Geez, just when I was getting to feel kind of good about finally having written some songs of my own, I read this thread and wonder if I shouldn't just throw in the towel. It's not that I haven't received a great deal of praise and compliments from audience members/listeners and other players/performers alike. When other performers ask if I mind if they play one of the songs I've written and audience members start asking for the lyrics to my songs and inquire about buying a cd containing my material, it sort of makes me think I must be doing something right.

I think I've intuitively aspired to do much of what El Greko posted above in his lesson to songwriters though I've had no actual formal training in anything musical. I've tried to incorporate many of the points he listed except for the idea of being too wordy. Many of the songs written by others that I love performing have just that quality to them. I don't believe that the authors of those songs had any such restrictions to contend with when writing and therefore did not allow this particular criticism posted here by many to get in the way of their expression. Bert Williams' version of "Some Little Bug" comes to mind as an example of wordy humor at it's best. Arlo's "Alice's Restaurant" is certainly wordy and long but a wonderful story full of good humor. Willie McTell's "Dyin' Crapshooter's Blues" is another great story. It's both wordy and long as is his song "Kill It Kid" but they work, at least, they sound fine to my ear.

If I had to level any kind of critique at some of the songs I've heard written by other singer/songwriters of late it would be the unfortunate tendency of some to use too few words and couple the sparse lyrics with repetitive lines or catch phrases at a pace that is far toooo sloooooow. Put it all together and you get the all too common folk/folk-rock/rock ballad. Add to the above a not very memorable melody or message, as many examples I've heard contain, and you get a recipe for yawns.

I think some of the points of view being posted here about writers are justified others seem to come from a particular type of listener that experiences music in only certain environments. Saying that a good folk song should be something that folks would want sing along with is being rather one dimensional in your ideas about what is what isn't a good folk song. Sing along ability can be an attribute to a good folksong but as someone already pointed out, there are no hard and fast rules to any of this.