brb writing down all of these sections so I can make the most incomprehensibly structured song and throwing as much of these in a single track as possible
As a DJ, I’ve learned over the years to never mess with a coda. Try fading out the end of ‘Hey Jude’ or ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’ and the floor will want to hang you 😂 Similarly with some intro, Gloria Gaynor’s ‘I Will Survive’ for example. The intro and coda are often integral to the energy of the entire song, even though they lack a dance beat.
hehe yeah. I run a lot of Opeth and Steven Wilson songs into my DAW and mark out distinct sections off to try and find a structure to the songs, and I often risk running out of alphabet!
Haha yeah I'm a progmetal composer and primarily go episodic with our 10 minute songs because they're telling "chapters" (thematic plot points) of the backing adventure fantasy story. but a couple are 4 or 5 minutes long and actually have a couple repeating sections! one is even "normal" with Intro, V, C, V, C, Bridge, Chorus Outro.
Alright you've convinced me.. I'll no longer be referring to the end of my songs as the outro.. from now on I will be calling them by their proper name, the "Outroduction"!!! Lmfao 🤣😆🤣😆🤣
Thanks for this video. I’m a lyricist who sometimes works with a composer partner. I knew many of these terms, but some were new to me. I have sometimes heard a pre-chorus referred to as a “slide.” One thing I’ll say about the bridge, from a lyricist’s point of view, is that it gives the writer the opportunity to offer a side comment on the song’s narrative. It’s an interesting way to bring in a new perspective that you might not be able to express in the verse or chorus.
thank you for always adding so many examples in your videos!! it really helps me to understand, especially because i dont know a whole lot of technical information about music!
I studied in a musical theatre conservatory and we spent a lot of time working with "Golden Age" tunes that used the AABA structure. He used a specific word--the "vest" to describe the verse before the beginning of the AABA section. Great example is the "But do you recall...the most famous reindeer of all?" portion of "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer."
A few song structures that appear a lot in modern worship music (and maybe also in other genres): tag, interlude, vamp, refrain, turnaround, breakdown. There are also modifiers that often get pre-pended to choruses such as: down, up, instrumental, a cappella, etc.
@@itnefer4787 I do listen to and have written in lots of genres of music. My comment did mention that perhaps other genres use some of those structures too. It’s just that my first interaction with a lot of those structures happened to occur while working on worship music. By worship, I’m referring mostly to Christian music from roughly the 1990s up to today. My experience with Jewish worship music and other types of worship music has shown me that often the entire framework and mindset can be very different from a musical perspective.
Could you explain the terms you mention or give some examples of songs that make use of them? I haven't heard of some of them before and I'd love to know more.
In Bohemian Rhapsody I always considered "Mama, just killed a man..." and "Too late, my time has come..." as two verses, which themselves have an AB structure each. That's because save for their respective endings (the 2nd verse's B cut short by 2 bars going intp the guitar solo which again is on that B's chord progression before it modulates for another 2 bar different ending)
DBP videos are wildly informative and very accessible, but the real reason I watch these videos is for David's pleasing British accent. Keep up the great work!
A notable song structure is the one of Lynyrd Skynyrd's Free Bird: two sections, one is a Coda and before the coda there's a section called "something you'd pretend doesn't even exist but you must listen just to get to the Coda"
I think y'all are nuts! (Not southern, just acting.) Of course we all love that amazing energy and the guitar work at the end, but it's a very emotional and melancholy song before it gets to that. It's also common in southern rock, like Fall of the Peacemakers, Ramblin' Man, and Green Grass and High Tides - the big southern rock anthems. It's a full song followed by a guitar break that's just as long. (I have difficulty calling it a coda. It seems way more than that.) I know, there is no argument for my taste being more meaningful than yours, but it seems a shame to sell the song short before the guitar leads. Since I was a little boy that slide guitar in Free Bird made me want to cry, and I never knew why.
This is one of the topics I struggle the most when composing, as I was not trained in music, just took some guitar classes. My UA-cam algorithm is flooded with production tips and tricks, but this... This is gold value for me. Thank you.
Yes. When just picking and choosing some parts of music to learn, you miss out on seemingly simple things that can actually really help with songwriting, like key changes.
One of my favorite "episodic" songs is Thunder Road by Bruce Springsteen. It has the same tempo and time signature throughout, but the melody changes slightly in each section and doesn't repeat. That's why it still feels fresh every time I hear it.
Hey! It's interesting because in French we only have the word Refrain, and not Chorus! It's really shows how language also shapes the way we analyse, differentiate, and identify different components of a song.
@@Lorenzo_der_RitterIn my Band it’s all messed up: Sometimes it’s Chorus, sometimes it’s Refrain, sometimes Strophe and Chorus are on the same sheet of paper.
And in russian there's "рефрен" (refrɛn) and "припев" (pripev) which mean the same thing (at least according to Wiktionary. my personal use of them is kinda "refrain" and "chorus" respectively)
Speaking of AᗺBA, the song Dancing Queen has an unusual structure when after the intro its jumps right into the second half of the chorus (or maybe you could call it a post-chorus). The reason for this, Björn Ulvaeus said when interviewed by Rick Beato, was because otherwise the song would've been too long. It's like: Intro-C2-A1-A2-B-C1-C2-A1-B-C1-C2-Outro
'Take me out' By Franz Ferdinand has an interesting structure - almost a contemporary example of the show tune structure, with an initial "verse" section in a different tempo to the rest of the song, that never gets repeated. 🤔
I think they said they liked the verse faster and the chorus slower so they just moved both verses to the beginning and left all the chorus’s at the end
I finally understand a bit that George Burns (guess hold old I am) used to do all the time -- singing forgotten verses to songs where the practice over time had become to jump right into the chorus. Thanks.
I remember John Bubbles on Tonight singing some of these and wrapping up with what he called the perfect universal first verse. He sang it and segued into the Star Spangled Banner
great overview. for those that are new to music this break down will help to establish some structure in their thinking, and give them some vocabulary for interacting with other musicians in band situations. nicely done.
I have heard ”Refrain” word to be used for the same last word or sentence repeated in every section. ”Can’t help falling in love with you” or ”My way” Are examples.
I've heard that as well and you provide great examples. I think these should be better described as _"refrain lines"_ if only to differentiate them further from choruses.
Yep, ”refrain line” makes sense at the moment. I’m not native english speaker, but as far as I understand ”refrain” means when you keep yourself from doing something. I am forexample this week refraining from coffee to let my body get it’s adenosine levels to natural levels. So in that in mind, refrain would mean, prolonged note before resolution and the repeating line in the end of every song section would be ”resolution line”.
@@GingerWaters That's a very nice way of looking at it. As far as I know, this word comes from Old French refraindre, meaning 'break', as the repeated refrain breaks up the sequence of the song/poem. It may go even further back and mean something slightly different in Latin.
This was extra good! Favourite video of yours. On favourite examples, Stockton Gala Days by 10,000 Maniacs has a clever structure, with bits chopped up and missed out, lots of pre and post choruses and bridges which help to deliver drive and release... Natalie Merchant often does interesting things with structure, and is well worth looking at in that light.
Visually highlighting the different sections of different songs definitely made this the most helpful of several videos I watchd on the subject. Apprecated.
What i've learned over the years is that as a composer you can't generally force a strong structure. The best structure given a couple sections that you are trying to get working together,largely depends on how to best present those sections and nothing else. The structures we see in songs are 'found' by trying everything possible and keeping the best arrangement. So when you hear many popular songs with very different structure: it means each is well done becasue it was true to it's elements and presented them effectively in the structure that created the most appropriate impact for the style and general presentation.
You are genuinely such a bright spot in the desolate wasteland that is the internet. I just finished writing my first EP and learned so much in the process. This video makes me want to go back and examine the structure of my songs and see if I can fine tune them using some of the things you mention here.
David, another great video. Thanks so much! You describe “Wake me up when September ends” as AABA. To me the repeating sentence “wake me up when September ends” ticks all the boxes to be considered a chorus, albeit a short one. That would make the song structure verse-chorus-verse-chorus with your B section as bridge (or middle 8).
Hi there. I politely disagree (with the intent of having a healthy debate, not judging or trolling). One thing David didn't mention about Strophic Form (AAA) in this video but has mentioned in a different video, is that Stophic Form often has a repeating line, usually the last line of the verse. This provides some of the function of a chorus in that it provides a particular repeating, melodic, catchy, line and has a lyric that provides a summary of the meaning of the song. However, it doesn't fully qualify as a Chorus because it is shorter and usually hasn't provided a shift in tonality or dynamic that is expected of a chorus. The term "refrain" could be used here if you wish. I know that this song is not Strophic as it is Binary, but you can still use this repeating last line of a verse in Binary or any other form. When describing or scoring music, there often can be multiple ways of doing it. However, often simplest is key because you are trying to explain an idea to someone else. Therefore, explaining "Wake me up when September Ends" as "ABABA Coda" is easier than saying "ABABCABABABCABABBB"
12:15 Even in Classical Music Pieces, for example in Mendelssohn's Rondo Capriciosso, the first Section Andante can be considered as a verse, and the second Presto Section is the Chorus.
man... this goes way back. First came the Menuet, which is AABA except B is called the trio. And then there's the Rondo, which is ABACA. and then comes Sonata form which really confuses things but I think it goes back further than that but I think all music will always revert back to these first structures because it feels right.
What a fun video, thank you! I think it's interesting how we start applying structure and "rules" to music based on music that already exists. It's very similar to language, where some kind of consensus has been found out of what is or has been most popular. Still, I'm always interested in experimenting and trying out new stuff. Well, new as in, not neccessarily popular. Of course an unfathomable amount of things has been tried out before.
During Jimmy Buffets first appearance on the Tonight Show, after Margaritaville he sang an old standard (forget which one) and made it a point to include the forgotten verse. Johnny was so impressed that he made it a point to thank Jimmy since it was so common to skip over it
Another mighty useful video. I knew about the 'missing verse' in (classic) 32-bar form.. but even though I knew a lot of the tunes were from shows, I never saw the movies/shows so didn't properly understand the usage of the verse. Chorus forms were also useful. and the explanation of how the 'Refrain' is often a 'mini-chorus'. Like the 'chord notation' and 'music iceberg' videos, these 'theory history' videos are often the most useful (to me, anyway). Fanx! a heap for posting them. 😀
The ABACA or ABACABA form is very common in Rondos, which originated in the Baroque era and continued into the Classical period. A great example is Beethoven's "Fur Elise".
@@DavidBennettPianoI think I agree that it is a chord progression and the song form is then Strophic as you repeat the 12 bars over and over I.e, it is AAAAAAA (ad infinitum, depending on how many people walk into the room and want to do their own guitar solo 😂).
Very glad you made this video, I’ve been trying to analyze song structure to try and help improve the flow for a lot of the songs I make. I have a habit of structuring my songs as "building A-section, Bridge, A section again with more elements to make it spicier". It works like once or twice since my songs are instrumental since I don't have confidence as a lyricist, but it feels like a crutch. It feels like a structure I've picked up from listening to (mostly) instrumental electronica like Fatboy Slim and The Chemical Brothers. Also, I remember when Kendrick Lamar’s Good Kid M.A.A.D. City dropped, my one friend who is a rapper was really excited about Money Trees and the structure of that song. He described it to me as, as best as I can remember, “7 different hooks just circling around each other” or something to that effect. I'll have to listen to the song again to see if I can identify the structure it has.
It's in music books too. It's not us being slackers. Pete Townshend played with that concept (kinda) in the rock opera Tommy, which had an overture and an underture. Now he was out on his own with that one. Outros are well established.
Wow, I was just wondering about this! I was trying to study some songs I liked to try and recreate them but I didn't know how to name parts of the structures for my notes.
One of my favourite codas is the one from Saviour by Prince. It's a complete tonal shift and could have been left out but it all works so well and is by far my favourite part of the song.
Variations is a form that has been used in classical music for centuries but a contemporary version would be building up a song through layering loops, and is popular in dance music and with some street performers (who use loops recorded and played back live, in layers, as an accompaniment).
Question: Songs like "With or Without You", "Careless Whisper" & "Last Christmas" use the same chord progression throughout but have distinct melodies for Verse & Chorus. Do these count as Strophic? Is it the chord progression or the melody which make it strophic?
And then you have trad music, which is just ABABABABABA on infinite loop until your group gets bored, the dance ends, everyone had a solo, or you get too fast to keep going. Love that.
Thank you so much I needed this concept broken down, I used to just go intro verse chorus verse chorus more or less, been writing and playing for years and only approached that way, I only did that way , I now know I should of started simple and bout much like learning theory I jumped into to deep and developed a bad habit of the same structure and my songs all the same, this is going help me so much , oh man thank u so much
Nice video as always. I would like to point out the rondo form; ABACAD. It would be interesting to also see how would you contextualize intstrumental solos and drum breaks.
I have to submit the song rearrangement in the next 1 and a half month but I'm still struggling with basic music theory. Your video helps me a lot, thank you very much T*T. Wish you a happy weekend
I never take any music class ever so I know nothing about this. I listen to a bunch of songs without really paying attention but I know for sure it usually have verse, prechorus, chorus, bridge and sometimes intro and outro until recently I listen to a bunch of kpop songs. Songs from SM like Super Junior 'Sexy, Free and Single' 'Mamacita', Exo 'Call Me Baby", Aespa "Next Level" really made my brain go, "wait, what's this I'm hearing?". It's not the usual song structure I've heard then I checked out genius lyrics and found things like Breakdown, Interlude, Refrain, etc. I watch this vid to know more about song structure as I'm interested and thank you for the explanation. I wish you could explain interlude and breakdown.
I was hoping to see a rondo represented somewhere. François Couperin's "Les Barricades Mystérieuses" is my all time favourite piece in that form, just sublime.
In Progressive rock you hear a lot about "Themes". (please excuse my lack of technical song knowledge) but it seems like the song can either go anywhere and not repeat anything except for this "theme" or it can have repeating sections (verse, chorus and so on) and still revisit the "theme" occasionally. (sometimes it seems randomly) It usually shows up in longer pieces that have movements such as Yes' Close to the Edge or Genesis' Supper's Ready or Pink Floyd's Dogs. If you like can you look at these types of songs and break them down? Thanks and I always enjoy your vids and feel I learn something from them.
In French, my native language, refrain is still the word we use for chorus. Also, one of my favorite bands that used to pretty much only write through-composed songs is actually the metalcore band Woe, Is Me. Although they now have choruses, their first two albums are quite striking to me as there is almost no recurring part in any of the songs. Quite a big particularity for the genre that I don't see many fans talking about.
Thanks David. Very informative video. But how does an interlude differ from other song structures? Is it just a break in a song to provide a contrast to create emphasis on the next section of the song?
My favorite examples of songs that are Strophic(aside from their brief intros and outros) but not supposed to be simple chants or rhymes are the video game tracks "Scarlet Phoneme" from _Touhou 4: Lotus Land Story_ and "Built to Scale" from _Rhythm Heaven Fever._ They both have one melody that repeats, but they change the key of the melody and have different beats to go alongside it as it progresses. The latter one also changes the BPM at which the melody plays as well, but that's ultimately just another simple setting change. It works so well because the one melody each of them use are independent and dynamic, to the point at which they can flawlessly lead up to themselves from themselves. A musical ouroboros, if you will.
Duran Duran Rio. . . Into-Verse-4BeatPause-Chorus-4BeatVerseSetup Verse-4BeatPause-Chorus-Mid8Expanded/Solo-Bridge-Outro Chorus While its basically Intro-A-B-A-B-C-B, is there a better way to name the sections and sub-sections? Simple sections don't properly describe what they do. (Is the final B really B' ?) Well-built song!
I've been learning All Star on the piano and I think it has a pre chorus and a bridge? The years start coming section being the prechorus and the solo part being a bridge.
Utterly brilliant and very helpful. Thank you so much @DavidBennettPiano Am I right in thinking ABBA's Thank You For The Music is a 32-bar form with an old-fashioned verse?
Brilliant, concise, clear exploration of these forms, thank you David, I will be circulating this to my songwriting pals! One point: I recently came across the term "rondo" - which I had heard but didn't know what it was. Turns out it's a form in which a section is repeated and interspersed with different sections, ie ABACAD etc... it seems to come from classical music and I can't think of any examples of it in pop music. Do you know of any, and do you think this is a distinct song structure to the ones you've outlined?
Does the Dave Bennett Theory course go over all these explanations? You're my favorite youtuber by the way. I'm a musician trying to become a songwriter/composer. I know there's a big difference between the two. Thank you
could you make a video giving tipps on how to change up a chordprogression for a bridge or for a chorus or something? i struggle really hard to get out of a chordprogression i wrote
cant wait:)) and thanks for your vids, ive been watching you for some time and nearly all my music knowledge comes from your videos…keep up the great work!
Bravo! Great explanations, and your graphics are so well done. My understanding of Refrain is: in binary form, when the "chorus" (repeating-lyrics section) begins the song. "This Land is Your Land," by Woody Gutherie.
Very nice explanation! I would be curious about some typical techniques (melodical and rhythmical) that are used e. g. in a pre-chorus. Maybe that’s an idea for more videos? 😊
You didn't mention D. S. (Dal Segno)/D. C. (Da Capo) al Coda. While not technically song structures (more player's notation), they do alter the song's structure and affect the existing structures by indicating what gets played again and what gets skipped before going to the Coda.
One of the cleverest bridges I know is in Better Be Home Soon by Crowded House. Also Wild Flowers by Ryan Adams has 4 or 5 different parts and is a genius song.
@@MasonBarge well 32 bar form is a structure with AABA pattern and other conventions. It doesn’t stipulate a chord progression. 12 bar blues is a 12 bar chord progression which is used as part of various other structures including strophic and binary
I didn't see anyone metion this, but in a lot of metal subgenres the breakdown is a pivotal section in the song. Anything from metalcore to djent it's present.
"Don't sleep in the subway" by Petula Clark is an odd one. It's two almost completely different tunes joined together by bridges in the form tune A, bridge 1, tune B, bridge 2, tune A, bridge 1, Tune B and repeat tune B.
Hi David. Great video. Made me think of a related video idea for you (apologies if you've already done it and I've missed it...). That is songs which are in effect two songs combined to make one. Obvious examples are 'Layla' and 'Day in the Life', but I'm sure you'd be able to source many other interesting others.
Today I was working on The Name of the Game by Abba with a voice student. I was struck by the strange structure of the song and the number of different melodies, particularly in the chorus. Then it's a straight run back through with a fade out on the main chorus theme. I haven't come across another song with this type of form.
I really enjoyed this video, David! I was super excited to see ABAC form here. ABAC has always fascinated me in many ways. I do have a question to ask: What's a good name for a chorus section that doesn't repeat? For example, the loud section from Radiohead's "2+2=5"
Something I have noticed with the 32-bar form is that each A section ends with a repeated vocal phrase that often is the title of the song. And that phrase often is the hook of the song as well.
brb writing down all of these sections so I can make the most incomprehensibly structured song and throwing as much of these in a single track as possible
Yesss fractal-like structured musiccc
Bro wtf
Komar and Melamid’s most unwanted song. A 22 minute masterpiece.
@@hopsiepikeI forgot about this masterpiece 😭
Bring it on. ABCDEBDCFDCA
As a DJ, I’ve learned over the years to never mess with a coda. Try fading out the end of ‘Hey Jude’ or ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’ and the floor will want to hang you 😂
Similarly with some intro, Gloria Gaynor’s ‘I Will Survive’ for example.
The intro and coda are often integral to the energy of the entire song, even though they lack a dance beat.
Prog is where you see a lot of episodic structure. My band has a song that goes: Intro/A/B/C/D/C/E/Break/F/G/H/G/B
hehe yeah. I run a lot of Opeth and Steven Wilson songs into my DAW and mark out distinct sections off to try and find a structure to the songs, and I often risk running out of alphabet!
What's the name of the song and your band? I love prog
@@Dipwad Band: Gamma Repeater. Album: Reverser in Neutral. Song: Dinosaur.
Yes may have run out of letters on some songs...
Haha yeah I'm a progmetal composer and primarily go episodic with our 10 minute songs because they're telling "chapters" (thematic plot points) of the backing adventure fantasy story. but a couple are 4 or 5 minutes long and actually have a couple repeating sections! one is even "normal" with Intro, V, C, V, C, Bridge, Chorus Outro.
Alright you've convinced me.. I'll no longer be referring to the end of my songs as the outro.. from now on I will be calling them by their proper name, the "Outroduction"!!! Lmfao 🤣😆🤣😆🤣
My favorite sequence is: AᗺBA
I like that one too. It's sweeter than Honey, Honey
That sequence makes me feel like i could dance and jive having the time of my life
@@CMAATNThe theory book on the shelf, the structure's repeating itseeeeeeeeeelf
I prefer ABACAB.
What is the genesis of that structure?
Thanks for this video. I’m a lyricist who sometimes works with a composer partner. I knew many of these terms, but some were new to me. I have sometimes heard a pre-chorus referred to as a “slide.” One thing I’ll say about the bridge, from a lyricist’s point of view, is that it gives the writer the opportunity to offer a side comment on the song’s narrative. It’s an interesting way to bring in a new perspective that you might not be able to express in the verse or chorus.
Finally, someone was able to give me a reasonable explanation of the difference between a "Bridge" and a "Middle 8". Thank you @davidbennettpiano !
@DavidBennettPiano
thank you for always adding so many examples in your videos!! it really helps me to understand, especially because i dont know a whole lot of technical information about music!
Great! 😊
I studied in a musical theatre conservatory and we spent a lot of time working with "Golden Age" tunes that used the AABA structure. He used a specific word--the "vest" to describe the verse before the beginning of the AABA section. Great example is the "But do you recall...the most famous reindeer of all?" portion of "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer."
"Say it ain't so" - Best bridge ever!
Love that song so much!
The best weezer song!@@DavidBennettPiano
One of the top five songs ever in history...
A few song structures that appear a lot in modern worship music (and maybe also in other genres): tag, interlude, vamp, refrain, turnaround, breakdown.
There are also modifiers that often get pre-pended to choruses such as: down, up, instrumental, a cappella, etc.
Worship music - whatever that really is - is not the only thing that uses those labels. Do have a listen to other types of music.
@@itnefer4787 I do listen to and have written in lots of genres of music. My comment did mention that perhaps other genres use some of those structures too. It’s just that my first interaction with a lot of those structures happened to occur while working on worship music.
By worship, I’m referring mostly to Christian music from roughly the 1990s up to today. My experience with Jewish worship music and other types of worship music has shown me that often the entire framework and mindset can be very different from a musical perspective.
Could you explain the terms you mention or give some examples of songs that make use of them? I haven't heard of some of them before and I'd love to know more.
In Bohemian Rhapsody I always considered "Mama, just killed a man..." and "Too late, my time has come..." as two verses, which themselves have an AB structure each. That's because save for their respective endings (the 2nd verse's B cut short by 2 bars going intp the guitar solo which again is on that B's chord progression before it modulates for another 2 bar different ending)
DBP videos are wildly informative and very accessible, but the real reason I watch these videos is for David's pleasing British accent. Keep up the great work!
This is just about the best explanation of musical form I've ever seen. Thank you!!!
19:09 - The example of a front-loaded chorus that immediately popped into my head was "In the Air Tonight". 🙂
I was thinking "She Loves You".
bon jovi's you give love a bad name
@@danielduarte2139And Bad Medicine! Althogh there is a short intro
A notable song structure is the one of Lynyrd Skynyrd's Free Bird: two sections, one is a Coda and before the coda there's a section called "something you'd pretend doesn't even exist but you must listen just to get to the Coda"
it’s like you physically *HAVE* to, you can’t listen to the coda without the pre-coda thing or else it’ll sound like a dumpster fire
I think y'all are nuts! (Not southern, just acting.) Of course we all love that amazing energy and the guitar work at the end, but it's a very emotional and melancholy song before it gets to that. It's also common in southern rock, like Fall of the Peacemakers, Ramblin' Man, and Green Grass and High Tides - the big southern rock anthems. It's a full song followed by a guitar break that's just as long. (I have difficulty calling it a coda. It seems way more than that.) I know, there is no argument for my taste being more meaningful than yours, but it seems a shame to sell the song short before the guitar leads. Since I was a little boy that slide guitar in Free Bird made me want to cry, and I never knew why.
This is one of the topics I struggle the most when composing, as I was not trained in music, just took some guitar classes. My UA-cam algorithm is flooded with production tips and tricks, but this... This is gold value for me.
Thank you.
Yes. When just picking and choosing some parts of music to learn, you miss out on seemingly simple things that can actually really help with songwriting, like key changes.
One of my favorite "episodic" songs is Thunder Road by Bruce Springsteen. It has the same tempo and time signature throughout, but the melody changes slightly in each section and doesn't repeat. That's why it still feels fresh every time I hear it.
Hey! It's interesting because in French we only have the word Refrain, and not Chorus! It's really shows how language also shapes the way we analyse, differentiate, and identify different components of a song.
same thing in German, we took the word "Refrain" from the French to mean the same thing as "Chorus" in English
In Portuguese we use the word ‘refrão’. I guess English is the problem here haha 😂
Pretty similar situation in Serbia/Croatia/Bosnia/Montenegro - we all just use _"refren"_ for the chorus.
@@Lorenzo_der_RitterIn my Band it’s all messed up: Sometimes it’s Chorus, sometimes it’s Refrain, sometimes Strophe and Chorus are on the same sheet of paper.
And in russian there's "рефрен" (refrɛn) and "припев" (pripev) which mean the same thing (at least according to Wiktionary. my personal use of them is kinda "refrain" and "chorus" respectively)
Speaking of AᗺBA, the song Dancing Queen has an unusual structure when after the intro its jumps right into the second half of the chorus (or maybe you could call it a post-chorus). The reason for this, Björn Ulvaeus said when interviewed by Rick Beato, was because otherwise the song would've been too long.
It's like: Intro-C2-A1-A2-B-C1-C2-A1-B-C1-C2-Outro
'Take me out' By Franz Ferdinand has an interesting structure - almost a contemporary example of the show tune structure, with an initial "verse" section in a different tempo to the rest of the song, that never gets repeated. 🤔
I think they said they liked the verse faster and the chorus slower so they just moved both verses to the beginning and left all the chorus’s at the end
I'll never get tired of listening to Bing Crosby's golden voice.
I agree, but then he was such an A-hole !
I finally understand a bit that George Burns (guess hold old I am) used to do all the time -- singing forgotten verses to songs where the practice over time had become to jump right into the chorus. Thanks.
Never heard of him!
I remember John Bubbles on Tonight singing some of these and wrapping up with what he called the perfect universal first verse. He sang it and segued into the Star Spangled Banner
This is so well constructed and clear. Lots of stuff I've been wanting to understand and I feel I got it completely in one go. Thanks so much!
great overview. for those that are new to music this break down will help to establish some structure in their thinking, and give them some vocabulary for interacting with other musicians in band situations. nicely done.
Holy smokes! One of your best videos yet...and that's really saying something 🙂🎹
Thank you!!
I agree
I have heard ”Refrain” word to be used for the same last word or sentence repeated in every section.
”Can’t help falling in love with you” or ”My way”
Are examples.
I've heard that as well and you provide great examples. I think these should be better described as _"refrain lines"_ if only to differentiate them further from choruses.
Yep, ”refrain line” makes sense at the moment.
I’m not native english speaker, but as far as I understand ”refrain” means when you keep yourself from doing something.
I am forexample this week refraining from coffee to let my body get it’s adenosine levels to natural levels.
So in that in mind, refrain would mean, prolonged note before resolution and the repeating line in the end of every song section would be ”resolution line”.
@@GingerWaters That's a very nice way of looking at it. As far as I know, this word comes from Old French refraindre, meaning 'break', as the repeated refrain breaks up the sequence of the song/poem. It may go even further back and mean something slightly different in Latin.
Don't forget that Rhythm Heaven song that uses the lyrical refrain "I suppose" as a built-in input cue for CLAPPING MONKIES HELL YEAH
This was extra good! Favourite video of yours.
On favourite examples, Stockton Gala Days by 10,000 Maniacs has a clever structure, with bits chopped up and missed out, lots of pre and post choruses and bridges which help to deliver drive and release... Natalie Merchant often does interesting things with structure, and is well worth looking at in that light.
Visually highlighting the different sections of different songs definitely made this the most helpful of several videos I watchd on the subject. Apprecated.
This was brilliant and so helpful, David. Thank you for producing such high-quality videos.
What i've learned over the years is that as a composer you can't generally force a strong structure. The best structure given a couple sections that you are trying to get working together,largely depends on how to best present those sections and nothing else. The structures we see in songs are 'found' by trying everything possible and keeping the best arrangement. So when you hear many popular songs with very different structure: it means each is well done becasue it was true to it's elements and presented them effectively in the structure that created the most appropriate impact for the style and general presentation.
You are genuinely such a bright spot in the desolate wasteland that is the internet. I just finished writing my first EP and learned so much in the process. This video makes me want to go back and examine the structure of my songs and see if I can fine tune them using some of the things you mention here.
I'm improving by watching your channel. When you discussed strophic form I immediately thought of 'The wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald'.
David, another great video. Thanks so much!
You describe “Wake me up when September ends” as AABA. To me the repeating sentence “wake me up when September ends” ticks all the boxes to be considered a chorus, albeit a short one. That would make the song structure verse-chorus-verse-chorus with your B section as bridge (or middle 8).
Hi there. I politely disagree (with the intent of having a healthy debate, not judging or trolling). One thing David didn't mention about Strophic Form (AAA) in this video but has mentioned in a different video, is that Stophic Form often has a repeating line, usually the last line of the verse. This provides some of the function of a chorus in that it provides a particular repeating, melodic, catchy, line and has a lyric that provides a summary of the meaning of the song. However, it doesn't fully qualify as a Chorus because it is shorter and usually hasn't provided a shift in tonality or dynamic that is expected of a chorus. The term "refrain" could be used here if you wish. I know that this song is not Strophic as it is Binary, but you can still use this repeating last line of a verse in Binary or any other form.
When describing or scoring music, there often can be multiple ways of doing it. However, often simplest is key because you are trying to explain an idea to someone else. Therefore, explaining "Wake me up when September Ends" as "ABABA Coda" is easier than saying "ABABCABABABCABABBB"
12:15 Even in Classical Music Pieces, for example in Mendelssohn's Rondo Capriciosso, the first Section Andante can be considered as a verse, and the second Presto Section is the Chorus.
Breakdown was snubbed 😢
Arf Arf 😂
StGeSoEm
man... this goes way back. First came the Menuet, which is AABA except B is called the trio. And then there's the Rondo, which is ABACA. and then comes Sonata form which really confuses things but I think it goes back further than that but I think all music will always revert back to these first structures because it feels right.
What a fun video, thank you! I think it's interesting how we start applying structure and "rules" to music based on music that already exists. It's very similar to language, where some kind of consensus has been found out of what is or has been most popular. Still, I'm always interested in experimenting and trying out new stuff. Well, new as in, not neccessarily popular. Of course an unfathomable amount of things has been tried out before.
I can't hit the like button enough. Thanks for taking the time to make this!
During Jimmy Buffets first appearance on the Tonight Show, after Margaritaville he sang an old standard (forget which one) and made it a point to include the forgotten verse. Johnny was so impressed that he made it a point to thank Jimmy since it was so common to skip over it
Another mighty useful video. I knew about the 'missing verse' in (classic) 32-bar form.. but even though I knew a lot of the tunes were from shows, I never saw the movies/shows so didn't properly understand the usage of the verse. Chorus forms were also useful. and the explanation of how the 'Refrain' is often a 'mini-chorus'.
Like the 'chord notation' and 'music iceberg' videos, these 'theory history' videos are often the most useful (to me, anyway). Fanx! a heap for posting them. 😀
😊😊😊
I love this channel so much
My favourite vid so far 💪🏻 your examples are so helpful. Been needing this lesson for years haha
Fantastic 😊😊
The ABACA or ABACABA form is very common in Rondos, which originated in the Baroque era and continued into the Classical period. A great example is Beethoven's "Fur Elise".
The Bee Gees “Nights on Broadway “ has complex beautiful structures that repeat excellently.
I'm surprised you didn't mention 12-bar blues. It's a form that's made its mark on popular music, especially in the early days of rock 'n' roll.
True. Although I think of 12 bar blues more as a chord progression than a song structure. 😊😊
Also the one chord vamp - john lee hooker bo diddley etc.@@DavidBennettPiano
@@DavidBennettPiano lyrics are often AAB, so imo it counts as a structure
@@TheHowlingEye yeah fair point 😊
@@DavidBennettPianoI think I agree that it is a chord progression and the song form is then Strophic as you repeat the 12 bars over and over I.e, it is AAAAAAA (ad infinitum, depending on how many people walk into the room and want to do their own guitar solo 😂).
Rhapsody is a greek term that literally means "sewed singing", which perfectly fits the A+B+C+D+E format!
Very glad you made this video, I’ve been trying to analyze song structure to try and help improve the flow for a lot of the songs I make.
I have a habit of structuring my songs as "building A-section, Bridge, A section again with more elements to make it spicier".
It works like once or twice since my songs are instrumental since I don't have confidence as a lyricist, but it feels like a crutch. It feels like a structure I've picked up from listening to (mostly) instrumental electronica like Fatboy Slim and The Chemical Brothers.
Also, I remember when Kendrick Lamar’s Good Kid M.A.A.D. City dropped, my one friend who is a rapper was really excited about Money Trees and the structure of that song. He described it to me as, as best as I can remember, “7 different hooks just circling around each other” or something to that effect. I'll have to listen to the song again to see if I can identify the structure it has.
I've only just realised that I've been calling it an outro and it never occurred to me that of course there's no such word as outroduction!!
It's in music books too. It's not us being slackers. Pete Townshend played with that concept (kinda) in the rock opera Tommy, which had an overture and an underture. Now he was out on his own with that one. Outros are well established.
Wow, I was just wondering about this! I was trying to study some songs I liked to try and recreate them but I didn't know how to name parts of the structures for my notes.
One of my favourite codas is the one from Saviour by Prince. It's a complete tonal shift and could have been left out but it all works so well and is by far my favourite part of the song.
As always, pure gold. Thank you!
Variations is a form that has been used in classical music for centuries but a contemporary version would be building up a song through layering loops, and is popular in dance music and with some street performers (who use loops recorded and played back live, in layers, as an accompaniment).
Such a great episode!
If you could make one about baroque-classical-romantic era music structures that would be perfect
Question: Songs like "With or Without You", "Careless Whisper" & "Last Christmas" use the same chord progression throughout but have distinct melodies for Verse & Chorus. Do these count as Strophic? Is it the chord progression or the melody which make it strophic?
it will interesting to make a video about the role of the instruments in every section and how a song builds up! thank you for your awesome work!
Your videos just get better. Thanks.
David, another brilliant video.
And then you have trad music, which is just ABABABABABA on infinite loop until your group gets bored, the dance ends, everyone had a solo, or you get too fast to keep going. Love that.
Thank you so much I needed this concept broken down, I used to just go intro verse chorus verse chorus more or less, been writing and playing for years and only approached that way, I only did that way , I now know I should of started simple and bout much like learning theory I jumped into to deep and developed a bad habit of the same structure and my songs all the same, this is going help me so much , oh man thank u so much
Best song structure video on YT. Thanks.
Nice video as always. I would like to point out the rondo form; ABACAD. It would be interesting to also see how would you contextualize intstrumental solos and drum breaks.
I have to submit the song rearrangement in the next 1 and a half month but I'm still struggling with basic music theory. Your video helps me a lot, thank you very much T*T. Wish you a happy weekend
I never take any music class ever so I know nothing about this. I listen to a bunch of songs without really paying attention but I know for sure it usually have verse, prechorus, chorus, bridge and sometimes intro and outro until recently I listen to a bunch of kpop songs.
Songs from SM like Super Junior 'Sexy, Free and Single' 'Mamacita', Exo 'Call Me Baby", Aespa "Next Level" really made my brain go, "wait, what's this I'm hearing?". It's not the usual song structure I've heard then I checked out genius lyrics and found things like Breakdown, Interlude, Refrain, etc.
I watch this vid to know more about song structure as I'm interested and thank you for the explanation. I wish you could explain interlude and breakdown.
Great video, but surely ABACAB by Genesis deserves a mention? It is probably the only song that (sort-of) describes its own structure!
actually it's ACCAABBAAC
I was screaming at my phone for ABACAB
Great cameo by Adam Neely at 18:15, even if it was only in my head. 😁
😂
I love your videos David, you always seem to put one out about a current topic in my mind!
Keep up the good work
😊😊😊😊
19:43 just one week ago my professor cited eleanor rigby as an example of song starting in the chorus
I was hoping to see a rondo represented somewhere. François Couperin's "Les Barricades Mystérieuses" is my all time favourite piece in that form, just sublime.
I think that you can view ABAC as a kind of truncated rondo.
In Progressive rock you hear a lot about "Themes". (please excuse my lack of technical song knowledge) but it seems like the song can either go anywhere and not repeat anything except for this "theme" or it can have repeating sections (verse, chorus and so on) and still revisit the "theme" occasionally. (sometimes it seems randomly) It usually shows up in longer pieces that have movements such as Yes' Close to the Edge or Genesis' Supper's Ready or Pink Floyd's Dogs. If you like can you look at these types of songs and break them down?
Thanks and I always enjoy your vids and feel I learn something from them.
In French, my native language, refrain is still the word we use for chorus.
Also, one of my favorite bands that used to pretty much only write through-composed songs is actually the metalcore band Woe, Is Me. Although they now have choruses, their first two albums are quite striking to me as there is almost no recurring part in any of the songs. Quite a big particularity for the genre that I don't see many fans talking about.
Gold. Thanks!
Thank you!
Thanks David. Very informative video. But how does an interlude differ from other song structures? Is it just a break in a song to provide a contrast to create emphasis on the next section of the song?
3:16 i'm so confused about the Pre Chorus
til you said and Did this 3:20, then a light went On 💡!
My favorite examples of songs that are Strophic(aside from their brief intros and outros) but not supposed to be simple chants or rhymes are the video game tracks "Scarlet Phoneme" from _Touhou 4: Lotus Land Story_ and "Built to Scale" from _Rhythm Heaven Fever._ They both have one melody that repeats, but they change the key of the melody and have different beats to go alongside it as it progresses. The latter one also changes the BPM at which the melody plays as well, but that's ultimately just another simple setting change. It works so well because the one melody each of them use are independent and dynamic, to the point at which they can flawlessly lead up to themselves from themselves. A musical ouroboros, if you will.
Duran Duran Rio. . .
Into-Verse-4BeatPause-Chorus-4BeatVerseSetup
Verse-4BeatPause-Chorus-Mid8Expanded/Solo-Bridge-Outro Chorus
While its basically Intro-A-B-A-B-C-B, is there a better way to name the sections and sub-sections? Simple sections don't properly describe what they do. (Is the final B really B' ?)
Well-built song!
I've been learning All Star on the piano and I think it has a pre chorus and a bridge? The years start coming section being the prechorus and the solo part being a bridge.
Utterly brilliant and very helpful. Thank you so much @DavidBennettPiano
Am I right in thinking ABBA's Thank You For The Music is a 32-bar form with an old-fashioned verse?
14:30 chorus in portuguese is "refrão"
15:16 refrain is just French for chorus actually but I get why you could make a difference.
Brilliant, concise, clear exploration of these forms, thank you David, I will be circulating this to my songwriting pals! One point: I recently came across the term "rondo" - which I had heard but didn't know what it was. Turns out it's a form in which a section is repeated and interspersed with different sections, ie ABACAD etc... it seems to come from classical music and I can't think of any examples of it in pop music. Do you know of any, and do you think this is a distinct song structure to the ones you've outlined?
That has cleared up so many questions for me, Thank You
Glad it was helpful!
Hi David! How do you get that kind of "graph" which shows the "intensity" of the songs? Like here 1:56 and 2:35 ?
It’s called a “waveform”… google “mp3 to waveform” 🙂
Does the Dave Bennett Theory course go over all these explanations? You're my favorite youtuber by the way.
I'm a musician trying to become a songwriter/composer. I know there's a big difference between the two. Thank you
I love that you put Judy on here! ❤
Wow. Not only do I finally understand what is meant by “bridge”, I also understand why I couldn’t understand it before.
could you make a video giving tipps on how to change up a chordprogression for a bridge or for a chorus or something? i struggle really hard to get out of a chordprogression i wrote
I'm actually planning a video on that soon!
cant wait:)) and thanks for your vids, ive been watching you for some time and nearly all my music knowledge comes from your videos…keep up the great work!
Bravo! Great explanations, and your graphics are so well done.
My understanding of Refrain is: in binary form, when the "chorus" (repeating-lyrics section) begins the song. "This Land is Your Land," by Woody Gutherie.
Very nice explanation! I would be curious about some typical techniques (melodical and rhythmical) that are used e. g. in a pre-chorus. Maybe that’s an idea for more videos? 😊
Goodjob.Can you make a Classical version of this?
You didn't mention D. S. (Dal Segno)/D. C. (Da Capo) al Coda. While not technically song structures (more player's notation), they do alter the song's structure and affect the existing structures by indicating what gets played again and what gets skipped before going to the Coda.
They're not sections at all, so it's understandable David didn't mention them.
One of the cleverest bridges I know is in Better Be Home Soon by Crowded House. Also Wild Flowers by Ryan Adams has 4 or 5 different parts and is a genius song.
I do believe you skipped one common structure. The 12 bar blues. There are a gazillion songs written with this structure.
12 bar blues is a chord progression really though, not a song structure
Absolutely correct, although the more traditional blues form has a stricter AAB form.
@@DavidBennettPiano If 32 bar is included, 12 bar should be. IMO.
@@MasonBarge well 32 bar form is a structure with AABA pattern and other conventions. It doesn’t stipulate a chord progression.
12 bar blues is a 12 bar chord progression which is used as part of various other structures including strophic and binary
@@MasonBarge it is true though that the blues traditionally had the AAB form within the 12 bars. Fair point
I didn't see anyone metion this, but in a lot of metal subgenres the breakdown is a pivotal section in the song. Anything from metalcore to djent it's present.
"Don't sleep in the subway" by Petula Clark is an odd one. It's two almost completely different tunes joined together by bridges in the form tune A, bridge 1, tune B, bridge 2, tune A, bridge 1, Tune B and repeat tune B.
Hi David. Great video. Made me think of a related video idea for you (apologies if you've already done it and I've missed it...). That is songs which are in effect two songs combined to make one. Obvious examples are 'Layla' and 'Day in the Life', but I'm sure you'd be able to source many other interesting others.
Today I was working on The Name of the Game by Abba with a voice student. I was struck by the strange structure of the song and the number of different melodies, particularly in the chorus. Then it's a straight run back through with a fade out on the main chorus theme. I haven't come across another song with this type of form.
Thanks again for your work.
This covered a few things that I was never taught.
Great 😊
I really enjoyed this video, David! I was super excited to see ABAC form here. ABAC has always fascinated me in many ways.
I do have a question to ask: What's a good name for a chorus section that doesn't repeat? For example, the loud section from Radiohead's "2+2=5"
In a through composed song like 2+2=5, what to name the sections is kind of anyone’s guess! Just something descriptive would do like “loud section!”
@@DavidBennettPiano Awesome! Thanks
Something I have noticed with the 32-bar form is that each A section ends with a repeated vocal phrase that often is the title of the song. And that phrase often is the hook of the song as well.