What are the technical and scientific reasons most pop music is structured so there're 3 or 4 verses and a repeated chorus?
March 7, 2010 10:16 AM Subscribe
What are the technical and scientific reasons most pop music is structured so there're 3 or 4 verses and a repeated chorus?
What are the technical and scientific reasons most pop music is structured so there're 3 or 4 verses and a repeated chorus?
From Elvis to the Monkees to Madonna to Pearl Jam to Lady Gaga...it's certainly the rule rather than the exception that we get a verse/chorus/verse/chorus/instrumental/chorus arrangement. Why?
In the same vein...what are the commercial reasons?
Do our ears respond more favorably to this sort of structure?
What are the technical and scientific reasons most pop music is structured so there're 3 or 4 verses and a repeated chorus?
From Elvis to the Monkees to Madonna to Pearl Jam to Lady Gaga...it's certainly the rule rather than the exception that we get a verse/chorus/verse/chorus/instrumental/chorus arrangement. Why?
In the same vein...what are the commercial reasons?
Do our ears respond more favorably to this sort of structure?
Short answer: that's what people like.
Long answer: all of pop music history and beyond.
posted by Aquaman at 10:30 AM on March 7, 2010
Long answer: all of pop music history and beyond.
posted by Aquaman at 10:30 AM on March 7, 2010
Well, from a commercial standpoint this is pop music because that's what sells. If music with other sorts of forms started selling more, the "commercial" major label sort of pop music would follow suit.
As for why this is the case, pop music is all about being catchy and getting stuck in people's heads, making them want to sing along to it, dance along to it, and otherwise have fun listening to it and not have to think too much to enjoy it. Having repeating choruses, and repeating verse melodies, makes this all much easier, and then a bridge is thrown in to refresh the song a bit. Usually the verse is brought back after that to tie it all together.
posted by wondermouse at 10:32 AM on March 7, 2010
As for why this is the case, pop music is all about being catchy and getting stuck in people's heads, making them want to sing along to it, dance along to it, and otherwise have fun listening to it and not have to think too much to enjoy it. Having repeating choruses, and repeating verse melodies, makes this all much easier, and then a bridge is thrown in to refresh the song a bit. Usually the verse is brought back after that to tie it all together.
posted by wondermouse at 10:32 AM on March 7, 2010
Though I would say the typical pop song structure, at least currently, is usually more like this: verse/chorus/verse/chorus/bridge/half-verse/chorus
posted by wondermouse at 10:33 AM on March 7, 2010
posted by wondermouse at 10:33 AM on March 7, 2010
There's nothing scientific about it.
It's tradition. Folk songs have had that structure right back to the time of the wandering bards.
posted by Chocolate Pickle at 12:08 PM on March 7, 2010
It's tradition. Folk songs have had that structure right back to the time of the wandering bards.
posted by Chocolate Pickle at 12:08 PM on March 7, 2010
Natural selection
i.e. it sells because repetition in music is more memorable. I'd guess that the 3 or 4 verses is most common as it limits the length of the song so as to make it more likely to be played on commercial radio - probably also something to do with the amnount of audio that can be squeezed onto a shellac or vinyl disc.
posted by robotot at 1:51 PM on March 7, 2010
i.e. it sells because repetition in music is more memorable. I'd guess that the 3 or 4 verses is most common as it limits the length of the song so as to make it more likely to be played on commercial radio - probably also something to do with the amnount of audio that can be squeezed onto a shellac or vinyl disc.
posted by robotot at 1:51 PM on March 7, 2010
The difficulty in answering this question is that it's hard to separate which qualities of song form are a result of cultural conditioning and which are consequences of something like a universal grammar of music.
Let's assume for a second that there is a universal grammar of music, and that we can think of it as a list of traits that all human musical forms implement in some way. Let's say that repetition is one of those traits. There is a vast multiplicity of ways in which an individual music might implement repetition. The particulars of why a certain implementation became popular are probably the result of a lot of environmental and cultural factors, and so it becomes basically impossible to say that there is any simple reason as to why, for example, strophic song forms are so effective, except that they fulfill the basic requirements of a universal musical grammar and that the cultural and environmental circumstances since their inception have favored their perpetuation.
The cherry-on-top difficulty is that it's hard to assert very much about what traits the universal grammar of music has, given the variation of musical styles in the world.
posted by invitapriore at 2:21 PM on March 7, 2010 [1 favorite]
Let's assume for a second that there is a universal grammar of music, and that we can think of it as a list of traits that all human musical forms implement in some way. Let's say that repetition is one of those traits. There is a vast multiplicity of ways in which an individual music might implement repetition. The particulars of why a certain implementation became popular are probably the result of a lot of environmental and cultural factors, and so it becomes basically impossible to say that there is any simple reason as to why, for example, strophic song forms are so effective, except that they fulfill the basic requirements of a universal musical grammar and that the cultural and environmental circumstances since their inception have favored their perpetuation.
The cherry-on-top difficulty is that it's hard to assert very much about what traits the universal grammar of music has, given the variation of musical styles in the world.
posted by invitapriore at 2:21 PM on March 7, 2010 [1 favorite]
It probably also has a lot to do with working memory capacity and attention. As others have alluded to, music that is "catchy" or likely to be repeated is music that is likely to be passed on or do well commercially. This leads to the question of why music with that particular structure is catchy or likely to be passed on.
I am a cognitive scientist (don't study this in particular, but I know a fair bit about working memory), and my guesses would be:
1. Things that people like (stories, music, etc) seem to generally hit a "sweet spot" in terms of information content, where there is enough repetition to feel comfortable and memorable, and enough novelty to engage your attention. The structure of repetitive choruses with distinct verses (often with the same tone or rhythm as each other) in between is probably a good way to enforce this balance.
2. I think 3-4 minutes is probably just about appropriate for our attention spans, given that we don't necessarily listen to pop music exclusive of other activities. (i.e., opera or orchestral music can be longer because very often when you listen to it, that's all you're doing). Any longer and it no longer seems as novel to our half-attending ears.
Again, I don't study this, so these are just educated guesses, but plausible ones, I think.
posted by forza at 3:32 PM on March 7, 2010 [2 favorites]
I am a cognitive scientist (don't study this in particular, but I know a fair bit about working memory), and my guesses would be:
1. Things that people like (stories, music, etc) seem to generally hit a "sweet spot" in terms of information content, where there is enough repetition to feel comfortable and memorable, and enough novelty to engage your attention. The structure of repetitive choruses with distinct verses (often with the same tone or rhythm as each other) in between is probably a good way to enforce this balance.
2. I think 3-4 minutes is probably just about appropriate for our attention spans, given that we don't necessarily listen to pop music exclusive of other activities. (i.e., opera or orchestral music can be longer because very often when you listen to it, that's all you're doing). Any longer and it no longer seems as novel to our half-attending ears.
Again, I don't study this, so these are just educated guesses, but plausible ones, I think.
posted by forza at 3:32 PM on March 7, 2010 [2 favorites]
I think 3-4 minutes is probably just about appropriate for our attention spans, given that we don't necessarily listen to pop music exclusive of other activities.
This is actually an excellent example of why this sort of speculation is difficult. It's not necessarily wrong, but the three to four minute duration of the average single likely has a lot to do with the dominance of the 78 RPM gramophone record in the beginning of the twentieth century, which had a maximum per-side duration of roughly three minutes. Maybe the modern attention span does conform to the limits of the three minute single, but that might be because of our familiarity with that convention as opposed to any physiological limit. In light of the available evidence, Occam's Razor favors that explanation.
posted by invitapriore at 4:43 PM on March 7, 2010
This is actually an excellent example of why this sort of speculation is difficult. It's not necessarily wrong, but the three to four minute duration of the average single likely has a lot to do with the dominance of the 78 RPM gramophone record in the beginning of the twentieth century, which had a maximum per-side duration of roughly three minutes. Maybe the modern attention span does conform to the limits of the three minute single, but that might be because of our familiarity with that convention as opposed to any physiological limit. In light of the available evidence, Occam's Razor favors that explanation.
posted by invitapriore at 4:43 PM on March 7, 2010
forza: "2. I think 3-4 minutes is probably just about appropriate for our attention spans...
Again, I don't study this, so these are just educated guesses, but plausible ones, I think."
Plausible, but I think the actual reason is more mundane: the capacity of a 78rpm vinyl record
posted by d. z. wang at 5:18 PM on March 7, 2010
Again, I don't study this, so these are just educated guesses, but plausible ones, I think."
Plausible, but I think the actual reason is more mundane: the capacity of a 78rpm vinyl record
posted by d. z. wang at 5:18 PM on March 7, 2010
D'oh! preview, how you fail me...
posted by d. z. wang at 5:18 PM on March 7, 2010
posted by d. z. wang at 5:18 PM on March 7, 2010
invitapriore, d.z. wang: good point. Although given that that was a constraint imposed by technology many many decades ago, and pop music has evolved significantly in many ways since then, I'd be surprised if that was all there was to it.
posted by forza at 6:54 PM on March 7, 2010
posted by forza at 6:54 PM on March 7, 2010
A lot more than a razor would be needed to explain why the punk rockers in the 70s said : hey let's stop jumping up and down after 3 minutes out of respect for our grandparent's technology. In the 1940s, recordings of 3 minutes duration were a solution to an actual problem and out-competed other, different length, recordings. People bought the recordings because they liked them. I'm predisposed to listen to 3 minute songs because my grandparents did ? The length of a pop song has stayed the same while every other segment of pop culture has changed because we got imprinted with 78 RPM ? I have no idea if forza is correct, but he is thinking in the right direction.
posted by llc at 8:15 PM on March 7, 2010
posted by llc at 8:15 PM on March 7, 2010
Look at it another way, there were plenty of records from the late 60s onwards that extended the format of the pop song. Some of them were very successful, but the three minute norm stayed. I'm a musician and not a scientist, but the 3-minute punk song can easily be explained as a reaction to the bloated nature of 70s rock. There may well be a psychological explanation for why 3 minutes is the optimum length for a song, but there are plenty more mundane reasons that explain this too.
posted by ob at 7:08 AM on March 8, 2010
posted by ob at 7:08 AM on March 8, 2010
1) Repetition
A part of the emergence of the popular culture was a finding that things that are repeated enough, are more easily marketed. So, the product must have a e.g. Chorus, and often so called "catch" a little trick that makes the tune unique.
2) Musical language
In music science (academic research of music) they separate primary and secondary components of the music. Primary components are essential musical phenomena (form, harmony, melody), and 2ndary are interpretation, little changes in the orchestration etc. It was rapidly discovered that ordinary people want to buy music the primary parameters of which they know, but the 2ndary parameters of which contain something new.
3) Attention
The length of the performance should not be too long so that ordinary person can maintain his/her concentration (seriously :) and it can be included in the commercials, movies etc.
4) Historic and culture related reasons
As mentioned, vinyls, radio shows, TV, music videos, movies, and now Spotify as well as development in audio and recording technology, instruments etc. all have affected.
5) Societal reasons
These affect through the previous ones. If people watch movies, the tunes are tailored to fit the movies.
6) Business
A good example of the highly produced popular culture is the "James Bond" pop score movies.
The music contains a Theme song that is sold also separately, it has a special place - not in the beginning of the movie - a few minutes from the beginning, so that people arriving late will hear it. The main themes of the song are used in the scoring, so that people get used to them etc.
Outcome:
Then, pop form is a state of the art concept, and highly precisely thought when music is produced to serve the needs of the music. E.g. the 1st chorus should appear just on time, so that the listener does not lose interest etc. Even tempos between verse and chorus are carefully thought. At its best, you are hooked! :)
posted by Doggiebreath at 5:45 PM on March 9, 2010 [1 favorite]
A part of the emergence of the popular culture was a finding that things that are repeated enough, are more easily marketed. So, the product must have a e.g. Chorus, and often so called "catch" a little trick that makes the tune unique.
2) Musical language
In music science (academic research of music) they separate primary and secondary components of the music. Primary components are essential musical phenomena (form, harmony, melody), and 2ndary are interpretation, little changes in the orchestration etc. It was rapidly discovered that ordinary people want to buy music the primary parameters of which they know, but the 2ndary parameters of which contain something new.
3) Attention
The length of the performance should not be too long so that ordinary person can maintain his/her concentration (seriously :) and it can be included in the commercials, movies etc.
4) Historic and culture related reasons
As mentioned, vinyls, radio shows, TV, music videos, movies, and now Spotify as well as development in audio and recording technology, instruments etc. all have affected.
5) Societal reasons
These affect through the previous ones. If people watch movies, the tunes are tailored to fit the movies.
6) Business
A good example of the highly produced popular culture is the "James Bond" pop score movies.
The music contains a Theme song that is sold also separately, it has a special place - not in the beginning of the movie - a few minutes from the beginning, so that people arriving late will hear it. The main themes of the song are used in the scoring, so that people get used to them etc.
Outcome:
Then, pop form is a state of the art concept, and highly precisely thought when music is produced to serve the needs of the music. E.g. the 1st chorus should appear just on time, so that the listener does not lose interest etc. Even tempos between verse and chorus are carefully thought. At its best, you are hooked! :)
posted by Doggiebreath at 5:45 PM on March 9, 2010 [1 favorite]
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by ludwig_van at 10:19 AM on March 7, 2010 [1 favorite]