Songwriting Challenge 2025: Odd Time Signatures

Our songwriting challenge for 2025 is to write a song in an odd time signature. The majority of popular songs are written in a 4/4 time signature, followed by 6/8, and then 3/4 (tradionally a waltz).

Songs that employ 5, 7, or 9 beats to the bar are far less common. But these songs can result in interesting tensions, inventive rhymths and an opportunity for unique melodies.

We’ve compiled a bunch of resources including new and old episodes of the podcast, and interesting videos.

Featured Episodes

• Our launch episode with Frank Horvat, featuring 8 songs with odd time signatures
• Songs with odd time signatures (2023)

Archived Episodes

We’ve had many guests who have shared songs in odd time signatures. Check out the episodes.

In our episode about the post-chorus, Neel talks about how he used compound time in a post-chorus (3/4 and 2/4 time signatures at the same time)

Odd Time Signature Songs

Check out our playlist of songs with odd time signature songs!