I'm more of a singer. I start out with the melody, simple strumming, and simple chords. And I fit the sounds around the singing or melody, want to give it the priority.

Often I'll come across a song that I want to sing, but it's in a key that isn't right for my voice. So I'll have to find the right Key. For example GuitarTricks has Crazy in the key of Bb, sung by Patsy Cline. That's a great song for singers, because it's ranges is about 14 whole notes. It's a workout for singers. But I'm more comfortable singing it like Willie in D. So I go through the process of listening to Willie, how he uses his voice with the chords, and try to image how he wrote it. He has a very unusual progression for country music of 1, 7, 6, 5, 2 in his style. Very rare in Country to be playing D and then 2 measures of verse with a B or BM7. He's a music rebel.

Once I have the basic down, I'll start trying to add the details. Sometimes I'll ask other players how they would play it.