[Songwriting Advice] Size Matters: A Study in Prosody
by Pat Pattison
Lana Del Ray’s single, Ride, creates a picturesque and surreal journey down an open road, leading us through a landscape that fuses relationships, mental turmoil and escape. The song is about motion, about the instability of a physical circumstance and mental state that causes her to lean into the future, to slide away from the confines of her past. Or something like that.
Anyway, it currently has over 62 million views on youtube, so lotsa folks like it.
Here are the first four sections:
(Insert Ride (unedited) here)
I've been out on that open road
You can be my full time daddy,
White and gold
Singing blues has been getting old
You can be my full time baby,
Hot or cold
Don't break me down
I've been travelin' too long
I've been trying too hard
With one pretty song
I hear the birds on the summer breeze,
I drive fast, I am alone in midnight
Been tryin' hard not to get into trouble,
But I, I've got a war in my mind
So, I just ride,
Just ride,
I just ride,
Just ride
Again, the song is all about moving. Yet, at the end of the last section, I didn’t feel the urge to move. I should have, but I didn’t. Why not?
First, let’s take a minute to talk about the concept of Prosody.
Prosody
Aristotle said that every great work of art contains the same feature – unity. Everything in the work belongs –supports every other element. Another word for unity is prosody – the “appropriate relationship between elements, whatever they may be.” Some examples of prosody in songs might be:
Prosody between words and music: a minor key could create, a feeling of sadness to support or even create sadness in an idea.
Prosody between syllables and notes: appropriate relationship between stressed syllables and stressed notes – a really big deal in songwriting. When they are lined up properly, the shape of the melody matches the natural shape of the language.
Prosody between rhythm and meaning: obvious examples like
“you gotta stop!.......(pause).................look and listen.”
Or writing a song about galloping horses in a triplet feel.
The elements of the song must all join together to support the central intent, idea and emotion of the work. Everything fits. Prosody is the appropriate relationship between elements.
Stable vs. Unstable
Stable vs. unstable is an effective window into prosody – a practical tool for creating prosody because it covers every aspect of a song: from the idea, to the melody, the rhythm, the chords, the lyric structure --everything. It governs the choices you make. Ask yourself, is the emotion in this section stable or unstable? Once you answer that question, you have a standard for making all your other choices.
Number of Lines
Every section you’ll ever write – verses, choruses, pre-choruses, bridges—will have (here it comes, get ready) some number of lines or other! OK, not much of a revelation. Even more specifically, every section you’ll ever write will have either an even number of lines, or an odd number of lines. Wow. Even more of an, um, revelation…
Now let’s talk a bit about an odd number of lines. An odd number of lines feels, er, odd -- off balance, unresolved, incomplete UNSTABLE. Let’s say you’re writing a verse where the idea is something like: “Baby, since you left me I’ve been feeling lost, odd -- off balance, unresolved, incomplete, UNSTABLE. Just theoretically, do you think this verse would be better with an even number of lines or an odd number of lines? Right. An odd number of lines.
This changes everything. You’ve recognized, maybe for the first time, that there can be a relationship between what you say and how many lines you use to say it. You’re feeling UNSTABLE, and the odd or UNSTABLE number of lines supports that feeling. Prosody. Your structure (in this case, your number of lines) can support meaning.
An even number of lines tends to feel, well, even -- solid, resolved, balanced, STABLE. Let’s say that your message is something like: “Baby, you’re the answer to all my prayers. I’ll be with you forever. I’m your rock. You can count on me.” How many lines should you use? Odd or even? Right. Even. You want a solid feeling in the structure to support the emotion you’re trying to communicate. “I mean it. You can trust me.” Prosody.
On the other hand, an odd number of lines feels, er, odd. Like it’s missing something. It creates a feeling of leaning forward. It feels unstable.
With this in mind, let’s take another look at these sections of Ride:
(Insert Ride (unedited) here)
I've been out on that open road
You can be my full time daddy,
White and gold
Singing blues has been getting old
You can be my full time baby,
Hot or cold
Don't break me down
I've been travelin' too long
I've been trying too hard
With one pretty song
I hear the birds on the summer breeze,
I drive fast, I am alone in midnight
Been tryin' hard not to get into trouble,
But I, I've got a war in my mind
So, I just ride,
Just ride,
I just ride,
Just ride
All four sections have an even number of lines. At least in this regard, all four feel stable. They don’t move. Let me repeat that: they don’t move.
Though the song is all about moving, all four sections stop. All four sections balance. That may not be an issue in the first section, where she’s stating facts. No drama, no motion, just facts.
I've been out on that open road
You can be my full time daddy,
White and gold
Singing blues has been getting old
You can be my full time baby,
Hot or cold
The even-numbered six-line section supports the facts nicely. Even the second section, where she’s giving commands, seems appropriate for an even number of lines:
Don't break me down
I've been travelin' too long
I've been trying too hard
With one pretty song
But it seems to me that sections three and four might profit from some instability, especially the title lines, the emotional centerpiece of the whole song:
So, I just ride,
Just ride,
I just ride,
Just ride
I’m an obsessive tinkerer, so I wondered what this might sound as a three lines section. It’s easy enough to toss the song into Garageband and do a little chopping, so I did. Here’s what it sounds like, omitting the third line:
(Insert Ride Edit 1 Chorus here)
So, I just ride,
Just ride,
Just ride
Nice. Can you feel the motion? The longing? The instability? Yup, the number of lines actually creates a feeling all by itself. It comments on the words like a film score comments on the images on the screen. It tells you how to feel about what you’re hearing, simply by applying the concept of Prosody, in this case, working with the number of lines in the section. The section moves forward, supporting the idea, Ride.
Listen to it in the context of all four sections.
(Insert Ride Edit 1 Complete here)
Still, the third section feels like it balances and stops motion with its even number of lines, making the last section have to do all the emotional work. What if the third section,
I hear the birds on the summer breeze,
I drive fast, I am alone in midnight
Been tryin' hard not to get into trouble,
But I, I've got a war in my mind
could push forward too? After all, it’s drenched with longing:
Back to Garageband for another edit, deleting the third line. Listen:
(Insert Ride Edit 2 Pre-Chorus here)
I hear the birds on the summer breeze,
I drive fast, I am alone in midnight
But I, I've got a war in my mind
Now, combined with the unstable fourth section, you can feel even more motion:
I hear the birds on the summer breeze,
I drive fast, I am alone in midnight
But I, I've got a war in my mind
So, I just ride,
Just ride,
Just ride
Now all four sections create prosody – their structures support their meaning, and, in the process, create a nice contrast between stable and unstable sections, making the third and fourth section’s forward motion seem even more dramatic:
(Insert Ride Edit 2 Complete here)
I've been out on that open road
You can be my full time daddy,
White and gold
Singing blues has been getting old
You can be my full time baby,
Hot or cold
Don't break me down
I've been travelin' too long
I've been trying too hard
With one pretty song
I hear the birds on the summer breeze,
I drive fast, I am alone in midnight
But I, I've got a war in my mind
So, I just ride,
Just ride,
Just ride
The structure of each section helps support the idea, using number of lines to make them move or stop.
Number of lines: one of the many tools affecting how your song creates an extra level of feeling. Don’t be afraid to use it.
Take a look at a few more applications of the use of an odd number of lines. Here are the first verses and chorus to Yes’s 1983 hit, Owner of a Lonely Heart:
(Insert Owner of a Lonely Heart (unedited) here)
Move yourself,
you always live your life
Never thinking of the future
Prove yourself
You are the move you make
Take your chances win or loser
See yourself,
you are the steps you take
You and you and that's the only way
Shake, shake yourself
You are every move you make
So the story goes
Owner of a lonely heart
Owner of a lonely heart
Owner of a broken heart
Owner of a lonely heart
If I had a lonely heart, I’d feel a sense of longing, of something missing. Try this:
(Insert Owner of a Lonely Heart Edit here)
Move yourself,
you always live your life
Never thinking of the future
Prove yourself
You are the move you make
Take your chances win or loser
See yourself,
you are the steps you take
You and you and that's the only way
Shake, shake yourself
You are every move you make
So the story goes
Owner of a lonely heart
Owner of a broken heart
Owner of a lonely heart
Now you can feel it. The odd number of lines makes a huge difference.
John Mayer did it right the first time in his Grammy-winning “Your Body is a Wonderland.” His three-line chorus creates a sense of longing, a desire for more:
(Insert Your Body Is A Wonderland unedited here)
We got the afternoon
You got this room for two
One thing I've left to do
Discover me
Discovering you
One mile to every inch of
Your skin like porcelain
One pair of candy lips and
Your bubblegum tongue
Cause if you want love
We'll make it
Swim in a deep sea
Of blankets
Take all your big plans
And break 'em
This is bound to be awhile
Your body is a wonderland
Your body is a wonder (I'll use my hands)
Your body is a wonderland
Without the sense of longing created by the odd number of lines, I doubt the song would have been John’s first Grammy. Judge for yourself. Listen to my Garageband edit, where I inserted an extra line into the chorus:
(Insert Wonderland Edit here)
We got the afternoon
You got this room for two
One thing I've left to do
Discover me
Discovering you
One mile to every inch of
Your skin like porcelain
One pair of candy lips and
Your bubblegum tongue
Cause if you want love
We'll make it
Swim in a deep sea
Of blankets
Take all your big plans
And break 'em
This is bound to be awhile
Your body is a wonderland
Your body is a wonderland
Your body is a wonder (I'll use my hands)
Your body is a wonderland
The even number of lines in the chorus stops motion and erases the sense of longing completely.
The Beatles supported the surrealism of Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds effectively with this three-line chorus:
(Insert Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds unedited here)
Picture yourself in a boat on a river
With tangerine trees and marmalade skies
Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly
A girl with kaleidoscope eyes
Cellophane flowers of yellow and green
Towering over your head
Look for the girl with the sun in her eyes
And she's gone
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Again, I’ve inserted an extra line in the chorus. Listen to the song now as it grinds to a dull halt with my Garageband-balanced chorus:
(Insert Lucy (edit) here)
Picture yourself in a boat on a river
With tangerine trees and marmalade skies
Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly
A girl with kaleidoscope eyes
Cellophane flowers of yellow and green
Towering over your head
Look for the girl with the sun in her eyes
And she's gone
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
It changes the feeling of the song completely.
Every section you write WILL have some number of lines, either odd or even. Ask yourself the simple question, “How do I feel in this section, stable or unstable?” Your number of lines, one of the many structural tools in your tool-belt, can help you gain even more emotion by supporting and enhancing your intent.
Prosody. It’s not rocket surgery. It’s simply having tools in your tool-belt and knowing how to use them. Prosody gives you an efficient window into effective composition.
Size matters.
Pat Pattison is a professor at Berklee College of Music, where he teaches lyric writing and poetry. In addition to his four books, Songwriting Without Boundaries (Writer’s Digest Books), Writing Better Lyrics (Writer’s Digest Books), The Essential Guide to Lyric Form and Structure (Berklee Press), and The Essential Guide to Rhyming (Berklee Press), Pat has developed five online courses for Berklee Online: three on lyric writing, one on poetry, and one on creative writing, all available through online.berklee.edu. His filmed series of lectures for Coursera.org has over 1,600,000 students enrolled to date. Pat has written over fifty articles for various magazines and blogs and has chapters in both The Poetics of American Song Lyrics (University Press of Mississippi) and the Handbook on Creative Writing (Edinburgh University Press). He continues to present songwriting clinics across the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Europe. Pat’s students include multiple Grammy-winner Gillian Welch, John Mayer, AND Tom Hambridge, Karmin, American Authors, Liz Longley, Greg Becker, Charlie Worsham, and many more.
To enter the 24th Annual USA Songwriting Competition, go to: https://www.songwriting.net
