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Hello, and welcome to English and Music at Open University of Kaohsiung. This is class No. 3 for spring semester, 2010. Today we’ll be talking about language elements a little more, and song structures. Last class we talk about language elements, idiom and metaphor, and listen to the music of the band Coldplay and look at the song “Clocks” and listen to the song “Clocks”. Today we are going to continue discussion and also look at song structures. So let’s get started.

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The first thing we are going to look at today is simile. Simile is one of the most common elements used in language. Simile exists when you say one thing is like another unrelated thing. Simile uses a language “like” or “as” and I have some examples here. “Her smile was like the sun.” “He was sleeping like a baby.” “Your love is like a hurricane.” “Time is like a river.” So first we have two different items in sentence. The first sentence is smile. The second element is the sun. Smile was like the sun, this sentence for most we mean that the smile give you a good, warm feeling, a bight, warm feeling. “He was sleeping like a baby.” That is a very common simile. Such is also an idiom, “sleeping like a baby”, that means very soundly. Next one “Your love is like a hurricane.” A hurricane is a violent storm, and so if you tell some one this your love is like a hurricane. Well, this is quite a hurricane can do, the violent energy, a hurricane, a very powerful storm. “Time is like a river.” If we think about this sentence, a river flows from one place to another. Time also move forward can like it to a river, a very destination, maybe. “Time is like a river.” It carries us along to our destination. So these are all examples of simile and we’ll find these in songs quite often. Because they’re very effective for creating images in our minds, creating our feeling by using two different unrelated things, very effective to our song writing and literature. Simile is a big similar to the Metaphor, the real differences using the word “like” or “as” in simile. Metaphor on the other hand, says one thing is another thing. So, if I wanna to turning similes into metaphors, I would say, “Her smile was the sun.” I would say, for the second sentence, “He as sleep…” “He was a sleeping baby.” The third one, “Your love is a hurricane.” Fourth one, “time is a river.” So you hear the difference. It’s a different feeling. It’s a board of this, simile and metaphor are used in literature poetry quite often. We have acidly different effect on aside listener very effective in song writing. Alright that’s enough for about simile. Let’s keep going.

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And here we have the song “Clocks” by Coldplay once again. Now you are familiar with the song, we can take a deeper look, and the song in terms of this structure. You know this, the lyrics are in different colors from lyrics in red are the song verses. And you see I have as one in verse two, they are in blue. We have the words you are since the chorus of the song. It’s kind of an unusual chorus just tow words, but interesting. So in blue, it’s a chorus, and also the words instrumental interlude. An interlude is a short section of just instrument playing with no singing, interlude. And then we have two more verses in the red. And then the chorus comes back in the blue in the right hand column. And it repeats, you see four repetitions there, follow by another instrumental interlude, and then another chorus, then the bridge. The bridge of a song is a section of a song that is different from the chorus or the verses. At this point of the song we heard the verse in the chorus repeatedly, and as a natural chorus of advance here for some musical change that happened. And the bridge is typically work that musical change chorus, and the bridge will often lead us back to a familiar section, so we have the bridge and then it may lead us back to a chorus or another verse or in this case, and we just back into the material we here at the very beginning of the song. So the bridge leads us into the introduction material, and the instrumental interlude follow by a chorus. And then in the purple, it says home, home where I want to do goal. This is…we can call this an outro. It’s a very significant section now. Some people might call this a coda, coda is a tone and for tail, and the tail of the song, the end of the song. And you’ll hear also in this final section that the lyrics in the chorus inter, and the vocals sing high above this section. It was interesting combination of musical material. So now we have an idea of structure. We have verse, verse, chorus, interlude, verse, verse, chorus, chorus, interlude, a chorus, bridge, chorus, and outro or coda. This is on paper of chorus, too much more interesting to listen to it. So Let’s do that, follow along with the lyrics and now that you are thinking in terms of structure listen to the differences between the sections and think about how, if you think of words, if you think of the song words well, the music, the musical changes and the structure. If it gets you a good feeling as you listen. OK, thinking about structure now, one more time, we’re going to listen to Coldplay singing their song, “Clocks”.

3-5  Song time

--Instrumental interlude--

--Instrumental interlude--

You are, you are

--Intro material with inst. interlude--

OK, so that was “Clocks”, listening there, so now did you know the structure I wonder if the song has a different effect you feel differently about he song and knowing more about it. “Clocks” has the typical song structure, starting at the verse, then will turn it in with choruses with a bridge somewhere about two third of the way through. And then, and then of chorus, it’s a very common structure. There’s some artists choose to try different structures, different approaches to their songs. For example, one common approach to the verse the alternation with the chorus and the verses is instead of starting with the verse, the song structure of the chorus, and it keeps hanging back alternating with verses. That’s one of approach. Another approach is a, for a song to be metaphor verses, and not really have a chorus at all. The music for each verse is the same, and typically Neo Leaf’s songs are like this. Neo Leaf folk song, in particularly, tell a story they don’t really, they of ten for this kind of pattern. So this is one structure we have done the verse, chorus, verse, chorus take turn, outer nation here with “Clocks”. Let’s get some more.

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Alright, we’re going to look at another song now. This is a folk song, we look at it long time ago, last semester, early in the semester. “This land is your land”, one of the best known folk songs from American culture. Their list by Americans, best known by Americans, “This land is your land”, written by Woodie Guthrie, and this performance is from a live concern by rock musician Bruce Springsteen. Springsteen folk song’s earlier by the class; this is an example, of how simple a song structure can be. In the case of Springsteen’s performance here, we basically get two verses, chorus, a verse, a chorus, and then at the end, he decides to add a harmonica solo, in kind of plays harmonica. Now this song is performed by another artist. They may all turning the verses acidly differently. Might have also heard this song sung with the chorus beginning the song, and then alternating with the verses every other verse. But springs…Springsteen, excuse me, decided to use this structures over verse, chorus, verse, chorus, solo at he end, a very simple structure, you may know this that the bridge is missing. We don’t have a bridge that simplifies themes quite a bit. Because the bridge is typically a musical charge, and it maybe really sophisticated times, sophisticated complex it make Coldplay’s music, brand-new music, chorus music, already heard in a piece, may mentioned instruments may do just about anything, but with other bridge songs of quite a bit, more simple. So, let’s give “This land is your land” a listen. The bridge brings in performance a live concern in New York City, that’s a very simple folk song, and a simple structure.

3-8  Song time

THIS LAND IS YOUR LAND 

By Woody Guthrie, sung by Bruce Springsteen

Well I rode the ribbon highway
I saw above me an endless skyway
I saw below me a golden valley
This land was made for you and me
 
I've roamed and rambled and I've followed my footsteps
To the sparkling sands of her diamond deserts
And all around me a voice was sounding
This land was made for you and me
 
This land is your land, this land is my land
From California, to the New York Island
From the redwood forest, to the gulf stream waters
This land was made for you and me
 
Well the sun came shining and I was strolling
Through the wheat fields waving and the dust clouds rolling
And a voice was sounding as the fog was lifting
Saying this land was made for you and me
 
This land is your land, this land is my land
From California, to the New York Island
From the redwood forest, to the gulf stream waters
This land was made for you and me

Harmonica solo---

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Ok, that was “This land is your land”, great folk song from American culture, made twenty century. One thing interesting about this song is that the uses of the theme music for the verses and the chorus, very, very simple structure. The theme music often in the song they chorus for feature different music then the verses. But the case of this folk song, very simple song, we use the theme exact music, so simple structure this one, and one of many structures we’ll be looking at this semester. “This land is your land” performed by Bruce Springsteen. All right, I hope you enjoy listening to that, and we taking a look at this structure. We’re not gonna talk about the language in this one much. Let’s bring straightly forward. OK, let’s keep moving.

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OK, now that we listen to couple of songs today, up to the structures of the songs, hopefully getting you a swing of things with songs looking at songs in this way. So you really understand how they put together and how the different elements in this song work. Imagine from small elements individual words, phrases to larger elements verses and larger structures, verse, chorus, bridge along with. We didn’t talk much about this but a little bit about how instrumental interludes work. We dissections that have singing in the “Clocks” song today, we had instrumental interlude and “This land is your land”, Bruce Springsteen. Introduce the song about harmonica passage, solo, an end of the song, simile way. It’s very effective to alternate between songs, chorus of the song, with instruments, instrumental portions of the song. One other thing to think about, in addition to work in phrases in structures, music is working instrumental passages, work in the song. And now we have a language elements check-list. This is just a short list, since we discussed so far and that you should be feeling more comfortable with now. First one “Rhyming”, rhyming was such as “fast, past cast”, rhyming encourages one the finally sound of words at the same. Rhyming is a little lines by lyric writers to create a claver lyrics that for together a while, and a pleasing to our ear, we like to hear rhyming more. Metaphor, metaphor we talked about a little bit today. This is a language element. I knew the all east about accent. So this is one element you should understand very well. Metaphor is when you say one thing is another thing. Some examples we used, “Her smile was the sun.” For example, simile related language element. Simile is when we say one thing is like or as another thing. “Love is like a river”, for example, “Love is like a river,” that is a simile. Idiom, idiom we didn’t talk about much today. Idiom at last class this is a phrase that does not mean or the literary says. And we give several examples at last class. Idiom is one of the things, grace, the grace of idioms really comfort time and lots of speaking and listening to a language whenever you learn, and you, language put you positive learning basically more complex form, and then the wildly known phrases that are used in the culture to express ideas, for then are idioms, some of them are quite humors actually. The more idioms that you know or understand the better you can communicate with speakers that language. And finally we have connotation. Connotation is the extra meaning, surrounding the word. And lyricists you are contrast of connotation carefully select by lyricist including a song. The Connotation is association we have with the word, a very important. For example, if I say the word “earth”, or I say “planet”, well, planet is kind of a generic term, could be any planet. There’s a little attachment to that term, “planet”. If I say “earth”, earth is something, is our home, something we are, can relative, and these days, more and more…becoming more and more important for us to sensitive to the impact we have on the earth. So these things coming to play, when a word such as “earth” is used in the song, or a poem, or a piece of little cheer, the connotation of the word is very important. Ok, so there are language check-lists, this is we just get. So we moving into the semester, fresh our memories and introduce such a view, a new days of the class, to these terms and concepts for studying English through lyrics. Alright, I think that will due it for today. So I hope you enjoy the music today and our discussion of structure and language elements, until next time, take care.