How to Write a Chorus

Lesson 7: How To Write A Chorus

A song without a chorus can hardly be called a song. This rather bad statement is my personal opinion so if you don’t agree, that’s okay. But I would like to start this lesson with this statement, not only to wake you up, but rather because it’s one of the key-statements of this lesson. So if you don’t like songs without a chorus and never intend to write one, than probably you won’t feel at home in this class this month. I must say I never felt at home when I was at school but that’s another story... But if you do stick around, even if you don’t like to write choruses, maybe you will change your mind about them.

A chorus is more or less the heart of a song, at least if it’s a good one of course. Why this is true is not as obvious as it seems. People always tend to remember the chorus of a song, while it may not even be the most interesting part of the song at all.
The easiest explanation of course is the fact that the chorus is usually played a couple of times during a song. But if this was the only reason why a chorus is the heart of most songs, how come then that lots of choruses are easily forgotten, even if they are played seemingly endless in the fadeout of a song? So there must be more to it.

In this lesson we will see it’s hard to reveal the secrets of a good chorus. Writing a good chorus may be more a matter of the heart (something called talent?) than the mind. But since this counts for songwriting in general, don’t be afraid; there are always some tricks to learn to help those who have to struggle a little more then the lucky, more talented ones. And believe me, most of us belong to the first group, to put it stronger, even the most talented ones often join the struggling crowd when they’re not inspired...
In lesson 5, we already saw some elements a good chorus should have. Now we will take a closer look at these elements, by discussing some rules you should follow if you want to write a good chorus. These rules are:

It should be catchy
It should contain elements of the rest of the song
It shouldn’t be an anti-climax

Following these rules, you obey to the most important rules of writing a good chorus. We will take a look at these rules in the next paragraph. You can also click on the links to go directly to the discussion of each of these rules.

Rule 1: a chorus should be catchy

What makes a chorus catchy? The easiest answer (for me at least) is: listen to all those golden oldies. Almost all the classics from the sixties and the seventies have catchy choruses. Of course The Beatles were real masters at this, but it seems all the bands that became famous in those days were able to write catchy choruses which seem to stick in your mind forever. Who doesn’t know the chorus of Honky Tonk Women for example...
Listening to examples is a great way to teach yourself, and that counts for songwriting too! But there's something more to say about this issue too.

Keep it simple: One of the main rules in writing a good chorus is to keep it simple. Try to avoid to make the chorus sound complicated.
Consider The Average Listener: The above indicates you’ll have to keep the average listener in mind while writing your chorus. Most listeners aren’t musicians so don’t forget that! The average listener will often look for things he/she can recognize, a certain general feeling of what sounds logical and which has been developed during many years.

So in general you could say the secret to write a catchy chorus is to make it sound logical.

Rule 2: a chorus should contain elements of the rest of the song

In this lesson we already saw a chorus is one of the most important parts of your song. In most cases, it's the part of the song which will be played the most often. So it better be good! Another trick to make your chorus a good chorus is to give it the treatment it deserves! Since it's the main element of your song, whether you like it or not, it should get all the attention it needs while you write it, to gain all the attention it needs when you play it.
This brings me to a rather contradictionary issue: writing songs is a very intuïtive job and that also counts for writing choruses. But to obey to the rule that a chorus should contain elements of the rest of the song, you should at least examine and evaluate your music thoroughly. In mine opinion just writing your music from the heart will generally result in the best music, but it's not very sensible only to rely on your heart. Evaluating your music can be very useful and especially when it comes to writing a chorus.
So no matter how you write, whether you write straight from the heart or not, you will have to evaluate your song. Not only because it will enhance your songwriting skills simply because you are "forced" to think about what you have written, but also because "technical rules" like these can only be followed by using technical means like evaluation.
Since a chorus is the part that will be played and remembered most, it's the best place to "advertise" your song. Maybe if you consider the chorus to be the advertisement of your song, you will better understand the importance of putting elements of the rest of the song into it, making it kind of an excerpt of your song. Some advantages of doing so are:

Recognition: People will recognize the song by just hearing the chorus. But it works the other way around too; they will recognize the chorus as being part of that piece of music they accidentally hear when they enter a bar for example.
Recollection: People will remember your song much more easily. Because the chorus is an excerpt of the song, they will only have to remember the excerpt to remember the song. Why not using old school-tricks when they work fine?
Strenght: By putting elements of the song together in your chorus, in fact you are just making a miniature of your song. When you do this right, it will result in a very strong piece of music. Producers will be pleased when they see you have skills to achieve this, because they usually want you to cut out all the unnecessary stuff from your song.

But what elements should you take? This in fact is completely up to you and depends on the song you are writing. Generally it works fine to pick some of the more melodic parts of your song, simply because most people remember a melodic piece of music better than a monotone piece. And that's about all there is to say on this issue, but there are some pitfalls to look out for. These tips might help you avoiding them:

Don't copy too much: While putting the best elements of your song together into your chorus, you are taking the risk of ending up with a chorus that unveils all the secrets of your song making the rest of the song predictable and dull. Therefor it's better not to copy too literally but hussle things a little. Tricks like changing the key of the parts while played during the chorus can help. Just consider all the best parts to be some sort of colour-palette, which enables you to make various versions of the same picture.
Don't make the chorus too long: Better leave out some good parts than desperately putting everything together in the chorus! Good choruses almost never exceed 6 lines.

As you can see, this part of writing songs can be very tricky. Don't forget your skills will grow after every song you've finished, even the more technical skills that you'll need to write a good song, like evaluating your song and deciding what parts should be reflected into the chorus. I deliberatly used the term reflect, because this is one of the most vague issues of writing songs, making it one of the most difficult parts of it. But aren't things always getting more difficult when technique meets feelings?

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