I’ve aterritten a fair bit lately about making a verse more effective, either by creating an interesting key change, or by paying closer attention to how the verse connects to the chorus. In this post, I want to look more closely at the chorus itself, and address an issue when the chorus itself just doesn’t […]
Many songs have what could be called its “climactic moment”: a spot where musical energy seems to be at its peak. In many songs, it sits there at the beginning of the chorus (“Firework”), sometimes in the middle (“Let It Be”), and sometimes near the end. (“Wichita Lineman”). Sometimes finding that moment may not be obvious. […]
When we talk about form in songwriting, we might be referring to the various sections of a song: verse, chorus, bridge, etc. Or we might be talking about something like the rhyme scheme of the lyrics: ABAB, for example. Or we might be talking about some aspect of the design of the melody… ascending figures contrasting with […]
At a minimum, most songs these days will use a verse-chorus or verse-refrain structure. Songs might be constructed of verses and nothing else, such as Amanda McBroom’s “The Rose”, made most famous by Bette Midler. Many old 12-bar blues songs are basically a verse and nothing else, though many will use a repeating refrain to […]
It’s common with many songwriters to start the songwriting process by working out the chorus, if only because that’s the part that’s going to be most memorable to your audience. Once you’ve got a chorus that really works well, it acts as a kind of goal — a target, so to speak — for you to aim […]
More so than almost any other genre, pop music has a feeling of spontaneity about it. Done well, a pop song, and in particular its performance, makes great use of the musicians’ collective abilities to improvise on the spot. We love when a guitar solo sounds like it’s happening on the spur of the moment, the ideas […]
