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Structure and Arrangement in EDM

1-2 What is Structure?


Structure: Looked horizontally. What plays when? Where is chorus, where is intro, where is
verse, how does verse transition to chorus etc.

Arrangement: Instruments. What plays on what? Your bass line is played with a bass sound.
Your chord progression is played with a pluck. Look at it vertically. What instruments are used in
your track.

Why is structure needed?: Creates familiarity, flow, tension, energy, entertain.

What is good structure?:


Expectation/tension (audience know where track going to a certain extent)
Repetition (especially in edm. Example is melody played at start and repeated later.)
Variation (variation in melody, rhythm, transitional effects etc)
Progression (evolves over time)
Momentum (periods of high energy and low energy which contrasts with high energy)

What is good EDM structure?:


Heavy focus on tension, rhythm and energy which help make people dance.
Can be long and repetitive.
More focus on rhythm than melody and harmony.

3 Phrasing for Beginners


-A bar is 4 beats. If you have 4 kicks you have 1 bar.
-A phrase can be 4, 8,or 16 bars.
-The following rules arent hard fast rules, just remember but they are only sometimes true:
In edm when 8 bars usually something minor happens such as a hi-hat comes in..
Every 16 or 32 bars, something big happens, such as move into different section or break down build up chorus.

-one way to analyze song structure is to create a template of empty different colored channels in FL: Chorus ,breakdown, buildup,
verse, bridge,intro,outro etc.
Then drag a song into FL, and assign these channels to each song every 4,8,16,32 bars(usually this number but not always).
Take a screenshot of it and save file.
Do that on another song and compare the 2 songs screenshots.

4 Sonata Form
-You can learn some stuff about structure by analyzing classical music.
-Introduction: not always necessary, just an add-on.
-Exposition: initial presentation of the thematic material of a musical composition. In dance
music that could be a chord progression or melody.
-Development: Is Elaboration and contrast to material presented in exposition. In EDM this
would be breakdown, where you elaborate on the material presented so far. According to
wikipedia, a breakdown is part of a song in which various instruments have solo parts (breaks).
This may take the form where all instruments play the verse together, and then several or all
instruments individually repeat the verse as solo parts.
-Recapitulation: Resolution of both materials. Often climax in edm. According to wikipedia, the
recapitulation occurs after the movement's development section, and typically presents once
more the musical themes from the movement's exposition. This material is most often
recapitulated in the tonic key of the movement, in such a way that it reaffirms that key as the
movement's home key.
5 House Form
-House is more driving the whole time. Trance is more dynamic. Starts off low and goes higher.
6 Trance Form -Trance is very diverse in structure.

7 Pop Form
-ABABAB: 90 percent of pop songs follow verse chorus verse chorus bridge chorus

8 Tension
-Tension: the anticipation music creates in a listener's mind for relaxation or release. For example,
tension may be produced through
-Repetition
-Increase in dynamic level
-Gradual motion to a higher or lower pitch
-Syncopations(syncopation involves a variety of rhythms which are in some way unexpected which make part or all of a tune or
piece of music off-beat. More simply, syncopation is a general term for "a disturbance or interruption of the regular flow of rhythm": a
"placement of rhythmic stresses or accents where they wouldn't normally occur.")
-Rises,snare rolls, other FX
-Removal of elements
-Blatant and subtle automation
-Silence

-Tension importance:
-Builds excitement, anticipation, leads to fulfilment
-Tease, engage listener
-Keeps people listening
-Helps song flow

-Macro and Micro tension:


8 Energy
-Energy definition: Overall dynamic/feel of track at any point. Energy is built up with
structure,composition, instrumentation, tension. A song has varying levels of energy. Chorus is
high energy. Breakdown low energy.

-Energy types:
Total/overall: Total energy of your track. Can be low or high.
Dynamic: How much difference between its high and low energy points? More dynamic= more
difference.
Rhythmic: Key in dance music. Strong rhythm, strong groove, simple.
Melodic: strong melody, good chord progression, less important than rhythmic energy.
Sonic: Mixing well.
-Release/drop:
Relies on buildup to give good release.
Dont need to go overboard. Just have few elements going on not too complicated.
Most important part of track
Its a good idea to start writing your song with release
Keep in context

-What to avoid:

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