Continuing our series of tips for writing quickly.
What's the secret of writing catchy songs?
Repetition!
What makes a song easier for listeners to hear?
Repetition!
What makes a song quicker to write?
That's right — the answer is repetition!
Don't struggle to invent extra material just to fill up your song. Say what you need to say, and then find the best way to spread out that material over the space of the song. Look for ways to repeat and reuse words, phrases, riffs, chord lines, and hooks.
Showing posts with label repetition. Show all posts
Showing posts with label repetition. Show all posts
Friday, February 10, 2012
Monday, May 17, 2010
Repetition (Songwriting tips)
Repetition affects perception.
For example, a "wrong note" played once might sound like a mistake. If you do it the same way three times, listeners will realize it's intentional, but it might come across as irritating. But if you do it 12 times, it might be a distinctive hook anchoring a memorable song.
Listeners who don't like a particular groove might complain that a song is "too repetitive," but those same listeners will like other songs that are just as repetitive, but that are in a different style that they feel more comfortable with.
There's no rule to tell you how much repetition is "right." It depends on the specifics of your song and your musical elements, and also on your audience and the context in which the song will appear.
For example, a "wrong note" played once might sound like a mistake. If you do it the same way three times, listeners will realize it's intentional, but it might come across as irritating. But if you do it 12 times, it might be a distinctive hook anchoring a memorable song.
Listeners who don't like a particular groove might complain that a song is "too repetitive," but those same listeners will like other songs that are just as repetitive, but that are in a different style that they feel more comfortable with.
There's no rule to tell you how much repetition is "right." It depends on the specifics of your song and your musical elements, and also on your audience and the context in which the song will appear.
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
4♠ Start with a loop
4♠ Four of Spades in The Rock Songwriter’s Deck: 52 Ways to Write a Song
The Four of Spades gives us a time-honored way to write a song. Start with a loop. A loop is a segment of audio that repeats over and over. You build your song over the repeats of the loop. The repetition gives you an automatic catchy element, while it also enforces a constraint on where your song can go.
In olden times, before music was recorded on computers, people still worked with loops and build songs from them. They cut out a section of magnetic recording tape, spliced the two ends together to make a physical loop of tape, and arranged the tape recorder so that it would keep playing that section of tape over and over.
Today, it's almost too easy: you can grab any audio clip and tell your recording program to loop it. (Copyright warning: It's a good idea to use audio material that you're legally entitled to use. If you sample another artist's song, you might create legal troubles that cost more than your new song is worth.)
If looping digital audio doesn't suit your style, you can also do loops the acoustic way: play a repeating riff or chord phrase over and over without variation, and use that repeating material as a framework on which to build a new song.
The Four of Spades gives us a time-honored way to write a song. Start with a loop. A loop is a segment of audio that repeats over and over. You build your song over the repeats of the loop. The repetition gives you an automatic catchy element, while it also enforces a constraint on where your song can go.
In olden times, before music was recorded on computers, people still worked with loops and build songs from them. They cut out a section of magnetic recording tape, spliced the two ends together to make a physical loop of tape, and arranged the tape recorder so that it would keep playing that section of tape over and over.
Today, it's almost too easy: you can grab any audio clip and tell your recording program to loop it. (Copyright warning: It's a good idea to use audio material that you're legally entitled to use. If you sample another artist's song, you might create legal troubles that cost more than your new song is worth.)
If looping digital audio doesn't suit your style, you can also do loops the acoustic way: play a repeating riff or chord phrase over and over without variation, and use that repeating material as a framework on which to build a new song.
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Messing with "Hey Jude"
On Thursday I asked you to review the fadeout of the Beatles' "Hey Jude," which famously features the [seven]♭ chord. The full chord phrase is:
[one] - [seven]♭ - [four] - [one] -
That great singalong chant melody in "Hey Jude" does not include the subtonic 7♭note, so it wasn't the melody that drove the Beatles to use [seven]♭ instead of [five]. And the rest of the song uses [five] and the regular ionian chords. They pointedly switched to mixolydian chords just for the fadeout of "Hey Jude."
Try singing the "Hey Jude" chant with these alternate chords:
[one] - [five] - [four] - [one] -
You'll notice that those alternate chords work just as well with the melody, but they bring a very different feel to the phrase.
It's hard to remember how groundbreaking "Hey Jude" was in a time when rock hits were trimmed to a length of 3:15 or shorter to meet the demands of radio. Since then, lengthy repeating fadeouts have become a staple of rock music, but at the time it took the biggest stars in music to break the mold and give us a 6-minute-long song with a couple minutes of repetitive ecstatic chanting at the end.
I think the Beatles' choice of [seven]♭ instead of [five] for the fade might make the mood a little more mellow, to help you surrender to the trancey groove instead of becoming impatient with the repetition. It's just my theory, and we'll never if "Hey Jude" might have been just as successful with different chords. But sometimes it's just this kind of subtle thing that makes the different between a good song and a great song.
[one] - [seven]♭ - [four] - [one] -
That great singalong chant melody in "Hey Jude" does not include the subtonic 7♭note, so it wasn't the melody that drove the Beatles to use [seven]♭ instead of [five]. And the rest of the song uses [five] and the regular ionian chords. They pointedly switched to mixolydian chords just for the fadeout of "Hey Jude."
Try singing the "Hey Jude" chant with these alternate chords:
[one] - [five] - [four] - [one] -
You'll notice that those alternate chords work just as well with the melody, but they bring a very different feel to the phrase.
It's hard to remember how groundbreaking "Hey Jude" was in a time when rock hits were trimmed to a length of 3:15 or shorter to meet the demands of radio. Since then, lengthy repeating fadeouts have become a staple of rock music, but at the time it took the biggest stars in music to break the mold and give us a 6-minute-long song with a couple minutes of repetitive ecstatic chanting at the end.
I think the Beatles' choice of [seven]♭ instead of [five] for the fade might make the mood a little more mellow, to help you surrender to the trancey groove instead of becoming impatient with the repetition. It's just my theory, and we'll never if "Hey Jude" might have been just as successful with different chords. But sometimes it's just this kind of subtle thing that makes the different between a good song and a great song.
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