With a jazzswing flavour

Hi Mark,
Thanks for your comments - I was aware of your earlier comments about this song and that gave me the courage to present it.

The role that BIAB plays is significant. Having said that, its very rarely that I take what it just generates first time and use it. BIAB has the ability to redo parts of a song (either chords or melody or both).

It usually takes me a full day to get something out of BIAB that I think I can work with. I get BIAB to generate songs in a variety of styles. Anything that appeals to me (which is less than 5% of the songs generated) I save. In a day, I may end up with 3 or 4 possible melodies.

I then come back to it again a few days later and 'cull' the generated tunes. I find that there are parts of the generated music that either no longer appeals or would be too hard to use. So I rework that. This reworking is done by using the BIAB 'part song' redo facility and can be at either the melody or chord level. At this stage, I may throw them all away and start again. (only about 10% pass this stage)

Having now achieved a song that I like, and still like after a week or so, I then start thinking about the words. There are plenty of Christian/Bible themes of all moods to choose from, and so I try to select a topic that would suit the music. (This is probably back to front for those who compose their own music).

While the above 'God so loved' from the lyrics point of view is very simple, most of my lyrics are more complex. I work out what thoughts I would like the song to convey, just as one would in preparing a sermon. This gives me the 'substance' of the lyrics (no actual lyrics yet).

I then go back to the BIAB tune, and make it singable. This usually involves three steps:
(a) making the melody pitch within range. This may be just changing octaves.
(b) removing fast runs etc where it would be impossible to sing any words,
(c) just touching up the melody here and there a bit to make it easier, and also to end in a satisfying way.

I now have something that I think will appeal. I then begin to work on the words.

So its a long process - and those who can compose directly are probably thankful they are spared from this tedious process. But we get there in the end.

Cheers ... Clyde