Untitled

[timmythunderstheory]

Track analysis of "Just Like Heaven" by The Cure

Here is my analysis of "Just Like Heaven" by The Cure.

STRUCTURE

The structure of the song itself is quite unusual for a pop song, as it starts with a 32 bar intro, with the vocals coming in for the 1st verse at the end of the 32 bar, around 50 seconds into the song.

The song is based mainly around a repetitive 4 chord pattern.  The intro, verses and instrumentals are the same structure and are based around the same chordal motif – the I chord (A), the V (E), the ii (Bm), and the IV (D).  It continues this pattern for 72 measures before there is a change in chords.

It strays away from the typical verse chorus, verse chorus, structure (or any of the other common structures), and instead has quite a unique structure that I would describe as INTRO – VERSE – INSTRUMENTAL – VERSE – REFRAIN/CHORUS – INSTRUMENTAL – VERSE – (shorter) REFRAIN/CHORUS.

The Refrain/Chorus is the only part in the song where the chords change, and the chords are the vi chord (F#m), a Major flat VII chord (G), and the IV chord (D).

As the song is in A Major, this G Major chord could be considered a borrowed chord, as it does not fit with the key signature of the A Major scale.  A very clever choice of chord in my opinion.

MELODY

The great thing about this song is there are a number of different melodies on different instruments, that feature prominently throughout the song.  The first melody is really the bass line, which etches the songs progression into your memory before any other melodies come in.

The next one is introduced by the electric guitar, and is essentially just harmonizing with the root notes by adding the relevant 3rds to the main progression.

After the acoustic guitar comes in, the keys introduce a beautifully simplistic melodic phrase before one of the main melodies comes in on electric guitar.  This melodic hook on the electric guitar is a prominent motif throughout the song, and for this reason could be considered the chorus, in my eyes.

Robert Smith’s vocals provide scores of other beautifully somber melodies throughout the song, with the vocal range in this song spanning from F#4 – A5.

Again, the keys provide numerous melody lines sporadically throughout the song.

HARMONY

After the initial melody of the bass line is provided, diatonic harmony in this song is provided initially from the electric guitar, as previously mentioned harmonizing the relative third of each root note played on the bass

Then the acoustic guitar comes in next completing the triadic harmony the listener has been waiting for, by introducing the 5th into each chord.

The next harmonic melody is provided by the keys, which produces a lovely mix of descending and ascending melodies.

The lead guitar then provides another conjunct harmonic melody with an descending phrase that is doubled, then it ascends back up through the scale to finish off the hook by repeating the descending phrase.

Robert Smith also provides vocal harmony’s throughout the song, entering into Lydian mode at one stage in the song.

Again, the keys harmonize with the vocal melodies sporadically throughout the song.

RHYTHM & METER

The song is in standard 4/4 timing

The songs tempo is roughly 150 bpm

The acoustic guitar in this song has a rhythmic pattern made up of a mixture of quarter notes, eighth notes, and sixteenth notes.  I have made up a lead sheet for the acoustic guitar which demonstrates the rhythm pattern.

There is a little jump to the rhythm of the song, by moving to the V and IV chords an eighth note early (on the 4&).

At the end of the first REFRAIN/CHORUS there is an extra 2 bars added on the IV chord.  At the end of the last REFRAIN/CHORUS there are 2 bars taken out, ending on the first beat of the 3rd bar.

TRANSCRIPTIONS

This is my transcription of the drums at the start of the song (I don't play drums, and I only started learning basic theory this year, so it might not be totally accurate, but I'm pretty sure it's close enough).

This is my transcription of the bass guitar at the start of the song.

This is my transcription of the rhythm and chords of the acoustic guitar when it comes in.

This is my transcription of the keyboard melody line when it comes in.

This is my transcription of the main lead guitar hook that leads into the first verse.

I made all these transcriptions using the MuseScore app.

[timmythunderstheory]

Track Analysis for "Give me one reason" by Tracy Chapman

Here is my transcription for the guitar in the song "Give Me One Reason" by the excellent Tracy Chapman.

STRUCTURE

It starts with an electric guitar hitting the open low E string three times starting on the offbeat &4&, before hitting the F# note on the 1st beat of the 1st bar.

The first bar is focused on the I (F#), the second bar goes from the IV (B) to the V (C#), and the 3rd and 4th bars center back around the I (F#)

From the 5th bar onwards, the structure of 'Give Me One Reason' is all based around a repeating 12- bar blues in the key of F#

It repeats the same 12-bar sequence 8 times

MELODY

The main melody for the song comes from Tracy Chapman's vocals.  She possesses a contralto vocal range, and in this song, she covers mainly 1 octave vocally, entering into a second octave at the start of each verse. The vocal range in this song spans from E4 – A5.

Her vocal melody is mainly based around the blues scale in F#, which features the flattened 3rd (A Natural) and flattened 7th (E Natural) 

Backing vocals come in throughout the song, in a call and response form

Lead guitar also provides melody during the verses, mostly filling out the air between the vocal melody

There is also a lead guitar solo during the 12-bar sequence between verse 4 and 5

HARMONY

As the guitar is fingerpicked, harmony comes from picking the corresponding major triads in each chord on beat 2 and 4, and on the offbeat of beat 3.

When the F# chord is played, the guitar picks out the 1st (F#), 3rd (A#), and 5th (C#) in unison

When the B chord is played, the guitar picks out the 5th (F#), 1st (B), and 3rd (D#) in unison

When the C# chord is played, the guitar picks out the 5th (A#), 1st (C#), and 3rd (F) in unison

Backing vocals also provide some harmony to the main vocal sporadically throughout the song

RHYTHM & METER

The song is in standard 4/4 timing

As the guitar is fingerpicked, the bass notes on the guitar accent the 1st beat of each bar, but are syncopated for the rest of the bar, accentuating the off beats of beat 2 and 4 (the lead sheet below gives a visual example of this)

It's hard to tell if the song was done to a metronome or not, as the BPM of the song speeds up each verse.  It starts at around 95bpm and ends up around the 105bpm mark.  This leads me to believe the song was either tempo mapped (increasing by about 2 bpm each verse), or else it was recorded without a click and the tempo naturally speeds up each verse, although I would be inclined to say the former, as the increase in tempo is very clinical

[timmythunderstheory]

Lead Sheet for the song Frosty the Snow Man

This is my transcription for the song Frosty the Snowman on vocals and guitar. The melodic line on the Stave is the vocal melody, with the words below the Stave. The chords for guitar are written above the Stave, I chose these to harmonize with the melody line.

Notice how there are no sharps or flats. This would indicate the key signature of the song is either in Cmajor, or it's relative minor, Aminor.

This song is however in Cmajor. The first chord is Cmajor, and the melody line starts on G, the perfect fifth of the Cmajor scale.

This is the transcription for the main body of the song, including the bridge.

This is the transcription I made for the outro of the song.

[timmythunderstheory]

Basics of Music Theory

Over the course of this article I will try to explain the basic concepts behind music theory.  I will use transcriptions I created using MuseScore as an example to try illustrate these concepts.

Music Theory is a system used to breakdown and interpret the fundamentals of music and musical compositions. The basics of music theory revolve around three key concepts; harmony, melody and rhythm.

I will now attempt to breakdown each of these concepts and reference specific musical compositions to try and illustrate these points.

MELODY

A melody consists of two or more notes played in succession.  A good example of a two note melody would be the theme tune from the film Jaws, composed by John Williams. 

Another good example of a melody we hear all the time is the Happy Birthday song.  Every time you have sang that song you were singing a melody line.

There are two main types of melodies, a conjunct melody and a disjunct melody.  A conjunct melody is a melody that features notes close together, these are usually easy to sing for most people.  A disjunct melody features notes that aren’t close together and have leaps/jumps in the melodic line, hence why these melodies can be harder for people to sing or even remember properly.

The main melody in the theme tune from Jaws would be considered a conjunct melody, whereas the Happy Birthday song features a combination of conjunct and disjunct melodies.  The third time we sing Happy Birthday there is a leap/jump of a whole octave in between the words “Happy” and “Birthday”, which can be tough for some people to sing.

HARMONY

Harmony is when two or more notes are played, or sang, at the same time over each other.  If you play an instrument a good example of harmony is a chord, as a chord is a collection of three or more notes played over each other simultaneously.

A basic major or minor chord on a guitar/piano etc. is a good example of consonant harmony, as they sound pleasing to the ear when played.

Dissonant harmonies are different notes played in unison that don’t sound as pleasing to the ear but instead function to add tension.

If you don’t play an instrument, a good example of harmony would be to think of a choir, as a choir is made up of multiple voices singing together harmoniously.  The start of Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen begins with multiple vocals singing in harmony.  If you took out some of the harmonies and were left with just one of the vocals (doesn’t matter which one), this would be called a melody.

RHYTHM

Rhythm is basically the repeating and recurring pulse of either notes or beats and the rests in between them. Our heartbeat is a good example of rhythm in it’s simplest form.  Another good example of rhythm is the drumbeat at the start of “We will rock you” by Queen. 

However, rhythm doesn’t just feature percussive elements, rhythm is at the core of every melodic phrase.

There are various elements that make up musical rhythm and these are:

Beats – These are the rhythmic pulses that make up a musical phrase.  Think of someone counting in a song, these are the beats that they are counting.

Time Signature – The time signature indicates the number of beats per bar/measure.  Again, if we think of someone counting into a song “1, 2, 3, 4”, this will usually give you an indication of the time signature, in this case 4/4.  If someone was to count “1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3” this would usually indicate that the song is in 3/4, likewise if they were to count “1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6” this would usually indicate that the song is in 6/8.

Tempo – This indicates how many beats there are per minute.  BPM = Beats per minute.  The tempo dictates how fast or slow a song is.  An example of a slow-tempo song would be one that is played at 60bpm, one beat every second. An example of a mid-tempo song would be one that is played at 120bpm, two beats every second.  An example of a fast-tempo song would be one that is played at 180bpm, three beats every second.

Meter – The meter of a song is basically the division of beats into equal sized groups, it is the difference in emphasis between the time signatures.  Essentially it is the feel of a song.

Duple meter has two beats per bar.

Triple meter has three beats per bar.  

Quadruple meter has four beats per bar.  

Simple meter is where you can divide the beats into groups of two.  For example:

A song in 2/4 is called Simple Duple (2 groups of 2 beats) and can be counted 1&, 2& || 1&, 2&.  

A song in 3/4 is called Simple Triple (3 groups of 2 beats) and can be counted 1&, 2&, 3& || 1&, 2&, 3&.  

A song in 4/4 is called Simple Quadruple (4 groups of 2 beats) and can be counted 1&, 2&, 3&, 4& || 1&, 2&, 3&, 4&.

Compound meter is where you can divide the beats up into groups of three.  For example:

A song in 6/8 is called Compound Duple (2 groups of 3 beats) and can be counted 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.  

A song in 9/8 is called Compound Triple (3 groups of 3 beats) and can be counted 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9

A song in 12/8 is called Compound Quadruple (4 groups of 3 beats) and can be counted 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12.