3 Advantages Of Songwriting With The Piano

I have to be honest.

My songwriting instrument of choice is the piano.

I like writing with acoustic and electric guitars, but the piano is my most powerful tool.

Let’s talk about the 3 main advantages of songwriting with the piano- even if you aren’t much of a pianist.

You Can Write Melody And Chords At The Same Time

The piano is the only mainstream instrument that easily allows you to write the melody and chords at the exact same time. 

You can with any “keyboard” such as an organ or harpsichord, but you probably aren’t songwriting with those very often are you?

And, yes, technically you can do this on guitar if you are proficient enough.

But most of us aren’t that skilled with guitar improvisation. On the other hand, you can improvise melody and chords on the piano with only rudimentary piano skills.

The piano is made for chords and melody being done at the same time.

Think about it- how many notes can you play at the same time with a flute, tuba, french horn, or any other brass or woodwind instrument?

One. You can’t even play a diad, much less a triad and a melody. 

What about stringed instruments like violin or cello? 

2 notes. Not even enough for a full triad, much less a triad and a melody.

What about the piano? You can play as many notes at the same time as you have fingers. So 10 (probably).

Realistically, you’re probably playing closer to 5 notes at once, but that’s still over double the maximum capacity of our violinist friends and five times the capacity of our brass and woodwind friends.

Realistically, how does writing chords and melody at the same time benefit you?

It gives you instant feedback.

You instantly know if the melody/chord pairing sounds how you want it to.

Maybe right now you’re saying “But, I can get that on the guitar if I just sing along!”

Let’s talk about that.

You Can Write More Interesting Melodies

I find that it’s easier to write more interesting melodies on the piano than with vocal improvisation.

Not only that, I find that the strongest melodies I write tend to come from the piano. I think there are a couple reasons for this.

One reason is that the piano has the most visually obvious notes of any instrument.

When you sing, you probably are thinking “higher” and “lower” and more or less feeling for the next notes. Even if you were blessed with perfect pitch, I doubt you can “visualize” how big of an interval you want to jump up by.

A piano has obvious intervals with obvious notes. Want to go up by 3 notes? Literally hit the key 3 notes higher. That’s all there is to it.

With the guitar, you have that same benefit on a single string, but once you start utilizing different strings, the notes’ relations to one another start becoming a lot less obvious.

With the piano, not only are notes and intervals fairly obvious, but you can literally see if you’re playing the same note in your melody as you are in the chord. 

Because every E looks the same on the piano. 

Every A# looks the same on the piano.

On a guitar, it’s all just frets on strings. 

When you’re writing a melody on the piano, you can literally see that you keep going up to an E in your melody, and change it up to go to an F# instead.

Unless you have near perfect pitch, you can’t really do that when singing.

Another reason I think the piano is so powerful for songwriting is that it is a very melodic instrument by nature.

Think about this:

What do you think of when you think of a beginner guitarist?

You probably just imagined that college guy sitting outside, strumming 4 chords on the guitar while singing a song to woo the ladies. Or something like that.

The point is that beginner or basic guitar playing is strumming chords. So predominantly a rhythmic and chord based playing style. 

You probably didn’t imagine someone plucking out a melody solo-style.

But what do you think of when you think of a beginner pianist?

You probably imagined someone sitting at a piano, plucking out the melody of twinkle twinkle little star. Or the melody (and harmony note) of *cringes* Chopsticks. 

Regardless of what you imagine, you probably weren’t imagining chords and rhythms. You probably were imagining someone index-fingering a melody.

Basic guitar is strumming chords. Basic piano is playing a melody. 

Even a non-pianist and non-musician very much has the capability to pluck out a melody on the piano. 

Because the piano is so melody-centric, it is a very effective tool for figuring out the melody for your song.

You Can Write More Of The Arrangement At Once

A lot of my favorite, most epic guitar riffs I wrote on the piano.

I’m not lying. For some of my most epic harder rock songs I’ve written, I wrote the guitar riffs on the piano.

The beauty of the piano is you have 2 hands to play notes. 

This means you can effectively write 2 guitar parts at once, getting instant feedback on how they sound together.

If you’re anything like me and like the sound of a wall of guitars or “dueling” guitars that play wildly different but cohesive riffs at the same time, writing your music on the piano can be a huge win.

Even beyond guitars, I often arrange some of the string and atmospheric parts of my songs with the keyboard.

The ability to play notes with 2 different hands is a huge gain.

It effectively makes it so you can always verify that 2 different parts work well together. 

You can write your chords and melody, with instant feedback on how well they work together.

So now you have chords you know work. Now you can play chords and a prospective guitar riff on the piano. If that works, now you can play the guitar riff and the melody at the same time. If all of those scenarios work out, great!

Now you don’t need to have a band or record all these parts to know they all fit together.

Good luck doing that with your guitar, violin, or flute. 

Well, really any non-keyboard instrument.