Musical Writing - How to Give Your Writing Rhythm
Lesson 19 from: From Structure to Style: Master Your CopywritingShani Raja
Musical Writing - How to Give Your Writing Rhythm
Lesson 19 from: From Structure to Style: Master Your CopywritingShani Raja
Lessons
Chapter 1: Copywriting Fundamentals
1Class Introduction - Overview of the Course Content
03:50 2The Five Aspirations of a Superior Copywriter
05:28 3The Importance of Defining Your Intention & Audience
06:02 4The “Secret Sauce” of Good Copywriting
04:29 5Quiz - Chapter 1
Chapter 2: Simplicity
6Introduction - The Power of Simplicity
02:06Tight Writing - How to Make Your Writing Snappy
05:43 8Tell it Straight - How to Write Plainly & Straightforwardly
03:36 9Don’t Overcomplicate - How to Avoid Unnecessary Complexity
04:59 10Quiz - Chapter 2
Chapter 3: Clarity
11Introduction - The Power of Clarity
01:33 12Nailing Down Your Ideas - How to Fix Fuzzy Ideas In Your Copy
04:07 13Place Words With Care - How to Avoid Misplacing Words
03:49 14Be Specific - How to Avoid Ambiguity, Jargon & Abstract Writing
09:09 15Quiz - Chapter 3
Chapter 4: Elegance
16Introduction - The Power of Elegance
01:57 17Present Elegantly - How to Make Your Writing Look Good
04:10 18Narrative Flow - How to Structure Your Copy Beautifully
04:09 19Musical Writing - How to Give Your Writing Rhythm
05:31 20Quiz - Chapter 4
Chapter 5: Evocativeness
21Introduction - The Power of Evocativeness
02:28 22Add Variety - How to Reduce Monotony in Your Writing
03:10 23Be Bold - How to Steer Clear of Weak Words
03:34 24Create Pictures - How to Make Your Writing Jump Out
06:23 25Quiz - Chapter 5
Chapter 6: Editing With Style
26Introduction - Get Ready to Edit
01:31 27The Quick-Smart Editing System
16:11 28Quiz - Chapter 6
Chapter 7: The Road Ahead: What’s Next?
29How to Nurture Your New Skills
03:06Final Quiz
30Final Quiz
Lesson Info
Musical Writing - How to Give Your Writing Rhythm
in this lesson, you're going to learn that there is another layer of elegance that you can add to your writing, that will also make it flow really well. And it's a concept that I like to call musicality. And once you understand this concept, you'll be able to give your writing what many writers like to refer to as rhythm. I'm talking about the quality here that turns a clunky sound of piece of writing um into something that dances along beautifully. Now when you have this musical quality running throughout your words, sentences and paragraphs, that's when you're writing really begins to take on the so called wow factor. The trouble, however, is that musicality and rhythm are really quite hard concepts to explain in the context of writing, even though many of us would recognize them. When we see them, take a look at this excerpt from dr martin Luther King's famous. I have a dream speech which contains an element of musicality. That is hard not to notice. I have a dream that one day on t...
he red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression would be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four Children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. Now, that's poetry isn't it? Look at this where I've tried to put some beats into dr martin. Dr martin Luther King's speech that hopefully gives you some feeling for its rhythmic elegance. Now, let me just say that this is not the only way to read the music in it and it may not even be the way the exact way that Dr King spoke it. But I do hope that you can at least recognize the the the poetry that is inherent within the text itself. Now, having those lines in there, I hope helps you to feel some of the music in it. Have a quick look at the following centers and try to spot what's inelegant or a new musical about it. Try CO LTD said in a statement Tuesday that it had bought Sunrise Technologies. The deal is worth billion. The software company said the acquisition would help it target consumers in asia. It added that the move would give a significant boost to its profit this year. Sunrise is the world's second biggest chipmaker. Tri ko is a US based company. Sunrise is based in Taiwan. Now, I hope you noticed that the same subject verb pattern is repeated here continually and that this pattern can feel a bit monotonous when reading it right, Try playing around with the sentence structure and punctuation to give the writing a better rhythm. Okay, well, how about this? Try co LTD bought Taiwan's Sunrise Technologies in a deal worth 20 billion in a statement Tuesday. The US software company said the acquisition would help target asian consumers adding that the move could significantly boost this year's profit. Sunrise is the world's second biggest chipmaker and that's better. Right. In fact, I encourage you to try treating everything that you write or edit from now on as a musical composition rather than merely a block of text. Also try as much as you can. Spotting the rhythm and the music in other people's writing. Look at well written newspapers like the economist or the Wall Street Journal for example, then try to emulate their style for practice, play with it, practice with it until you finally embedded the concept of rhythm deeply into your psyche. And I want to take this concept of rhythm just a little bit further now and show you how you can improve the elegance of your writing by ensuring that ideas in a sentence are presented in a delightfully parallel way. Just take a look at this sentence and see if you can tell what's in elegant about it. Josie is in charge of packing crates, keeping track of outgoing stock and she maintains records of customer complaints. Well, notice how the ideas aren't perfectly parallel and notice how this gives the sentence a bit of a clunky feeling. Have a go yourself first at making the ideas sit more in a parallel way. Okay, well, how about this, josie is in charge of packing crates, keeping track of outgoing stock and recording customer complaints there you have the verbs packing, keeping track of and recording lining up in a perfectly parallel way, thereby giving the sentence more gracefulness. So I hope that this series of lectures on elegance has given you a better idea of how to write your sentences, structure your narratives and present your content in a more elegant and flowing way. But before we get onto the 4th and final ingredient in the Secret Source evocative nous, please take the short quiz at the end of this video, which will help you embed the learnings from this chapter.