Talk:Song structure (popular music)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[edit] Some Considerations

I don't want to rewrite this page completely, so I'm going to start a discussion and I promise to come back and check if people are interested.

I made a clarification to the first paragraph then realized the whole thing could use a good rewrite. The tone is not at all appropriate for an encyclopedia. Good Luck to you! 207.69.137.41 04:05, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Verse: People need explained how a verse functions. It does correspond to a stanza, and it is usually the body or the story section of the song, as in a ballad form poem, which was an old song form that preceded and heavily influenced ours, honestly because it's just a really good form.

Chorus: The part that everyone sings along at, repeated the same every time, or slightly modified to make for a changing meaning of the song, but usually not modified by more than a few words. It is usually replaced in hip hop, modern R&B and the current pop music by a hook, which is just a memorable, compelling repeated phrase or series of notes, although occasionally in hip hop the hook is a whole lot more like a chorus. (Tupac does this alot, may not be important for the article.)

Bridge: Usually the most complex part of a pop song, if a bridge appears at all. While the Tin Pan Alley songs, and nearly all jazz songs have a bridge as the B section between the repeated A section, most Rock songs that I can think of have the Bridge as the C section, as in REM, replacing the 3rd or sometimes 4th verse and leading to the repeated and then faded chorus. I have also heard REM put the bridge before a 3rd or 4th verse, but this doesn't strike me as very common. REM may not be hep, but they are excellent people to study in terms of song form and harmonic structure. Genesis in their later, less psychedelic years also comes to mind, again very lame by today's terms but there it is.

The Hook: There is another kind of hook, and you'll hear this in Kanye West and some similar people, where instead of repeating the phrase or series of notes at the Chorus section, it introduces and forms the backbone of the song. This is very repetitive and in my opinion lazy, but it is a compelling sound and people buy it, and that is what matters in popular music.

None of this is objective so when I come back I'll see what people think here and have done on the main page and I'll put my two cents in. This could be very nice for people who want to try their hands at writing songs for their girlfriend or their daughter, or who want to figure out how to sell popular songs.

Tim.

[edit] Question

"The bridge may then replace the 3rd verse or precede it. In the latter case it delays an expected chorus." - Does this make sense? The two cases you mention are (as far as I can see) VCVCBC or VCVCBV. In the second one the bridge delays an expected verse. Neither of these delay an expected chorus.

[edit] Verse

It seem the link Verse as a main article to be false! --A4 21:14, 26 March 2007 (UTC)