Chorus Construction

Learn the basics of chorus construction and what you should think about when you´re constructing choruses for commercial songs. The Chorus
The chorus is the part of the song that most people will remember. It is the part that gets stuck in your head and has you singing the song to yourself for days after hearing it.

There have been occasions where I’ve had a chorus stuck in my head for awhile and couldn’t remember a single bit of the rest of the song. What about songs that you’ve had stuck in your head? Or have you ever been listening to the radio and a song comes on that you’re familiar with?

The melody of the verse may sound familiar and you may sing along with a few of the words, but when the chorus kicks in, you know every word and you’re singing along like your life depends on it.

Keep It Simple
The chorus of a popular song is not Shakespeare. Don’t think it should feature delicate wordplay and intricate metrical content. It should be the simplest distillation of the song’s ideas.

It Bears Repeating
When you´re working with your chorus construction remember this. The chorus is the part of the song that will be repeated a few times. If it isn’t any good, then the audience is not going to like hearing it repeated to them three or four times.

Make It Catchy
A song’s chorus needs a catchy melody and catchy wordplay. It needs to make people want to sing along. Listen to The Beatles for examples of catchy choruses. After their songs being around for four decades, people still sing along.

It´s a good example of successful chorus construction. The words are simple and the melody is catchy. In fact, while you’re listening to The Beatles, check out other aspects of their songs as well. There’s a reason they’re known as one of the greatest bands in history and study of their songs will help you in writing your own.

This is also why some songs have alternate titles in parentheses.

Chorus Structure
There are lots of different ways to write a chorus, and many different chorus constructions can work. Any form is acceptable as long as it meets the requirements above: its simple and its catchy.

That said, let’s talk about lyric form for the chorus. Most choruses use repeated lines. This could mean the first line is repeated two times, followed by two different lines, or first line repeated followed by two repeated lines, or there is only one line in the chorus and it is repeated however many times, or any other number of combinations.

This repetition can be used to drive home the point of a song or it can be used to build tension for a part of the chorus that is different and will therefore stand out more.

While repetition is useful, there are also songs out there that have a chorus with no repeated lines and some with lines that have no rhyming lines whatsoever. A chorus could also be a redux of a verse’s structure with variations that make it unique.

There are tons of options for writing your chorus, just make sure that it is catchy and simple. Your chorus could be absolute gibberish, but if its catchy gibberish that gets people singing along, then its a success. :-)

Cliches
The next article in the craft section is about Cliches. Click here to go directly to it.

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