What is a song and why is it so??

[rattley]

Greetings!!

What is a song?  Are there any real rules? How much music theory is involved, if any?    I ask because lately every song I hear I analyze it in my mind as to its structure.  Could that song be done well on an arranger?  And.....could I do it?


So many songs try to fit into such similar patterns..........

Intro - Variations 1 thru 4 - Ending

The variations start out with minimal accompaniment and progress adding more accompaniment and perhaps volumes as the song plays.  When did we start using this type of template for song creation and why?   


A long time ago when arrangers only had 2 variations most of the songs I remember playing sounded so repetitive you knew it was done on an arranger.  When 4 variations came into play it made things sound much more realistic, but only to a point.  Does the song make the style?  Or, does the style make the song?  When I start repeating variations in a song I try to be aware and make changes to the accompaniment to not be as repetitive. Removing  or changing a voice or two makes the style sound less busy.  What do you do to keep from sounding repetitive?  What tricks can you share??  -charley

[DrakeM]

Hi Charley

I thought I knew the answer but I looked it up on the internet (and I was correct in my thinking).

Song:
A brief composition written or adapted for singing.
The act or art of singing.

But I bet you want to know how to make an instrumental tune interesting.

I can only suggest that you check for popular instrumental covers on YouTube and build your style as close to what you hear a successful person has done with the song. Try to copy a pro sound and if you fall a bit short, it will still sound pretty good to most people. 

Drake

[BogdanH]

hi charley

What is a song?  Are there any real rules? How much music theory is involved, if any?    I ask because lately every song I hear I analyze it in my mind as to its structure.  Could that song be done well on an arranger?  And.....could I do it?

I think certain things in music are difficult to explain because it has to do with human perception, mood, cultural environment, how much sense for music someone has, our age, etc. -and that is what defines the rules.
Similar as you, when I hear some song/music that I like (that catch my interest, so to speak), I start to analyze it in my head and try to find out how to transfer it into arranger.
Can I do it? If I really like the song, then I usually can ...or I will learn how to do it during creation. But as I found out, that's not the right question.. right question is: will I be able to play that song?
The thing is, we only have two hands and many times that's not enough to imitate several musicians: playing on splitted keybed, changing chords, changing voices, executing pads at the right time, ...not to mention, that we can't afford mistakes if variations consists of several bars.
I also realized that not every song is suited for playing on arranger. Many songs are great mainly because of singers voice and the way how (s)he sing it. And no matter how perfect style we make, we will not able to present that with arranger. I've created quite a few such styles and in the middle of the process I realized that it will sound... boring -and I deleted it.

The variations start out with minimal accompaniment and progress adding more accompaniment and perhaps volumes as the song plays.  When did we start using this type of template for song creation and why?   

It's because preset styles are made that way. They serve for demonstration only -they're not song specific. Not everyone is able or interested to make custom styles and so they just use what's there -it becomes kinda boring over the time, though.

...When 4 variations came into play it made things sound much more realistic, but only to a point.

Here comes my wish that I expressed a while ago: we need more than only four variations! -your conclusion confirm that my wish has it's place.

...What do you do to keep from sounding repetitive?

Well, I don't play gigs for audience (except few youtube videos) and so I can only share my thoughts on how to avoid repetitions:
Each song must have distinctly different rhythm pattern in style. That doesn't necessary mean that every style must be totally different in it's core. Many times it's enough if we only change bass and/or padding pattern, to make song sounding quite differently. What I'm saying is, a style must sound interesting enough if we use three (max four) channels only. For example, drums, bass and (guitar, piano, etc.) padding.
Most songs can be performed with a style that has only length of one bar in all variations... which sounds very boring if we use such styles for all our songs.

Just sharing my thoughts,
Bogdan

[mikf]

When you ask what is a song, I think you are really asking what makes a good song. And the answer is that it can be anything. It can be the melody, the harmony ( what people refer to as the chord progression), the  rhythm, the arrangement, the lyrics, or some combination of all of them.
Sometimes songs stand up well against very simple, fairly repetitive or unobtrusive accompaniment, but more often than not when making a great recording the total arrangement is important to enhancing the full experience.
Frankly, it's silly to think a style - no matter how good or how many variations- can substitute for a great overall, free flowing, arrangement. Styles are meant to provide a decent substitute for live playing, and when well, chosen work well for that. And in some cases custom styles can be quite close. But they can never compete with work of a talented arranger.
I find though that you can make quite good arrangements on the arranger keyboard by using a basic style to set the foundation, then adding in multi tracks to complete the arrangement.
If you are wondering though if someone could use styles to inspire an original composition, then I believe people do that all the time. How good it is though, depends on their talent level,
Mike

[DerekA]

If you need more than  4 variations, the workaround is to use 2 styles and use the registration bank to switch the styles at the right point. Then use more than one registration bank if you need to, named so that pressing Reg+ brings the second one up.

[BogdanH]

If you need more than  4 variations, the workaround is...

Workaround means finding a solution because of styles limitation. There's a reason why it was decided to increase number of variations from two to four: one song=one style -> simplified song management.
Technically there's no reason why four variations limit exist as no hardware change is needed for that -solution is purely software (firmware) based.
But then, that's only one of the things that needs to be improved for styles: fill-in longer than one bar, a true half bar fill-in, etc.

...
Styles are meant to provide a decent substitute for live playing, and when well, chosen work well for that...

Yes! And to sound authentic, we need to keep the number of "our band members" reasonably small -it's only about how good each "member" (=content of each style channel) is and how good they complement each other.

Most of my "oldies" pop songs (link to my Youtube below) only have 3-4 instruments, because that's how many were actually used originally -and most of them were big hits that we still enjoy today!
To tell the truth, for playing "just for fun" I created few styles with three instruments only (for example, drum+bass+piano and me playing sax). This allows me to play songs randomly, which many times inspires me to make different sequences for those three instruments.. and so a new song is born 

Bogdan

[pjd]

Might want to check out books on songwriting and arranging techniques. The local library system may have some books in case you want to save money.

I have "Melody In Songwriting" on my bookshelf. It's written by Jack Perricone and published by Berklee Press. Kind of an old resource by now -- maybe Berklee Press has newer books?

Just a few suggestions -- pj

[rattley]

Thanks for all your replies. I thought this might be an interesting topic.  -charley

[BogdanH]

hi charley,
It is an interesting topic! -although we maybe went a bit sideways with our replies 

Bogdan

[mikf]

Charley, I read your OP again and now have a different take on what you were really asking. You want to know how to make your playing sound good on the arranger.
My own view is that most arranger players try to put too much on the style, voices and style variations to do this. They become obsessed with what the electronics can do for them, rather than learning about musicianship and playing skills. The thing is that you have to play the song so it's interesting and then it will never sound repetitive, even without changing styles.
If you play the straight melody as it is written, with one finger, and very rigid timing, its inevitably going to sound dull and repetitive, no matter what the style is doing. But if you have great phrasing, know how to make the melody 'sing', and can improv effectively, adding riffs and fills, and great variable harmony, and bring even subtle changes to repeat sections, it will then sound interesting even with the simplest of accompaniment.
Listen to how really good players do it and learn.
David Read (dalekwars) our forum member plays well - , listen to his version here of an Elton John song played on the SX900 without access to fancy arranger voices, styles, style variations  - nothing, just his playing. Its far from dull or repetitive - why, because it is played in an interesting way, he makes it his. Even if you dont like this kind if music, you can still learn by observing how he approaches the song, hearing in his head first how he wants it to sound, then producing that. Of course your playing skill may not match up to the capability of David, not many do, but you can still use your imagination to find an interesting way to present a song. 
BTW ....maybe this video also says a lot about the realism of the piano voices on arrangers.

And if you want to have a lesson on how to then add the full range of capability of an arranger, listen to the next video also by David of an ABBA song. This time he uses the arranger to provide a very nice accompaniment while he plays live on the 88 key Korg.

Truth is, a lot of how interesting you can make a song starts in your head. Not on the keyboard. I often envisage how I might want to play a song just before I go to sleep.
Mike
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7md6441P30
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vnp0lDEUZpU

[BogdanH]

Excellent performance on those videos, Mike -they fully describe what you're saying.
Thank you!

Bogdan

[Denn]

When I was with the YPKF many years ago a chap called in to see me. He said he only used one voice in the right hand (Tyros4) as that was the "melody" instrument. All the other voices were the backing. I never really came to terms with that but having read this post I now see to what he was referring. The styles are the backing, drums, bass guitar and the piano or sax is the melody instrument. Must reorganise my thinking.
Denn.