{"id":163,"date":"2009-11-17T20:17:07","date_gmt":"2009-11-18T00:17:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/irenejackson.com\/songblog\/?p=163"},"modified":"2010-02-26T17:26:14","modified_gmt":"2010-02-27T01:26:14","slug":"song-forms-and-terms-a-quick-study","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/irenejackson.com\/songblog\/song-forms-and-terms-a-quick-study\/","title":{"rendered":"Song Forms and Terms – A Quick Study"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Image by Rickyuan<\/a> via Flickr<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\u00a9 I.Woloshen<\/p>\n

None of us likes to think that we require any “structure” to our writing…that we just pour out our thoughts and feelings, resulting in a perfect song. That may be true on a personal level…however, chaos is a pretty difficult thing for others to listen to! In listening to newer writers, I occasionally come across a song that seems to have no structure at all, with little or no thought paid to what the listener might be going through \ud83d\ude42 So as much as you might want to rail against the idea of “rules”, there is one thing to consider. A house still needs a door to go in and out of, it still needs a window or two and some solid walls so it won’t fall down. This, metaphorically<\/a> speaking, is what song form is all about. It is a framework, a sense of meaningful structure, that makes the song listenable.<\/p>\n

Before we tackle the subject of song form…let’s talk about different songwriting terms and what they mean. Most people understand the idea of a verse<\/a> and a chorus. In an earlier article entitled Song Structure<\/a>, I discuss in more detail the purpose of each part of a song. But I will briefly go through them here again in order to introduce the idea of song form.<\/p>\n

The purpose of a verse is to tell the story or describe the feeling, etc. The chorus is the focal point of the song, the central theme, if you will. A bridge is a kind of fresh perspective, a small part that may consist of only music, or both lyrics<\/a> and music, usually placed after the second chorus. These are the main parts that are used when describing song form. Song form is no big mystery, just a new term to some people \ud83d\ude42 You may have seen or heard about a song having an ABAB form, or ABABC, etc. What does this mean?
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