Taylor Swift Shares her Songwriting Techniques for 5 Minutes Straight

took the money in the bag and I stole the money took the money in the bag and I sold the keys that was the last time you ever saw me [Music] I have a bit of a habit in choosing something that is a phrase that people often say in conversation and the thought of like that kind of triplet of notes being like why aren't you mad and like you need to calm down to that kind of rhythmic Cadence a hook is often talked about in songwriting it can be one of the most powerful parts of

a song a lot of the time if somebody only knows a little bit of a song it's the hook and all of a sudden there was this moment where I thought of the whole chorus and it was over the chords that I had just told him are not chorus chords the chorus of Shake It Off just came out in like kind of one Fell Swoop and I want it to be the song where like if it's played at a wedding and there's this one girl who hasn't danced all night at the reception um all her

friends come over and then they're like you have to dance come on you have to dance on this one that's what I wanted a lot of like right like a hook is Shake It Off shake it off or baby now we got bad blood or um most personal process I'm not thinking about all those people singing the words to the music I'm not thinking about it if it'll get played on the radio when I'm writing a song all I'm thinking about is the person that I'm writing it about and what they're going to think when

they hear it and to me that's just always been my process it's like I just keep it very one-on-one very personal between me and whatever Muse has come into my life and inspired it you say that you'll never find another like me oh fun of me I know people who will write a verse for one song and decide to just put it on another song or like I like this chorus but I like it with this pre-chorus from this song and I'm like oh I've never done that once I kind of have to capitalize on

the excitement of me getting that idea and see it all the way through or else I'll leave it behind and I'll just assume it wasn't good enough I think as a songwriter there is that urge to connect there is that urge to say like this is how I feel sometimes and then have fans say oh my God like I feel that way sometimes too and I think a documentary if you are open enough you can connect with people I write songs not just to put them on albums but I write songs to help understand a

little life a little bit more life makes a little more sense to me when I can take these complex emotions and and you know tricky situations and things that come at you in life and process them and say them in a song yeah [Music] writing just kind of happens to me like no matter where I am four in the morning or in the middle of a conversation I'll just get an idea and I'll have to like record it into my cell phone so that I don't forget so on to the phone is that how you

do it just yeah record it onto the phone and then I come back to it later and like see if I want to expand it into a whole song or if it's just stupid and I was like thought I had a good idea but I didn't then I just delete it because that's the thing do you go do you think I mean recording to your phone so you might sing something like a tune uh or do you just have a lyric coming to your head it's either you know it's really unexpected because it's always different

like like a fragment of a verse with like a little bit of a melody or it could be like a background vocal vocal it's always a different part of the song So it keeps me on my toes it keeps me of the look on your face [Music] [Music] this time