[00:06] Oh, I swear I could learn how to live if I stood outside
[00:20] Listening to the wind. [Music] full of ideas, full of inspiration? You get into the process and then you just
[00:34] can't quite nail it and you listen to the songs that you love and you can hear the sections of the songs. You can hear the chorus coming. You can hear the tension building. You can hear the bridge doing something really cool and
[00:47] interesting, but you just don't know how to nail it. It's not happening in your song. You are not alone. When I first started writing songs over 25 years ago, I wrote on Instinct 2, and that got me so far until I'd hit the same wall that
[01:03] you might be experiencing. Learning how the sections of the songs actually work in a song form was totally transformative for me as a songwriter and really opened up the world of songs. not by becoming formulaic, but by really
[01:18] understanding the fundamental building blocks of songs so that you can freely change them around with a lot more confidence, and actually a lot more creative freedom. In this video, I'm going to focus on one type of section,
[01:33] the verse. And I'm going to show you exactly what a verse is, what it's supposed to do, how to write one, and also a few classic mistakes to avoid.
[01:48] function of the verse in a song really is because it shouldn't be a coin toss what the difference between a verse and a chorus is. And a chorus is not just not just picking something that might otherwise be a verse and repeating it
[02:03] and then calling it a chorus. And by the same token, the verse isn't necessarily just the first section that you write. There are things that a verse is and does that are different to the chorus or the pre chorus or the bridge of a song.
[02:17] So, we really want to understand what the purpose, function, and role of a verse is so that when we sit down to write one, we know what we're going for. We know what we're looking for, and we also know where we're headed.
[02:31] also know where we're headed. Lyrically, a verse is there to build the Lyrically, a verse is there to build the world of the song. Verses tell us who is singing the song, to whom they are singing, if anyone, and often tell us
[02:45] singing, if anyone, and often tell us something about where and when the narrative elements of the song are actually happening. Let's look at a beautiful contemporary example by an amazing songwriter and lyric writer,
[02:59] Phoebe Bridges. So, these are the lyrics to the first verse of Moonong. The first to the first verse of Moonong. The first verse establishes who is singing. In this case, of course, it's the singer. Now, that might sound obvious, but there
[03:13] are other ways to do it. We don't always need to use the first person pronoun. The singer of the song doesn't always need to be the main character of the song. The singer of the song can sometimes merely be the storyteller
[03:26] singing about other people's worlds and other people's lives. But in this case, in this Phoebe Bridges song, she as the singer is a character in the world of the song and we know it immediately. Who is she singing the song to? Well, she
[03:41] also immediately introduces the you pronoun. So, we know there is another person in this song world. We know that this song is actually a direct
[03:53] conversation. It is a direct piece of communication to this other person. We also know something about the relationship immediately. We know that there is some kind of intimacy or friendship, but we also know there's
[04:08] some kind of distance between these characters. And in fact, that becomes the theme of the whole song. So, very quickly, we know who the main characters are and we know something about their relationship. Where is this song taking
[04:24] place? We actually have some information there. We know that they're walking home, so we can actually see them on the street. And then we also can see them arriving at the singer's house. So, there's actually a very specific set of
[04:39] narrative detail here about where this situation is happening, where the song world in the imagination of the songwriter is actually taking place. There's a little movie scene in the mind of the listener already starting to
[04:54] roll. When is the world of this song taking place? We also have that information in here. It's probably at nighttime and certainly it's happening after they've been out somewhere together and are walking home. So,
[05:06] there's a bit of assumption happening, but there's detail in there that tells us specific narrative elements about who is singing, who they're singing to, where this is happening, and when it is happening.
[05:25] In addition to the who, to whom, where, and when, we also get a sense of why. These are the details that tell us what has initiated the need to sing and write
[05:37] this song in the first place. The verses are often where we expose, explore and are often where we expose, explore and develop the problem, tension or conflict that has given rise to the need to express or communicate something. This
[05:53] lyric to Moonong shows us that so clearly. It's not just that there is a me and a you in the world of this song. It's that there is a relationship and there's trouble in that relationship. What we know just from these first four
[06:06] lines is that they've probably gotten drunk, over drunk. One of the characters is pushing the other one. There's some sort of aggression there. And really, sort of aggression there. And really, that last line is giving us the heart of
[06:18] this song, the why of this song. She's telling us, "My feet can't touch the bottom of you." She's saying in that line alone, there's some kind of distance between us. It's a distance. I don't want to be there, but it's there.
[06:31] [Music] So that is the job of the verses. But beyond the first verse, we often have multiple verses. We might have two, multiple verses. We might have two, three or four verses in a song. So when
[06:45] we actually zoom out and look at the job of the verses throughout the song form, of the verses throughout the song form, the job of the verses is to develop upon the job of the verses is to develop upon the initial idea. The verses need to
[06:58] the initial idea. The verses need to take the idea further and deeper and not simply repeat the same idea from verse one again and again with different images and words. So the lyrics of the verses will change which contrast to
[07:15] verses will change which contrast to sections like a chorus and very commonly a pre chorus will also have lyrics that actually repeat again and again. But it's the job of the verses to develop the idea, to take the idea further, so
[07:29] that when we get to those repeating sections, we hear them from a new perspective. [Music] But what about the structure of a verse? How long should a verse be? The answer
[07:42] is, of course, and somewhat frustratingly, that it entirely depends and there are no rules. But there are some helpful guidelines that can get you started straight away. A solid starting point with a verse is to aim for a verse
[07:59] with four lines of lyric. It's a great place to start and it also gives you a solid basic structure to then work with, play with, and change if you want to.
[08:11] Looking at Moon Song again, this is a classic fourline verse. And she moves after this verse onto a new type of section. But a verse can of course be
[08:23] six lines, which is what we see in the global smash hit, Let Her Go by Passenger. A verse can of course also be eight lines, like we see in a much more contemporary song, Where the Hell Is My Husband by Ray. A verse can of course be
[08:38] five lines, seven lines, nine lines. But at the end of the day, starting with a fourline structure is great because once we have that, we can then add a line to make it five. We can double the length of it to make it an eight line section.
[08:53] It's a great basic building block to aim for at the beginning. If we actually look at the number of bars for each of the verse examples we've just seen, we see something really interesting, which is actually that the fourline section
[09:08] and six line section happen over 16 bars. By contrast to the eight line section, which happens in eight bars. So in the Phoebe Bridges song, it's a much slower tempo. the lines are coming out a
[09:23] lot slower with a lot more space as opposed to the eight line verse in the Ray song where she's really delivering those lines in a rapid fire way. So if you are sitting there with guitar in hand or piano under fingers, start with
[09:38] a fourline section. And once you have that and music starts to interact with your lyrics a little bit, you can then decide whether or not four lines is
[09:50] enough and you're ready to move on or whether it's all come out really quick and you're actually going to do another four lines to get to a full complete verse. The basic goal for the music of a verse
[10:05] The basic goal for the music of a verse is that we want the music to reflect and is that we want the music to reflect and support the emotion and mood of the lyrics. Which begs the question, do we start with music first and then bring in
[10:18] the lyrics or do we start with lyrics first and then bring in music? But one first and then bring in music? But one suggestion is to try and get lyrics and music dancing together as soon as you can. So rather than writing a full set
[10:33] instrument, you might want your instrument there as you're coming up with lyrics. or vice versa. If you are coming up with melody, starting to get some words or syllables that suit the melody that naturally and organically
[10:48] come into your mind and come out your mouth as you're singing that melody is going to make sure that there's a relationship between the two from the get- go. Before we get to some of the tips of things to avoid when writing
[11:04] verses, what I actually want to do is demonstrate to you how you can put this into action right now. So, I'm going to pick up my guitar and I'm going to take you through a very quick process and show you how I would do it. And the
[11:17] purpose is really to encourage you to do it as well. Pick up an instrument right now and see what you come up with in the next 10 minutes.
[11:29] up with following these exact tips. Okay, the first tip is you do not need to write a heartbreaking work of staggering genius. Okay, we just need to take the pressure off ourselves to write something completely worldshattering.
[11:46] We're just aiming to get a vibe, a shape, a sense of the initial idea of what it could be without needing to define it yet. A great way to start is simply to use your environment to literally look around your room or look
[12:00] literally look around your room or look out the window and simply describe what you see, what you hear. Maybe you smell something, maybe there's sensation on your skin, there's texture or touch. simply starting with your own actual
[12:13] environment and then also adding into that any feelings that arise in response to your environment or any thoughts that arise in response to what you are describing or observing. So I wrote this yesterday as I was preparing for this
[12:29] video and I was literally looking out the window to my backyard. I have some really big, beautiful trees in my neighborhood and it was a windy day and the wind was tossing the leaves and branches around and I simply started
[12:44] with that and then immediately paid attention to like what does it make me think about? What does it make me feel? And I just added those lines in. And lo and behold, I actually really like what I came up with and I'm going to keep
[12:57] working on this song. And it all came from a commitment to not needing to write anything groundbreaking, simply using the immediate environment that is using the immediate environment that is in my perceptive field as the basis for
[13:11] an initial idea. I also started with a really simple chord figure here that just sounds really nice and evocative to me. I'm not questioning it. And I'm letting that interact with melody and imagery. And this is what came out.
[13:31] [Music] Branches on the trees outside swing in Branches on the trees outside swing in the wind. Well, they break and fall to the ground if they didn't know how to bend. Oh, I swear I could learn how to
[13:46] live. If I stood outside
[14:03] Listening to the wind. [Music] Now that I've got that verse lyric and that verse melody, that then becomes a
[14:15] template for the next verse, which is really nice. And an important thing really nice. And an important thing about verses is that we want our verses to sound alike, to essentially have the same melody, the same structure, the
[14:30] same length, and even to a certain extent the same rhyme scheme. So if I've set up in this section a certain rhyme scheme, I will replicate that rhyme scheme, I will replicate that rhyme scheme in my next verse section.
[14:45] Let's talk about a few basic things to avoid in your verses because it's a very common experience for beginner songwriters and actually quite frankly experienced songwriters as well to get to the second verse and think what do I
[15:01] do now? We call this affectionately second verse hell. The first thing to second verse hell. The first thing to avoid is putting too much information into the first verse. A great tip is to think about verses as going narrow but
[15:15] deep. We don't want to explore three different ideas, three different themes. We want to pick one thing that we really want to express and communicate in this verse and use the lines to build and develop that one idea. We also want to
[15:30] avoid setting off all the melody fireworks in the first verse. It's obviously very tempting. The very first thing we say or thing that we sing, we want it to impress. We want to make a statement. But the problem is, if we set
[15:46] off all the fireworks before we get to the main event, which is probably going to be the hook or the title, the chorus, well, then we've set off the fireworks before we've even gotten to the party really. So, it's often a good idea to
[16:02] stay somewhat restrained in your melody so that you've actually got somewhere to go and somewhere to grow the melody. When we zoom the lens out and actually look at all the verses within our song, we also want to avoid simply stating the
[16:20] same idea over and over again in all the verses. Just using different imagery or different words, but essentially staying with the same idea and remaining at an emotional flatline. We really want our verses as we go through the song to
[16:36] progress. Once we have an initial idea, we've got something going, the natural question of course then becomes, well, how do I progress the idea into verse 2 or verse 3 or verse 4? How do I take this idea further and deeper and not
[16:51] simply restate the same thing again and again? I've created this song map template for you that you can download for free right now in the video show notes. And it's a series of guide questions that you can ask of each verse
[17:08] section. The questions are designed to methodically take you further and deeper beyond the initial idea. The other resource I would recommend is to check resource I would recommend is to check out this video right here, which is all
[17:23] about song mapping. And in that video, I take you through three different song maps that you can try out on any idea, but really strategically and methodically take an initial idea and ensure that you're not simply repeating
[17:39] the same idea, but really moving that idea so that when we get back to the chorus, we hear the chorus or the hook line of your song. We hear the same words, but we hear it through a new perspective, a new lens. And when you
[17:53] actually work your verses like that, the chorus gets deeper and more impactful as the song progresses. And if you want more of the fundamentals of songwriting series, make sure to subscribe to the channel. Happy songwriting. I'll see you
[18:08] channel. Happy songwriting. I'll see you next time.