Is there a right and a wrong way to punctuate song lyrics?

December 1, 2023 10:04 AM

My instinct is to put a comma at the end of every line and (assuming there's no run-on sentence involved) perhaps a period at the end of the verse. Looking at printed poetry, though, it seems more usual to ignore all the line breaks and simply punctuate the text as if it were ordinary prose. Is one of these approaches right and the other wrong? And, if so, which is which?
posted by Paul Slade to Writing & Language (5 answers total)

There must be no periods or commas at the end of any lyric line. Exclamation points, question marks, and quotation marks must be the only end-line punctuation and must be included as needed. Within the line, it is most important to follow traditional grammar rules.

Guidelines from Apple Music, which are typical of the guidelines many sites use. If you go through lyrics on Genius, you'll see the lack of full stops.

For including in a text, MLA style.

In other words, don't put a comma at the end of a line.
posted by betweenthebars at 10:18 AM on December 1, 2023 [7 favorites]

I've always seen the line break as a form of punctuation, so adding a mark is redundant.

This is true in poetry, too, but also poets can do whatever they want to achieve a certain effect.
posted by Ryon at 10:47 AM on December 1, 2023

I would treat lyrics like poetry and not have commas or periods at the end of lines unless that is a specific choice that the writer is making.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 11:10 AM on December 1, 2023

"Do you have the time / to listen to me whine / about nothing and everything all at once?"

You don't punctuate the end of a line where there is a line break, but you do indicate the line break with a slash (with spaces on either side) when there is no line break present or you can't control where they fall, when quoting lyrics or poetry in MLA standard.

I mention and illustrate just bc it's a closely related issue that may be relevant to your use case.
posted by SaltySalticid at 11:25 AM on December 1, 2023 [3 favorites]

It is worth being aware of how breathing marks are notated in music - because sometimes a comma can be assumed to be a breath marker as well as a pause. If writing “Oh Little Town of Bethlehem” then the line “where meek souls receive him, still the dear Christ enters in” the need to pause and breathe at the comma is important for the performance.
posted by rongorongo at 3:01 AM on December 2, 2023