Jay-Z Shares His Song Writing Secret

Jay-Z recently shared his song writing secret, and how he makes hits. Read more on it below-

"When I'm writing a song that I know is going to work, it's a feeling of euphoria," Jay writes. "It's how a basketball player must feel when he starts hitting every shot, when you're in that zone. As soon as you start, you get that magic feeling, an extra feeling. Songs like that come out in five minutes; if I work on them more than, say, 20 minutes, they're probably not going to work. When I was starting out, I was just trying to tell stories. I wasn't thinking about melodies. Then I started to marry storytelling with every thing I was learning from all these other great records: the great writers like Babyface and Lionel Richie; Rakim's technique and syncopation; Dre's whole package on the Chronic albums; Quincy Jones, the greatest producer of all time; Rick Rubin, who's not too far behind because of all his genre-jumping." (Rolling Stone)

Jay also cites today's advanced technology for adversely affecting an artist's creative process.
"Technology has caused the songwriting process to lose some of the magic," he writes. "A lot of times now, people working on a song aren't in the same room. Imagine if Michael Jackson and Quincy Jones hadn't been in the same room! Those records would have been totally different. I've had times when I changed one word because of something that somebody said in the studio, and it changed the whole song. It's so important to have other people in the room, vibing, saying, "No, this part is good, put that there." I spend a lot of time fighting myself to stay out of the way of a great song. It's hard for me to leave a song alone, in its natural state. I want it to have that mass appeal, but once I start trying to push it too far, you can feel that something isn't right. When you can hear what a writer is trying to do, it's like watching a dancer and seeing him counting his steps. Music is emotional -- if you're singing that you're in love with somebody but it doesn't really feel like you are, people can tell." (Rolling Stone)

I am a writer and i think art is art, so i totally agree with jay-z on everything he just said. My first book, i wrote within ten days, and i am sure it wouldn't have been as magical as it came out if i had prolonged it. It is almost like you are handed the song/book idea etc, in the spirit realm and not meant to change anything, or else, you spoil the whole "soup".