Simple question. Does it matter to you if an artist writes their own music?

yes

Personally I give them more respect

It helps give them credibility, but I'd never refuse to listen to an artist or song because they didn't write their own lyrics. It's not that big of a deal; many of the greatest artists of all time didn't write their own lyrics.

Yes, I won't necessarily like their music, but I will give them much more respect.

Yeah. I feel a lot more passionate about who I stan for when they write their own lyrics; it shows that they play a role in how their career is being handled and that they're putting music out there that they're passionate about.

It depends. Some artists when u realize that they wrote the lyrics, it makes it more personable. U can be able to say u relate to the artist because u have gone through the same things the writer has.

Some artists are so good at interpreting lyrics, that u feel like they wrote the song themselves because of the emotion. For example: Whitney Houston hardly wrote any of her songs, but the emotion u felt from her singing was greater than an artist who could of wrote and sung the song themselves.

Yes

This is me. But I was talking to my anut earlier, and she said she doesn't think you're fully an artist until you take hand in your own music

Yes, it has a lot of influence in the way I see an artist. But of course that doesn't imply that I won't listen to "Toxic", or "We Found Love", or "Like a Virgin" just because their singers didn't write it.

Not particularly. Songwriters exist because they are exceptionally gifted at their craft. They deserve that opportunity to do what they do best. If a songwriter can pen better lyrics or compose a more appealing melody than random pop star, why not utilize that talented songwriter for those sort of tasks? It's a big misconception that reliance on a songwriter relieves the performer of "the difficult work." That simply isn't the case. Proper interpretation of a song requires as much focus and skill as the act of songwriting.

That said, there are plenty of "songwriter dependant" singers who should make more of an effort to do their own songwriting, because they're actually quite good at it. (And in Britney's case, it isn't enough to simply write a song - she should also lobby for said song to appear on her album. For whatever reason, they seem to squander her talent as a songwriter, and she's more than capable of penning something spectacular.)

I don't really care as long as they have some kind of input.

Depends on the quality of the lyrics, to be honest.


I'm not expecting everyone to be on some Adele/Amy Winehouse-type level, but really, what's the point of writing your own music if it's mostly ****?


Simply do what you're good at.

ALL OF THIS TEA!!!!!!!

Almost all of the greatest artists of all time either didn't write any of their songs, or didn't write the majority of their hits. There are a few exceptions but most of the legends don't. Interpretation, song selection, image, concept, production etc...they all factor in, and each are just as important as the next. Sure it's great if someone who is talented is also a great songwriter as you can expect continued level of song and their music has a certain voice to it (aka Robyn or the like) but it doesn't matter to me, really.

No one could interpret a song like Whitney Houston, but then again no1 could sing and write a song like Mariah Carey so it's a debate.

Celine
Whitney don't write a lot
Rihanna

but
Madonna Janet Mariah R.Kelly Michael do

It will always be a debate.

It's not necessary to me. If I like the song, I like the song. If the performer wrote the song, more respect to them.

I can see the pros and cons of each side...One the one hand, as has been already mentioned, many great artists don't write their own lyrics and still are valued as musicians simply because of their ability to intrepret and perform their material so well. On the other, though, I think that when a singer participates in the creation of their own material, they can bring interesting perspectives that commercial songwriters can't. I still think that Kelly's "My December" album is amazing, and part of that is because she really took ownership of her music (even if it wasn't commercially successful) and you could just hear the passion that went into it.

It's nice to use in stan wars, and it makes me like the artist by themselves more, but I really don't care. Music is music, if it's good, someone with talent made those lyrics, and the song should get credit for it.

Yep, talent.