Music Composition/Songwriting How To 7

Another point is section length. Tunes will tend to run on the short side if you have verses and choruses back to back with only 8 measures each. So one or both of them should be 16 measures.

F.Y.I. A vast majority of western music is built in blocks of 2,4,8 or 16 measures. Also, you can contrast phrase lengths not only between sections but within sections as well.

If the first phrase is 8 measures long then the second phrase could be 4 measures long or you could have two 4 measure phrases for balance at another even 8.

Other possibilities include a four measure phrase followed by two 2 measure phrases etc...

So, go get your notebook. Make some schemes for the song form, decide how long each section will be and which key, then how long each phrase will be and write in the starting and ending pitches of each verse and chorus.

Don't agonize over these decisions. Just plop them in. If you catch yourself spending too much time on this process go get some dice and let them decide.

Then decide the starting and ending notes for the phrases within each section for the positions that are still left undecided. That would be the ending of the first phrase and the beginning of the second phrase.

Isn't planning for variety fun? This is the method that I have used a lot and recommend to beginners. Not everyone needs to do it. They have heard and played so much music that the right moves come out unconsciously.

Much of the time it falls nearly exactly like I'm talking about here.

Another consideration is that the chorus should most often reach a higher note than the verse.

Your tunes are starting to take shape and have ceased being an amorphous impossible anything and everything.

We can also talk about melodic shape. If one phrase rises and falls and the next one rises and falls, even if it uses different notes and uses a higher pitch, they still have the same overall shape and that can be boring. Not really if it happens in only one song but if it happens in every song then it WILL be boring without a doubt.

Although many good melodies have both an upper and a lower curve it's possible to write effective melodies that primarily rise or primarily fall or are primarily a flat line, even a single note.

In your notebook plug in some melodic shapes for each phrase in your big plans. Again don't agonize too much. Just dump them in.

You can always change stuff later that's not working or that could work better and you'll have a baseline with which to evaluate them.

I make charts for all this stuff to help me keep track of what strategies I've already used.

Music Composition/Songwriting How To 6

I'm certain Mariah Carey's songwriters know this stuff. You should too.

You can break these rules but you'll want to know that you ARE breaking them and better yet why you're breaking them and that it will probably reduce the sellability of your material if you do.

A related point is that if the chorus starts on the first note of the scale and the first beat of the first measure then the verse shouldn't do either. For variety's sake you should start the verse on a different note and a different rhythmic starting point.

This is the main thing amateur composers miss. I've heard it on all of the songwriter/composition forums I've belonged to. 95% of the stuff people are posting for review aren't taking advantage if this basic strategy.

Every section sounds like its supposed to be a chorus if they all start on the downbeat and on the first note of the scale. The effect is usually boredom.

To recap, the Chorus starts on the downbeat and on the first note of the scale.

The verse doesn't start on the downbeat (perhaps on the "and" of 1 or on beat 2 or before the downbeat) and on some other note of the scale such as the 3rd, 5th, 7th, 2nd, 6th or 4th in that order.

If your chorus started on the 5th which is a slightly weaker note then you probably don't want to start the verse on the 1st note of the scale because it's a stronger note and you'll be relegated to choosing from the 7th, 2nd, 6th or 4th.

The fourth is actually a dissonant interval which is why it's placed last and most tunes don't start with it so if you feel like you need to narrow your choices feel free to drop it from your available options especially if you're a beginner and aren't sure how to treat it.

Now, what are you going to put in those sections? A better question is how are you going to put it in?

Did you know that most sections of popular music have at least two melodic phrases? And you have to write the first one to sound like it's not finished so that people will be expecting the second one?

There are two ways to accomplish that. The first way is where it ends and the second way is what not it ends on.

In a 4 measure phrase if you end on beat one of the 4th measure it will be a strong ending position. The phrase will sound finished.

If you also end on the first note of the scale or the root of the chord that's playing then it may even sound like the end of the whole tune.

Obviously you don't want to end in that position or on that note if there's more music coming. So don't. End somewhere else and end on any other note, preferably not the one you started on either.

Again I've never seen this advice anywhere except in the Berklee book. Not even in books on classical composition. It's very specific and advice that's easy to accomplish.

Arranging Verses and Choruses

I remembered there are a couple other ways to distinguish verses and choruses. That’s with arranging. Sometimes the chorus is a little faster or has added instruments or is louder or all of the above. I’ve heard people change the groove between sections too but I don’t feel it’s as effective. I think if the new groove is based on the original groove then that works and I’ve done that a lot but a completely new groove often sounds like it should be a separate song.

It’s probably a good idea to listen to your favorite composers and hear what they’re doing concerning all of the points in this thread. I’m good at analysis so I get my hands on scores. That’s the main way how I learned Indonesian gamelan music.

I’ll do something like get a Mariah Carey song book and write out the melodic rhythms of the tunes I like and analyze starting positions, rhythm schemes such as aaab, aaba, and I’ll just put the notes in that tune’s chorus’ starting note such as the first note of the scale or the fifth or whatever.

Here is what an old one looks like in my notebook. About every four lines is a new song. Bridges and transitions such as prechoruses are NOT included. The first four lines are Mariah’s tune Sweetheart, the next four are When You Believe, then Always Be My Baby, One Sweet Day, Dreamlover, Emotions, then U2’s Sunday Bloody Sunday which takes up six lines, On New Years Day, the last four lines are their tune In The Name Of Love.

William Russo, in his book Composing Music, recommends writing new melodies to your favorite melodic rhythms.

http://i253.photobucket.com/albums/hh53/gongchime/MariahU2Marley.jpg