How to Write the Perfect Song with Georg’ Estelle

By Alessia Mavakala
Photo Georg’ Estelle

We spend hours of our day listening to music, learning the lyrics by heart and giving our own meaning to each word and sentence. But what does it actually take to write a song? Is there a meaning behind every word or do the artists just pick them randomly from the vocabulary? How are the beats selected and who gets the credit for all this hard work?

As a listener and music lover, I hadn’t yet attempted to find out the process behind writing a song. To help me better understand, I had the opportunity to speak with Georg’ Estelle, a singer and songwriter, who recently released a brilliant music video about her single Taste of You.

We chatted about who and what inspired her to create the song, and she gave me a total breakdown of how she came up with the song lyrics, and her personal favourite lyrics.

A: What is your favourite sentence from your song?
G: I have a few depending on the mood but my absolute favourite one is ‘Like my coffee in the morning, you get me through’ and ‘I don’t care if it breaks down’. It shows that mood of being free and fearless. You don’t care what’s gonna happen you are still gonna try to make things work.

Is Taste of You a romantic song?
It’s a very romantic and cheesy song but when I wrote it I wasn’t thinking about anyone in particular. It’s a love song for the people who are in love but it’s for the singles as well. With this song I hope that people can fall back in love with life. I want people to be excited again like the excitement you feel when first falling in love. When you're first stepping into a new love, you just want to do everything with that person, you’re not thinking too much, you're just living. 

Where did you get the inspiration to write and create this song?
I created a playlist called ‘Funk electronic soul vibes’ with songs by Disclosure, Daft Punk, Justin Timberlake, Duke Dumont and Jill Scott. It’s a very upbeat, uplifting and dance playlist which is very different from what I have normally done which is more soft, jazzy and low-key chill vibes. I created the playlist to get inspiration from it and I wanted to create a song that I can dance to.

 What was the process behind writing this song?
I met with the producer on Zoom, his name is Oscar Bell and we had two hours to work on something as I was on an artist development programme. I told him the vibes I wanted to go for and what kind of melody I wanted. We had never met before and we couldn’t meet in person because we met at the peak of the pandemic during the summer. We listened to a few inspirational songs, he started playing instruments, acting a vibe and I was like ‘Yes, I like that!’ 

It came out so naturally and it was actually the best session I’ve ever had. The producer and I are very similar, we were laughing all the time and had a very good connection. 

The following session, which also lasted two hours, we started writing the music. We still didn’t know what to create but we already had a rhythm and I knew I wanted to create a song with happy and summery vibes’. It was also the first time I created a song on Zoom. I don’t have a studio at home so in August, when we were allowed, we recorded the vocals together in a studio.

So the process of writing a song is with the producer? 
Having the direction of a producer is really important. This song is more professional and higher level than what I have done before and I think it's because of the good directions I’ve received. I usually write my own songs alone but I’ve done some group songwriting sessions which are incredibly helpful, especially when you are just starting out and you are building your confidence.

 A lot of major artists don’t have time to be writing as much as they are putting out music all the time. What usually happens is that they have co-writers and maybe a room of five people who are all writing the song.

So, who gets the credit?
Each person creating will get a percentage based on the success of the song. People usually know the song because it is sung by, for example, Dua Lipa. She might be one of the writers as when things start to get bigger you have more people in the team. It’s very much a collaborative process.

 Do you prefer working with yourself or writing with a team?
If it’s something very personal I’d love to be able to express myself [and work individually]. When it’s not as personal I love working with other people. The more brains the more ideas.

Sometimes I am in group sessions and someone gives an idea and I’m like ‘Wow, I could have. Ever come up with that!’ Also English is not my first language [my first language is Italian] so sometimes I struggle to have the widest vocabulary and certain expressions won’t come to my mind, despite my English being very good.

Is there a song you created entirely by yourself?
I have produced songs myself but it hasn’t come out yet and I don't think it will because I have never learned production. I like to work with producers that know what they are doing. I can put down ideas and I am very careful about what songs I make. If there’s something I like but it’s not really me, I won’t use it.

My next single will be something that comes from my soul, it flows very naturally. My first single was entirely written by me and I sang it to my friend who is a guitarist. It had the melody and he just accompanied me with his guitar.  

What I learned from this wonderful conversation with Georg’ Estelle is that a song can have thousands of different interpretations and that there are multiple people involved in the writing process of a song. My favourite sentence from the song is ‘I want to save you for a rainy day but I want you right now’, it is telling me to enjoy the moment and it is giving me very romantic vibes. This sentence is really telling me that our duties are important but we should also give space to the little pleasures of life, like meeting our loved ones more often, buying ourselves flowers, eating cake for no special occasion and not leaving the ice cream in the freezer for ‘later’.

I love listening to the song and analysing the lyrics so definitely I will spend more time trying to find out what other secrets are hidden behind this song. In the meanwhile, here is the playlist that Georg’ Estelle was telling me about. It is available on Spotify and maybe it will give you inspiration to write your own song.

Check out Georg’s new music video here.