of music theory. However, he composed more than 3,000 songs which made him one of the most important references in American music.

Irving sadly died at the age of 101 in New York, the place where so many people appreciated and admired him for his music.

Pete Townshend

If you're a fan of The Who… I don't need to explain who Pete Townshend is.

He’s just a guitar expert! This man has been responsible for writing more than 100 songs for 12 different albums of the legendary band, but the interesting thing is that most of them were written with just his ear. Townshend had no knowledge of music theory, but he had one great advantage, he was very talented with his instrument.

Paul McCartney

We have all heard a song by The Beatles at some point in our lives, as they have become one of the most important bands in history. Who doesn't know the geniuses who changed music forever? Well, one of them, as you may already know, is Paul McCartney, one of the best songwriters in the world!

But a fact that you might not know is that Paul can play almost all instruments, but when he started learning as a child, much of his progress was thanks to the great musical ear he had. In other words, McCartney never needed music theory. But this is a particular case, he is an absolute genius!

If you haven't seen the new music Paul has released in the last few months, I recommend you listen to this song:

Find My Way by Paul McCartney & Beck

But there’s something you need to know, nowadays it's not difficult to write songs. On the internet, you can find all kinds of courses, videos, or documents that explain in detail how to write a song step by step. But you must keep something in mind, music theory will not enhance your musical creativity, it will only give you the theoretical tools that every composer acquires throughout his career. To simply answer the main question of this article...

Do you need music theory to write songs? Yes... and no.

If you want to write a song, you can do it in different ways, either by following music theory or just writing by ear. In other words, you can just make a song by making sure it sounds good. To be honest, most of the time I do that when I write songs.

Now that you have the answer to the main question, I will give you some tips you can follow if you are interested in learning music theory:

• Make sure you look for a mentor who can help you, either online or in a music academy: this will allow you to accelerate your learning process, even though you can learn on your own, I recommend that you do it accompanied!
• All the theories you learn must be practiced constantly: by this I mean that you must put into practice everything you learn, because if you don't do it... you can easily forget all the knowledge. For example, you can do a very interesting exercise...

Learn songs of your favorite artists and try to identify what chords they are playing!

This exercise will not only improve your musical ear, but you will also get a better handle on musical chords. In fact, if you're excited about this idea, here's a song for you to identify the chords that are used on the guitar:

Pumped Up Kicks by Foster the People

In conclusion, you can write songs without having advanced knowledge of music theory, but I recommend that you learn at least the basics, and be encouraged to play a lot of music!

Theory can be turned into a fun learning experience.

If you liked this article, please share it with your friends! Many people have all kinds of questions about music theory, so maybe this article can be of some help to them.

What about you, do you have any knowledge about music theory? Or do you like to compose songs without it?