There are no rules for "right" and "wrong" rhythms, but we can develop
our art for choosing rhythms by:
Studying the patterns and ideas in the rhythms in popular songs
Practicing using those ideas in our own writing
So, for this lesson, we'll look at a single phrase from the folk-rock classic
Like A Rolling Stone by Bob Dylan. If you don't love this
particular song, that's fine; use this lesson to learn how to study the
rhythms in songs you do love. This lesson uses the version from The
Essential Bob Dylan ($1.29 at
Amazon
as of this writing).
Here's the first 4-measure phrase from Verse 1 of Like A Rolling Stone
(at 00:16 in the recording):
Now let's pull some rhythm ideas out of this example. We'll explore these
ideas:
A simple idea to start with: How many notes per measure, i.e. how "busy" is
the melody? Measures 1 & 2 above have ~8 notes per measure; that's pretty
busy, like a "patter song" or "proto-rap".
Verse vs. chorus: Notice that this "busy" melody is in the verse
rather than the chorus. That's the general trend in songs; the
verses have more notes/words to tell the story, and the
chorus has fewer notes to make it simple and memorable.
Different styles. Even for a verse, this phrase is pretty busy,
compared to the average song. I think that's because Dylan was a poet before
he was a songwriter, and this phrase reminds me of 50's "beat poetry"; this is
a "talking song". Many songs have a more "abstract" melody rhythm than this,
without such a close connection between the rhythm and the words; but that's
something you should see for yourself, by analyzing songs you like.
Analyze how many notes per measure appear in songs you like.
Compare different parts of the songs (e.g. verse vs. chorus). Look for
meaningful "themes" and "patterns".
Look at your own songs. How do your own notes-per-measure compare to
songs you like? Is your own pattern of notes-per-measure "in a rut"?
Practice something different. If you find a notes-per-measure idea
you like which you haven't used yourself, use it on purpose in a song
or "exercise" of your own.
First Half, Second Half
Listeners constantly listen for the first half and second half
of the "time chunks" in music. Other names for "first half" and "second half"
are "statement and conclusion", "question and answer", or "call and response".
This is fundamental to how people listen to music, and it happens at multiple
"time levels" simultaneously:
The listener hears one measure, and listens for how the next
measure completes a 2-measure phrase;
The listener hears a 2-measure phrase, and listens for how the
next 2-measure phrase completes a 4-measure phrase;
The listener hears a 4-measure phrase, and listens for how the
next 4-measure phrase completes an 8-measure "sentence".
measure
measure
measure
measure
measure
measure
measure
measure
2-measure phrase
2-measure phrase
2-measure phrase
2-measure phrase
4-measure phrase
4-measure phrase
8-measure phrase
When listening to music, the listener is looking for a meaningful
pattern or "story" in the "time chunks", and that story is
usually about these 1st and 2nd halves. Here's my interpretation of the
"rhythm story" in our Like A Rolling Stone phrase:
Measures 1-2: The listener hears measure 1 as "busy".
Then, measure 2 is also "busy". So, the basic "1st half, 2nd
half" story for measures 1-2 is "2nd half repeats 1st half". A
"repeating" story like this is perfectly acceptable and very very
common; in fact, the listener needs to hear repeating ideas to
hear "meaning" in the music. The story for this 2-measure chunk as a
whole, then, is "busy".
Measures 3-4:Measure 3's story is "3 quick notes";
measure 4's story is "take a breath" (no notes). So, the story
for this 2-measure chunk is "a few quick notes, then take a
break".
Measures 1-4: Combining the above 2-measure chunks, the
story for the whole 4-measure phrase is "busy statement
followed by short response". Looking at the lyrics, you can see
how this rhythm story perfectly complements the song's word
story. Again, many songs have a more abstract rhythm story which is
not closely tied to the word story; I think the close coupling of the
rhythm and word stories here shows Dylan as a "word-oriented" songwriter.
Exercises:
Study songs you like and make up "1st half, 2nd half" rhythm stories
to describe how you think the listener will interpret
(subconsciously!) the 4-measure phrases. Your stories will probably be very
different from my story for our Like A Rolling Stone phrase, but in
general they can be very "abstract, geometric" stories which have no
obvious relationship to the song's words.
Find the "1st half, 2nd half" rhythm stories in your own songs. How
do they compare to songs you like? Are you in a rut?
Practice something different. Use the "1st half, 2nd half" rhythm
stories you found in other people's songs, as inspiration to try some
different rhythm stories in your own songs or exercises.
Accented Syllables
A melody is composed of rhythmically strong and rhythmically
weak notes. The strong notes attract more "listener attention" than the
weak notes. The rhythmically strong notes generally do one of these things:
They fall on a stronger counting point. For example, in a beat
divided into 16th-notes ("1 e + a"), the "1" and "+" (which are on
half-beats) are stronger counting points than the "off-16ths", "e"
and "a".
Or, the rhythmically strong notes last longer than the weak notes.
The accented syllables in a song's words are generally on these
rhythmically strong melody notes; if not, then the words sound awkward,
like they don't fit the melody. The following shows the accented syllables (in
bold), along with the counting points, for measures 1 & 2 of our
Like A Rolling Stone phrase:
1 e
+
a
2
e
+
a
3 e
+
a
4 e + a
Once
up-
on
a
time
you
dressed
so
fine
1
e
+
a
2 e +
a
3
e
+ a
4 e + a
Threw
the
bums
a
dime
in
your
prime
Notice how the accented syllables fall on rhythmically strong
notes: that is, on notes which fall on stronger counting points, or last
longer, than the notes around them.
If the words were created before the melody rhythm, then you usually
need to craft the rhythm to place the accented syllables on
rhythmically strong notes. You can do this by adding or removing a note
from a beat, or by moving a note (or a few notes) forward or backward.
However, often, the melody rhythm comes before the words. This often
happens when a melody is reused with different words. This happens all
the time in the different verses of a song, but it also happens even within a
single phrase; in fact it happens in measure 2 ("Threw the bums a dime...")
above. Measure 2's melody is very similar to measure 1's; the main difference
is the words.
When the melody rhythm comes before the words, often the words are then
carefully chosen to fit that rhythm. But, you can also modify the
rhythm to fit the new words. This happens in measure 2 above; it repeats
the melody from measure 1, but it's modified to fit the new words in measure
2.
Exercise: Analyze the melodies and words in songs you like. Find the
rhythmically strong notes in the melody and the accented
syllables in the words. I think you'll find that these strong notes and
accented syllables usually match up.
Tip: When you're adding words to a melody, you can use word
phrases that "don't fit" the melody if you modify the rhythm to make
the words fit.
Dramatic Hesitation
In measure 3 of our Like A Rolling Stone phrase:
... notice how the melody rests for 2 beats (after the "busy" measures
1 & 2), then he sings "didn't you?" on beat 3, instead of singing
"didn't you?" on the "obvious" beat 1. I call this dramatic
hesitation (not a fancy technical term, I just made it up). It gets the
listener's attention for the key "conclusion" of the 4-bar phrase, the
question "didn't you?".
Exercises:
Analyze songs you like, looking for dramatic rhythm tricks:
any detail of the melody rhythm which seems to add drama or emotion.
This "dramatic hesitation" technique is just one example of such tricks.
Practice using these tricks in your own melodies. These are
embellishments you can add to an already-written melody, so you could
review melodies you've already written, especially any boring parts, and see
if a dramatic rhythm trick could spice them up.
Syncopation
Our Like A Rolling Stone phrase also uses the syncopation
techniques of anticipation and repeated threes. Look it over and
find these techniques; if you can't, review
Lesson 42: Syncopation.
