The Structure, Function, and Genesis of the Prechorus

Example 1. Mark Dinning, "Teen Angel" (1960)[1] This article examines an episode in the evolution of verse-chorus form in pop/rock music. Until the mid-1960s, most verse-chorus songs alternated between the two formal sections from which verse-chorus form takes its name: verses and choruses. Example 1, Mark Dinning's "Teen Angel," illustrates the form.(2) As is typical for verse-chorus songs, the focal point of "Teen Angel" is the chorus: it contains the most engaging musical material; its unchanging lyric makes it easy to remember; and it is marked for special attention by additional vocal and instrumental parts. The verses, on the other hand, provide context: each verse advances the song narrative by presenting fresh lyrics; and the music is more modest in instrumentation and intensity so as not to steal attention from the chorus. In "Teen Angel," the tempo is treated flexibly during the verses, which further distinguishes them from the choruses. This song also includes a framing introduction and coda, which are common but optional features of verse-chorus form.Example 2. Romantics, "Talking In Your Sleep" (1984)(click to enlarge and listen )Example 3. Romantics, "Talking In Your Sleep" (1984)Kick Patterns[2] To build momentum and smooth the transition from verse to chorus, the final portion of each verse in "Teen Angel" (shaded gray in Example 1) is supported by a fuller complement of instruments and voices, and the tempo is more strictly maintained. In the early 1960s, a new musical corridor called the "prechorus" started to appear in verse-chorus songs, in which transitional effects of this sort could be stretched out over a longer period of time. Musical examples from that time period will be examined below. Example 2, "Talking In Your Sleep" by the Romantics, is a verse-prechorus-chorus song from the mid-1980s, by which time the prechorus had become a standard feature within verse-chorus form. In "Talking In Your Sleep," the increase in musical intensity at the end of each verse (the bass leaps upward to its highest pitch in the song, followed by a drum fill) does not lead directly into the chorus; it is followed by a prechorus, where much more momentum is gained. The bass sets forth an insistent stream of eighth notes, punctuated with increasing frequency by a three-note figure in the guitar. This contributes to a feeling of urgency and expectation quite unlike the verse, where bass and guitar trade back and forth in a relaxed groove. Momentum is also gained in the vocal layer: each two-bar lyric line in the verse is followed by two bars of lyric rest; in the prechorus, this alternation quickens to single bars of lyric and rest, and the final line ("And I know that I'm right, 'cause I hear it in the night") drives through two bars, omitting the rest altogether.(3) In addition, the kick pattern changes from a four-beat repeating pattern to a two-beat pattern, as shown in Example 3, which is another instance of formal units being shortened to quicken their rate of succession.[3] The momentum-building devices deployed in prechoruses vary widely from song to song. Changes in groove, lyric phrasing, and the length of formal units, as well as dynamic level, register, instrumentation, timbre, harmonic progression, and harmonic rhythm all have the potential to increase forward formal urgency. By some combination of such changes, a prechorus transforms the verse-chorus song from a two-section form into a three-section form that is more strongly teleological. In the standard verse-chorus song, momentum building is a transitional effect; in the verse-prechorus-chorus song, momentum building is the function of an entire formal section. What is especially interesting about the emergence of the prechorus in the early 1960s is that it seems not to have originated as an extension of the transitional effect already present at the ends of verses. Neither does it seem to have originated as an insertion into verse-chorus form. …