I hear you, Polly.

The truth is, any value we place on each piece of a song is whatever the writers agree on. It's all subjective. If you agree to all be equal partners, that's good. If you decide to go 90%/10%, that's fine too...it's all worth whatever you agree on.

But I recall a conversation I once had with a lyricist who wanted me to compose music for one of his pieces...he made it clear to me that he felt entitled to the lion's share of the song because he figured it was basically a finished song and concept, and that since the music I put to it would be guided entirely by that finished lyric, my contribution was therefore more of an assistant role than an equal role. BUT---and this is the good part---he decided to be "a good guy" and go 50/50 with me.

I wrote him back and said, "So you're basically telling me 'Here's my half of the package, the lyrics. Now you do your half---the genre, style, melody, chord structure, arrangement, vocals, harmonies, bass, drums, keys, guitars, strings, performance, tracking, production, mixing, mastering and all that silly music stuff.'"

I declined his offer.

http://www.soundclick.com/MarkKaufman