First of all, everything depends on the kind of music you want to write. Pop and rock music for example have pretty standard structures, while IDM electronica, for example, does not.

Secondly, it all depends on your method of working. Some people like to improvise on loops, other want to write music while they alreay have in their mind how the piece should go.

Additionaly, you have to know that the structure interacts with the length of the song. The standard pop form will work nice for small length songs, no matter the genre. However, it might not work too well for epic 12-minute progressive metal songs .

Not your average pop band

So, let’s take a look at some musical forms.

The pop form that we mentioned above is the following: Intro – Verse – Chorus – Verse – Chorus x 2 – Bridge- Chorus. Almost all pop songs ever written are built upon this form or variations of it. Also, it is very important the the chorus comes before the first minute and the song doesn’t last more than 4 minutes. You will notice that most pop songs go like that.

This form, however, is not only for pop songs. You can listen for example my piece ‘Gabriel’ at http://raskolnikovsdream.com/discography.html. It follows the same form, but in no way you can call it ‘pop’.

Another form, that is never used in pop music is the form A-B-C-D-etc. It’s actually a series of parts that are not directly connected to each other. This form is popular among metal bands, be it classic heavy metal bands like Iron Maiden, or black metal like Cradle of Filth. Listen for example to Afraid to Shoot Strangers. While there is some repetition inside the parts, thus making the parts something like (a-b-a-b)-(c-c)-etc., the large form is actually A-B-C-etc. The parts between them are completely different, even having abrupt changes in the tempo.

Link: www.youtube.com

Another very useful form that is used very much in ambient music is A – A+B – A + B + C – etc. This means that you start on a loop, and you add subsequent loops thereafter. Because this form doesn’t have any great fluctuations in intensity, it is very soothing. You can hear this in my track ‘Horse’ at http://raskolnikovsdream.com/discography.html. You can also hear it in Boards of Canada (my favorite ambient group) Amo Bishop Rodden.

Link: www.youtube.com

So, that was it for today! Of course, these are not the only musical forms in existence. These are just 3, that can be very useful in your musical compositions. We will cover more forms in future articles.

Allen Forte was a musicologist that tried to analyze atonal music. He created a music theory revolving around pitch-class sets, which however, can be used to encompass not only atonal music, but tonal music as well.

Allen Forte

When we are referring to a pitch-class, we mean a note, not matter which octave it is in. So for example, the pitch-class C, contains all the Cs on a piano.

When we are referring to a pitch-class set, we mean a set that contains some (or all) pitch-classes.

A pitch-class set that contains the notes C, E and F. Instead of using musical notation, we could also just refer to our set as C, E, F, since the octave doesn’t matter.

This was a very useful invention for studying atonal music. Atonal music is not based on scales, but usually on things like certain series of notes, that don’t necessarily have any inner logic.

By defining the pitch-class set for a musical composition, the theorist can know upon which pitch-classes the musical piece is based and analyse them easier. However, what makes pitch-class set theory interesting for those who don’t write atonal music, is the fact that pitch-class sets provide a very easy way of encapsulating all other music theories.

One of the problems that people face when they start writing music, and they are not very accustomed with music theory, is this: If I want to play a solo, or an extra riff, or anything, over something else (melody or harmony), which notes should I play?

This problem is solved as follows. The notes of the first musical phrase that you’ll play over, constitute a pitch-class set. No matter the scale or the mode, a new musical phrase, always sounds in tune, as long as it shares the same pitch-class set as the original musical phrase.

So, let’s see the following example.

This meter is actually in C major. However, even if you don’t know scale theory, you can just consider all these notes a the following pitch-class set: C, D, E, F, G, A, B. Then you can play anything you like with these notes.

Of course, someone will wonder, why use this theory, while I know it is C major. Consider the following example now.

This example doesn’t clearly belong to any scale. However, pitch-class sets don’t possess such limitations. The pitch-class set for this example is: C, D, D# (or Eb), E, F, G, A, A#(or Bb) and B.

This can be applied to any example. So, pitch-class set theory makes it much easier to not only to analyze atonal music pieces, but also, to help you deal with musical phrases that don’t belong clearly to any scale.

Major scales, minor scales and modes can all be included in this system. We will cover these in future posts. For now, you just keep in mind, the above rule

No matter the scale or the mode, a new musical phrase, always sounds in tune, as long as it shares the same pitch-class set as the original musical phrase.

Since, scales and modes are so omnipresent, additional rules have been created for their use and analysis that we will cover in other articles. Until then, just keep playing and writing music