Songs that don't have a chorus

this video is sponsored by the piano learning app skoove in pop and rock music it's usually fairly safe to assume that any given song will have a chorus however there are various songs that one way or another avoid having a chorus section now before we start looking at some examples let's be clear about what exactly constitutes a chorus the chorus of a song is the section that is periodically repeated throughout each time with pretty much the exact same lyrics and music the chorus is usually the focal point of a song the part of the song we'll find ourselves humming and remembering later on it's also the moment where all of the dynamic energy that's been built up during the verse and pre-chorus sections is finally released in a gratifying payoff when described like that it's hard to imagine how a song could get by without a chorus if the chorus is the focus of the song the most exciting and rewarding part why would a song ever not feature one well there are various reasons why a song might forego a chorus section for example a chorus has to be repeated throughout the song on various occasions right so what if we had a song that was through composed music which is through composed never returns to a previous section once the section is complete it will never go back to repeat it i.e it moves through the piece of music and perhaps the most famous example of a through composed song is queen's bohemian rhapsody bohemian rhapsody features five distinct sections that once completed are never returned to and although many of these sections have moments when they sound quite chorus-like i don't think we can class any of them as a chorus because none of them ever repeat bohemian rhapsody though as i'm sure you'll agree doesn't suffer from a lack of chorus and this is because many of the roles usually fulfilled by the chorus are instead fulfilled by these five sections for example the rock section provides the dynamic peak and sense of release and excitement that we'd usually get from a chorus [Music] and the operatic section provides us many memorable lyrical moments that are going to stick in our head just like the lyric of a chorus [Music] the chorus is usually the section that provides a rigid and clear structure to a piece of music giving us a predictable and satisfying burst of energy and excitement every time it comes around but songs like bohemian rhapsody actively avoid this predictable structure and instead their sense of energy and excitement comes from the journey that we go on as we travel from section to section from mood to mood of course although bohemian rhapsody is the gold standard of what you may call episodic song structure it is far from the only example green day's nine-minute epic jesus of suburbia was reportedly billy joe armstrong's attempt to write a bohemian rhapsody of the future we can see that just like bohemian rhapsody jesus of suburbia is comprised of five distinct sections none of which would qualify as a chorus [Music] one of the earliest examples of an episodic song is the beatles happiness is a warm gun clocking in at only two minutes and 43 seconds this song is made up of three contrasting sections which john lennon referred to as the dirty old man [Music] and the gunman satire of 50s rock and [Music] roll almost three decades later it was happiness as a warm gun that allegedly inspired radiohead to write their own through composed song paranoid android paranoid android is made up of four contrasting sections each with varying key centers tempos and [Music] moods the only repetition we get in paranoid android is a reprise at the end of the guitar riff we heard in the second section [Music] however i hardly think this repetition counts as a chorus making paranoid android yet another example of a chorusless song not all examples though of chorusless songs are in this episodic form another common song structure to not feature a chorus is aaba form otherwise known as 32 bar form or american songbook form as the name suggests this is the form that many american songbook tunes from the 1930s and 40s were written in for example over the rainbow algorithm and blue skies 32 bar form follows the structure aaba so in other words we get one 8 bar line [Music] then we get that eight bar line again although of course with different lyrics we then get the b section or what is sometimes called the middle eight an eight bar line that musically contrasts the a section [Music] and then we return to that original eight bar a section once more at the end so 32 bar form songs like over the rainbow don't have a chorus they are just a aaba or to use more modern terminology verse verse middle 8 verse aaba form remained popular into the 1960s for example although they often put their own spin on it the beatles used the aaba form in many of their classic songs yesterday consists of a repeating seven bar a section yesterday and a contrasting 8 bar b section or middle 8. so yesterday is a chorusless song the same is true of the long and winding road which has a 12 bar a section broken up by a four-bar b-section many times i've been alone and many times i cry so how do songs with an aaba form like yesterday and long winding road get by without a chorus well unlike in conventional verse pre-chorus chorus form where the dynamic energy is created by building from the reserved muted verse section to the full energy chorus section in aaba form the dynamic of the song instead comes from the contrast between the a and b sections i like to think of it as reverse chorus structure is a roller coaster where we are either building energy or releasing it and aaba form is more like a swinging ship where the excitement comes from moving from position a to position b now by the 1970s the aaba form soon fell out of fashion and the verse chorus form we often see today began to become the structure of choice however we can still find some relatively modern examples of the aaba form including make you feel my love by bob dylan made famous by adele and don't know why by nora jones if you've always been interested in learning to play the piano then you can get started right now with scoove scoove is an easy to use interactive app that can teach you real songs by classic artists like the beatles alicia keys and elton john start your free trial today with the link in the description another way that a song could get by without a chorus is if it instead featured what for a lack of a better word i would call an instrumental chorus for example seven nation army is largely built from a repeating verse section featuring the song's iconic wrist [Music] but where we would expect to get to the chorus we instead get to this a two bar build up followed by a full energy version of the main rift [Music] now this section certainly feels like it's fulfilling the role of a chorus it's the energetic peak of the song and it's the moment we are anticipating during the verse however i don't think we can call it a chorus as it doesn't feature a lyric or vocal another example of an instrumental chorus like this is baker street by jerry rafferty in baker street instead of a conventional chorus we get the iconic sax line instead this use of an instrumental chorus is quite common in modern pop music particularly in electronic pop songs the structure will often consist of a typically muted verse section this is then followed by what i would call a build-up a section very similar to a pre-chorus where the energy is being built up ready to release in the chorus but after this build-up instead of a chorus we get what you might call the drop a section where all of the tension and energy that's been built up is released all at once creating the dynamic climax of the song [Music] so we've talked about episodic songs like bohemian rhapsody and songs with an aaba structure like yesterday and songs with an instrumental chorus like seven nation army but perhaps the most common form for songs of outer chorus is what's called strophic form strophic form is when a song consists of just one repeating verse section so rather than the aaba form we looked at earlier strophic form is effectively aaa form each first will feature different lyrics of course but the music those lyrics are set to will remain the same strophic form is often used in songs that are intended to be sung as a large group without much rehearsal so the simple repeating form makes it easy for a crowd of people to pick up the tune even if they've not heard it before for example many national anthems are strophic hymns and spirituals are also often strophic nursery rhymes and children songs are usually strophic as to keep them as simple as possible and also many folk songs are in strophic form so how do strophic songs get by without a chorus section well despite consisting of one continuously repeating verse section that first section will often be divided up into subsections giving us a sense of contrast for example in god save the queen the verse is broken up into two sub-sections one of six bars and one of eight bars so despite really only being one repeating verse section we still get a sense of contrast and development another thing that you may have noticed in god save the queen and in other strophic songs is that even though each verse has different lyrics the lyric of the final line always remains the same and it's also the title of the song this is a very common technique in strophic songs that gives the song focus and structure despite the lack of a chorus many 12 bar blues songs are also in strophic form and they take this repeated lyric idea a step further often blues will not only use the same lyric at the end of each verse like we saw in god save the queen but on top of this each verse will only feature one other line of lyrics which gets sung twice in a row by repeating lyrics so often it brings extra structure and focus to each verse making up for the lack of a chorus section strophic form isn't particularly common in rock or pop music but examples can be found the beatles tomorrow never knows is almost trophic in form vocally it consists of just one 8-bar verse melody that gets repeated throughout [Music] however this is broken up by an instrumental section that slightly varies the form much like tomorrow never knows elephant by taemin parlour is built from a repeating verse section however once again this is broken up by an extended instrumental and the last type of song we'll look at which doesn't feature a chorus is songs that do consist of various repeating contrasting sections but no one section really qualifies as a chorus golden brown by the stranglers is built largely from this instrumental section [Music] and this first section [Music] beyond that it has an extended solo section and a brief vocal outro but no chorus personally i think golden brown operates in quite a similar way to the instrumental chorus songs we were looking at earlier like seven nation army and baker street the iconic harpsichord riff that we hear at the beginning of the song and throughout effectively plays the role of the chorus up the junction by squeeze is largely made up of a repeating 10 bar verse section this is later contrasted by a 10 bar bridge [Music] and the whole thing is bookended by an instrumental simp section but we never get a chorus the lack of a chorus section though works well for up the junction because it's a storytelling song so not having to waste time repeating a chorus every minute allows maximum time to get the narrative across of course 12 repetitions of the same 10 bar verse melody is in danger of getting boring but squeeze have made sure to add plenty of variety throughout the song to keep each verse interesting including a key change and various dynamic changes there are definitely loads more examples of chorusless songs out there so if you can think of a good example then do leave it in the comments down below also one thing i've not covered in this video is how the term chorus was historically used quite differently i actually went into a lot more depth with this in my recent songs inspired by jazz video so do go check that out if you haven't already and thank you as always to all of the wonderful people who support me on patreon including the names you see on screen right now and andrei sans diagram andrew andrew brown andrew sussman austin barrett austin russell bob mckinstry brittany parker cameron oliveina colin aiken chris cabell christopher ryan courageous chameleon david rivers donald howard dr darren wicks elena scorchenko as ben hansen eugene leroy fd hodor yolamo latona james brockelbank hugo miller james ko j.a kochensparger john dye josh sandolin justin vigor mark heit mark ziegenhagen max o'keefe melody composer squared melanie schoenert michael vivian nancy gillard nathan lawrence nathaniel park paul miller paul paisle peter dunphy pioche milovsky richard pride roger clay sam lin scott finley sean kennedy steve daly stephen lazzaro tim beaker toma aharoni tricia adams tim payne toot victor levy vidad flowers vladimir kodakov and [Music] volte [Music] you

Channel: David Bennett Piano

Views: 582,506

Rating: 4.9525132 out of 5

Keywords: songs without a chorus, music theory, analysis, no chorus, song structure, explained, strophic, 32 bar form

Id: OeApbSCslEc

Length: 16min 14sec (974 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 29 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/RanchBaganch]

Being British, David Bennett has a lot of videos that include Queen. And the Beatles, and Radiohead.

It’s an interesting channel.