A songwriter is an individual who writes the lyrics, melodies and chord progressions for songs, typically for a popular music genre such as country music. A songwriter can also be called a composer, although the latter term tends to be mainly used for individuals from the classical music genre. The pressure from the music industry to produce popular hits means that songwriting is often an activity for which the task are distributed between a number of people. For example, a songwriter who excels at writing lyrics might be paired with a songwriter with a gift for creating original melodies. Pop songs may be written by group members from the band or by staff writers – songwriters directly employed by music publishers. Some songwriters serve as their own music publishers, while others have ou