"Now the earth was formless and void..."

Checklist Number 9: FORM

Tom Douglas photo by Logan Wall

Number Nine - Form
The standard form for a song typically looks like this:

• Intro: 15 seconds

• First Verse: 30 seconds

• Turn: 10 seconds

• Chorus: 30 seconds

• Turn: 10 seconds

• Second Verse: 30 seconds

• Bridge: 15 seconds

• Last Chorus: 45 seconds

And voilà—about 3 minutes of magic.

But what if we shook things up and started with the chorus? Songs like Help! by The Beatles, Jolene by Dolly Parton, and Ain’t No Sunshine by Bill Withers did just that. Rules, after all, are meant to be broken.

Stephen Sondheim, the brilliant American composer and lyricist, had a few rules about writing:

1. Less is more.

2. God is in the details.

3. Content dictates form.

All in the service of clarity.

For our purposes, let’s explore what “content dictates form” means in relation to songwriting.

I like analogies, so here’s one to try on for size:
The formula for water is H₂O (two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen).

The formula for content is:

• One part location (the where), and

• Two parts conflict (the tension driving the narrative).

A. The Location

Where is your song taking place? The location is the real estate, the geography, the longitude and latitude. Is it a seaside bar with tiki torches flickering? The shotgun seat of a 1997 Silverado? A fire tower road with a cold beer on a hot August night? Or perhaps a dirty kitchen in a pink flamingo double-wide trailer?