Normative form designs in pop and rock music

Thinking very broadly about popular music (inclusive of pop, rock, jazz, indie, country, and other popular genres), we can identify a number of normative form designs. The list that follows is not exhaustive, but rather summarizes the most commonly used formal designs in popular music.

The twelve-bar blues

The twelve-bar blues is a form design based on harmonic progression, as shown in Figure 37‑1. Example 37‑1 features the twelve-bar blues in Big Mama Thornton’s famous tune “Hound Dog.”

Strophic form

As we learned in Chapter 36, strophic forms consist of repeating sections (called strophes, verses, or stanzas), each with different lyrics set to the same melody and harmonic content. Some strophic forms feature a recurring tail refrain at the end of each strophe (verse), as in Example 37‑2, which concludes each verse with the same lyrics: “The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind / the answer is blowin’ in the wind.” In the studio recording featured in Example 37-2, the tail refrains occur at 0:36–0:45, 1:28–1:38, and 2:21–2:31.

AABA form

AABA form is typically in 32-bar song form, as we previously explored in Chapter 34. The A sections are verses, featuring the same melodic and harmonic content with different lyrics, and the B section is the bridge, containing contrasting material. A standard form design in jazz music, AABA form is pop’s version of rounded binary. John Covach observes that the focus of AABA form is on the verse (2005, 71).

Verse-chorus form

Covach provides a detailed exploration of the verse-chorus form, a staple of popular music (2005, 71–74). These forms feature an alternation between verse and chorus sections, where the verses feature different lyrics set to the same melody and harmonic content, and the chorus sections feature the same lyrics, melody, and harmonic content in each statement. In contrast to AABA forms, the focus in verse-chorus form is on the chorus section (Covach 2005, 71).

There are two types of verse-chorus form. As the name implies, contrasting verse-chorus form features musical material in the verses that differs from the music in the chorus, as exemplified in Example 37‑3. Simple verse-chorus form uses the same harmonic material in both verse and chorus; the only difference between sections is lyrical content, as exemplified in Example 37‑4.^[1]

Compound forms

As we already learned in Chapter 35, compound form designs contain large sections that have their own internal formal designs. While we learned about the concept as it relates to compound ternary form, any form (regardless of its number of large sections) may be designated as compound as long as its large sections have identifiable internal forms. Learn more about compound forms in popular music by reading Covach (2005, 74–76).

Terminally climactic forms

Brad Osborn coined the phrase terminally climactic forms to describe designs that “are characterized by their balance between the expected memorable highpoint (the chorus) and the thematically independent terminal climax, the song’s actual high point, which appears only once at the end of the song” (2013, 23). Example 37‑5 and its accompanying form diagram in Figure 37‑2 show one example of a terminally climactic form.

Additional terminology

The following list provides definitions of key terms related to form in popular genres.

Chorus: Section “in which the lyrics remain constant each time it sounds” (Covach 2005, 67), or “the section of the song that resolves any lyrical and/or musical tension established in previous sections” (Endrinal 2011).

Verse: Section that features different lyrics in each iteration, but with the same melody and harmonic content.

Bridge: Section of contrasting material; the B section in the AABA form design or a contrasting “middle passage of a verse-chorus form” (de Clercq 2017, par.1.7); also referred to as the “middle eight.”

Hook: “The main theme or motive around which the song is based. The hook often is presented in the introduction, although this material frequently is featured in the chorus. A song may have multiple hooks, which may be of musical character or lyrical content, or both” (Endrinal 2011).

Refrain: “A line or pair of lines that recur throughout the song. The refrain usually appears at the end of a verse or a transition. Most often, the song’s title, or some variation thereof, serves as the text of the refrain” (Endrinal 2011); “a short passage that serves as the melodic and lyrical ‘hook’ of the verse” (Nobile 2020, 59). When placed at the end of a verse, refrains are called tail refrains (more common), and when placed at the beginning of a verse, they are called head refrains (less common).

Pre-chorus: An additional section between the verse and the chorus, usually brief, containing the same lyrics in each iteration; its typical formal function is to set up the appearance of the chorus. Some scholars consider the pre-chorus section to be subsumed within the verse section, appearing at the end of the verse.