Co-Writing Configurations: Case Studies in Collaborative Music Production

I. Introduction

Over the centuries, as the contributions of the great classical composers have solidified into monolithic masterworks, so too has the persona of the composer or songwriter coalesced into a Romantic ideal: the solitary genius, alone with his/her ink and paper, carving out manifestations of the divine against the indifference of a remote outside world. However, in recent decades scholarly debate about the nature of creativity has revealed a pervasive connection between the creative process and the social collective. (Burnard 2012, McIntyre 2007) Whether between an artist and the field of experts from which he/she seeks validation, between a producer and the artist whose sample he/she manipulates, or between co-writers puzzling over lyrics, chords, or tracks together, collaboration is the underlying geology of our musical landscape. 

This paper will focus specifically on co-writing and its myriad forms. Via the methodology of reflective analysis of existing literature as well as a consideration of case studies and personal experience, the aim of this project is to examine the processes that drive musical collaboration, delineate various models of co-writing, and illuminate the challenges and solutions that undermine or enhance creativity within the collaborative setting.

II. Principles of General Creativity

Any discussion of collaboration must begin with a consideration of the creative process. “Creativity is the ability to come up with ideas or artefacts that are new, surprising and valuable.” (Boden 2004, p. 1) For many decades the discussion of what processes yield this innovation has centered around the idea of discrete creative stages as originally put forth by Graeme Wallas––preparation, incubation, inspiration and verification––with other researchers truncating, substituting, or expanding on this modular approach. (McIntyre 2007, p. 4) Betty S. Flowers has her own names for these creative energies: “Madman, architect, carpenter, and judge.” But the central idea is the same: freely flowing stimuli are subsequently organized and finally evaluated and edited. Flowers contends that writer’s block (the disruption of this process) is the result of “two competing energies…locked horn to horn, pushing against each other… And the trick to not getting [writer’s block] involves separating [those] energies.” (2014)

Csikszentmihalyi, however, argues for a less modular approach to the creative process. Each creative stage, he submits, “is constantly interrupted by periods of incubation and is punctuated by epiphanies. Many fresh insights emerge as one is presumably just putting finishing touches on the initial insight...Thus the creative process is less linear than recursive.” (McIntyre 2007, p. 5) Assuming there is some truth to both Flowers and Csikszentmihalyi’s viewpoints, harnessing one’s creativity then becomes an act of inhabiting multiple creative energies simultaneously (i.e. allowing new ideas to form while concurrently editing them) without allowing one’s inner judge to nullify the whole operation.

III. Team Roles in Music Production

“All artistic work, like all human activity, involves the joint activity of a number, often a large number of people.” (Becker quoted in Burnard 2012, p. 14) In Csikszentmihalyi’s Systems Model of creativity, an individual creator is a de facto collaborator with “a culture that contains symbolic rules…and a field of experts who recognise and validate the innovation.” (McIntyre 2007, p. 2) In other words, in the Systems Model, an individual draws on their own unique knowledge and experience in a particular domain, then seeks verification from those who have proven themselves experts or gatekeepers of that domain. Co-writing, then––a team-based approach to creativity––theoretically augments the chances of appealing to those experts by compounding the perspectives and knowledge of each contributor to the project. (Bennett 2011) According to Burnard, “Sharing authorship is increasingly the norm nowadays.” She attributes this to co-writers’ common awareness of “the particular manifestations of creativity inherent in certain cultural traditions; generic conventions…and the specific social, historical and political circumstances of the production context.” (Burnard 2012, p. 73)

The question becomes, then, how co-writers harness the creative process together harmoniously, lest one writer’s inner judge suppress another writer’s inner madman ad infinitum. R. M. Belbin, in analyzing team roles in the workplace, advocates for specialization, arguing that what sets a “team” apart from a “group” of loosely connected individuals or a “squad” working in disciplined uniformity is that, like in sports or games, “the skills of the players are important but the strength of the team depends more especially on how well the players combine.” (1998, p. 87, 91)

Belbin enumerates a set of specific behavioral roles including “Chairman, Shaper, Monitor-Evaluator, Resource Investigator,” and so forth. (Prichard and Stanton 1999, p. 653) Phil Harding, recording engineer at PWL Studios during the heyday of Stock Aitken Waterman, has his own set of ideal team roles as it applies to a music production team: administrator, synth programmer, drum programmer, and topliner. (2016) However, as we will see in our subsequent case studies, successful collaborations arise out of a wide variety of team configurations. A particular division of roles that works for one group may not work for another.

Bennett (2011) identifies six processes at work in a collaborative endeavor, regardless of individual roles: “stimulus, approval, adaptation, negotiation, veto and consensus… One writer will provide stimulus material and the other writer will approve, adapt or veto the idea… If an idea is vetoed in its entirety the provider of the stimulus will either accept this, or enter negotiation to defend or further adapt it.” (ibid.) The act of co-writing, in other words, is a complex dance of accepting, rejecting, substituting, and modifying collective ideas in a common effort to create something that conforms to the communal view of the cultural domain.

IV. Models of Co-Writing 

Bennet (2011) defines 7 models of co-writing: Nashville, Factory, Svengali, Demarcation, Jamming, Top-Line Writing, and Asynchronicity. His models share a bit of overlap: Top-line writing is a form of demarcation and commonly occurs in the Factory model. (Seabrook 2015, p. 200) Likewise the Svengali model (the collaboration of an artist with more experienced songwriters) could apply to any of Bennett’s other models. In light of these issues, a more succinct list is needed. I propose the following four:

1. Brill Building/Nashville

This is the pen and paper approach, a hallmark of the Brill Building/Tin Pan Alley era as well as today’s country music. In this model, “one writer sits at the piano, trying chords and singing possible melodies, while the other sketches the story and the rhymes.” (Seabrook 2015, p. 200) Bennett defines this model in part by its dependence on acoustic instruments and “minimal technology.” (2011)

2. Track and Hook

This model divides creative roles between “a track maker/producer, who is responsible for the beats, the chord progression, and the instrumentation…[and] a hook writer/topliner, who writes the melodies.” (Seabrook 2015, p. 200) “The backing track acts as harmonic/tempo template but more crucially as inspiration for genre-apposite creative decisions, such as singability of a line.” (Bennett 2011)

3. Improvisation/Jamming

Bands like U2 are known to make frequent use of this approach. (ibid.) The freely flowing ideas that spawn and coalesce in a jam session neatly fit Huizinga’s description of improvisation as “an activity that proceeds within certain limits of time and space, in a visible order, [and] according to rules freely accepted.” (Burnard 2012, p. 11)

4. Asynchronicity

This model refers to any collaboration in which the co-writers work at different times and/or in different places. Demarcation––“a lyricist [providing] a finished lyric for word-setting by a composer” or vice-versa––is “usually implemented asynchronously.” (Bennett 2011) Indie band The Postal Service was so named because producer Jimmy Tamborello would send guitarist and vocalist Ben Gibbard recordings via physical post for him to embellish. (Ingraham 2013) The practice of sampling can also be considered a form of asynchronous co-authorship. In this scenario, one of the contributors may not even be aware of their own involvement. This, however, does not invalidate it as a form of collaboration as “intertextuality is increasingly recognised as a fundamental technique of creative production in as much as all things come into being from a set of antecedent conditions.” (Morey and McIntyre 2014)

As we will see in the following case studies, there is still a bit of overlap inherent in these four models. For example, when Stargate collaborate with Ester Dean they blend improvisation with the track-and-hook approach. (Seabrook 2015, p. 217-19) Therefore, these models ought to be considered fluid rather than concrete. 

V. Case Studies

1. Max Martin, Dr Luke, Benny Blanco, Bonnie McKee, and Katy Perry

Katy Perry’s “Teenage Dream” is a quintessential example of the track-and-hook model. In 2005, aspiring producer Benny Blanco was invited by veteran producer Dr Luke to write with him in his Los Angeles studio. In their late-night session they produced two instrumental tracks together. Years later, Max Martin and Dr Luke were in the process of crafting Perry’s sophomore pop album when Dr Luke pulled up one of his Benny Blanco tracks and added a new melody on top of it. At this point, the song passed to Perry and Bonnie McKee for lyrics and, after five or six unsatisfactory drafts, the final version of the song as known to the public was rendered. (Seabrook, 2015, p.238, 261-62)

2. Stargate and Ester Dean

Norwegian production duo Stargate are regular collaborators with topliner Ester Dean. “In advance of Dean’s coming to [the studio], Stargate [prepare] several dozen tracks. They create most of them by jamming together on keyboards until they come up with an idea––generally a central chord progression or a riff––around which they quickly build up a track, using the vast array of preprogrammed sounds and beats at their disposal.” When Dean arrives, she improvises melodies and hooks over the track, after which Stargate re-shape them into repetitive songform using their DAW. (Seabrook, 2015, p. 217-19) This particular method of co-writing combines the spontaneity of jam sessions with the track-and-hook model.

3. Adele and Paul Epworth

According to Seabrook, “track-and-hook has become the pillar and post of popular song [and] has largely replaced the melody-and-lyrics…method [of] the Brill Building and Tin Pan Alley eras.” (2015, p. 200) The collaborative style of Adele and producer Paul Epworth is a clear counterexample to that assertion. When speaking of writing “Rolling in the Deep,” Epworth reports, “I had all these chords I thought would be perfect for [Adele]… I tried all these out on her for about two hours. She literally sat there with a pen in her hand staring blankly, and she just went, ‘I’m not feeling anything.’ And then she went, ‘I’ve got this riff, this idea, that’s going round and round my head,’ and [she sang] ‘There’s a fire.’ I said wow, and I just grabbed a guitar and quickly tried to figure out what the key was… We wrote the core of the song — her verses and the chords — in under 15 minutes.” (McKinley 2012)

It is possible there was some use of technology in this session that Epworth doesn’t mention. However, based solely on this account, it appears that this particular song was born of chords on a guitar, lyrics put to paper, and Adele’s voice––the old Brill Building way.

4. Skrillex, Diplo, Justin Bieber, Jason Boyd, and Karl Rubin Brutus

“Where Are Ü Now” (a collaboration between producers Skrillex and Diplo and artist Justin Bieber) was produced through a series of dinstinct, separate writing sessions and provides a good example of asynchronous collaboration. First, songwriter Jason “Poo Bear” Boyd came up with chords and a melody together with instrumentalist Karl Rubin Brutus. Later, in a co-writing session with Justin Bieber, Boyd and Bieber used those chords and melody to craft a piano/vocal ballad called “The Most” (Golden, 2015).

When Bieber’s management team negotiated a collaboration between the singer and producer Diplo, “The Most” was sent to Diplo via email. He involved Skrillex and the two of them began cutting up and sampling Bieber’s vocal and adding drums, bass, and synths. (Pareles, 2015). The resulting record includes the distinct fingerprint of each collaborator in spite of several of them presumably never meeting face to face during the production of the song.

V. Conclusion and Aims

Literature on the nature of creativity, team roles, and co-writing contains a spectrum of viewpoints: Linear creative stages vs recursive fluidity, various configurations of team roles in a musical production team, etc. Further research is necessary to improve our collective understanding of these issues. With that line of inquiry in mind, I will be undertaking a collaborative project this summer to attempt to add my own case study to the discussion. I will attempt to utilize a wide variety of co-writers and co-writing models in the creation of a portfolio of songs (produced and mixed to broadcast quality) by 15 September 2017. I intend to work on multiple tracks simultaneously and, ideally, will have have several completed tracks by the end of the summer. However, since co-writing necessitates a dependence on persons outside of my control, it is more realistic to expect one finished track with others in progress. My intermediate goal is to produce a finished draft of one song by 31 August 2017, giving me time to seek and respond to feedback from allies and mentors before handing in an improved portfolio by 15 September 2017.

I will be keeping a journal of my research and will chronicle the results of each collaborative session. Special attention will paid to the following questions:

• How does disparate understanding of the cultural domain affect collaboration between individuals with unique perspectives?
• How are team roles determined in a new configuration of co-writers? Are they more effective if they arise naturally or if they are verbally determined?
• Who on the team has veto power over ideas? How does having/not having veto power affect each team member’s experience?
• Do individual team members inhabit the different stages of the creative process synchronously or asynchronously? How does a team member in an “editing” mode interact with a team member in an “inspiration” mode?

In addition to presenting my journal in an abridged format along with my portfolio, I will present my research alternatively in a series of video interviews with my collaborators. My hope and expectation is that this project will provide me with new insights into the processes that drive musical collaboration and empower me to form better and more effective production teams in the future.

Bibliography

Belbin, R. M. (1998) Team Roles at Work. Butterworth-Heinemann, Woburn, MA.

Bennett, J. (2011) Collaborative Songwriting – The Ontology Of Negotiated Creativity In Popular Music Studio Practice. Journal on the Art of Record Production, [Online] July. Available from: <http://http://arpjournal.com> [Accessed 20 June 2017].

Boden, M. (2004) The Creative Mind: Myths and mechanisms. Routledge, London.

Burnard, P. (2012) Musical Creativities in Practice. Oxford University Press, Oxford.

Flowers, B. (2014) Madman, Architect, Carpenter, Judge: Roles and the Writing Process [Online]. Available from: <http://www.ut-ie.com> [Accessed 27 June 2017]

Golden, Z. (2015) How Justin Bieber Grew Into Himself, According To Poo Bear. The Fader [Online], November 11. Available from: <http://www.thefader.com> [Accessed 18 November 2016].

Harding, P. (2016) Mixing lecture notes. GEH430006 Studio Production Skills, Leeds Beckett University, delivered 26 October 2016.

Ingraham, N. (2013) The Postal Service talks about resurrecting a band from the dead after 10 long years. The Verge [Online], July. Available from: <http://www.theverge.com> [Accessed 29 June 2017].

McKinley, J. (2012) Hot Tracks, the Collaborative Method. The New York Times [Online], February, C1. Available from: <http://www.nytimes.com> [Accessed 20 October 2016].

Morey, J. and McIntrye, P. (2014) The Creative Studio Practice of Contemporary Dance Music Sampling Composers. Dancecult : Journal of Electronic Dance Music Culture, 1 (6) p. 41 - 60.

McIntyre, P. (2007) Rethinking Creativity: Record Production and the Systems Model. Brisbane: Queensland University of Technology. 

The New York Times (2015) Bieber, Diplo and Skrillex Make a Hit. Youtube [Online video], 26 August. Available from: <http://www.youtube.com> [Accessed 18 November 2016].

Pareles, J. (2015) The Inside History of ‘Where Are Ü Now’. The New York Times [Online], August. Available from: <http://www.nytimes.com> [Accessed 18 November 2016].

Prichard, J. and Stanton, N. (1999) Testing Belbin's team role theory of effective groups. The Journal of ManagementDevelopment, 18 (8) p. 652-665.

Seabrook, J. (2015) The Song Machine: Inside the Hit Factory. Jonathan Cape Publishing, London, Great Britain.

Melodic Math: Harnessing Memorability in Pop Melodies

Abstract: 

When asked about his approach to songwriting, eminent pop producer Max Martin often speaks of something called “melodic math.” As Martin owes much of his success to the catchiness of his melodies, this paper examines the psychological principles behind catchiness––what makes a melody memorable. A cursory look at various scientific studies linking memory and aspects of melody provides insight into several principles of melodic catchiness: repetition and motivic variation across phrases and sections, implication and realization within pitch contours, cognitive limits of recall in regards to rhythm span, and textual integration. Examination of Katy Perry’s “Roar”––a quintessential example of Martin’s songwriting––reveals that Martin does, in fact, adhere to these principles. Whether this is by study or instinct is less certain, but it suggests that “melodic math” may a viable discipline that other writers can emulate.

Introduction

Karl Martin Sandberg, more widely known by the pseudonym Max Martin, is one of the most successful songwriters of the past generation. With twenty No. 1 Billboard hits as of 2015, (in a cool third place behind John Lennon and Paul McCartney, he falls into the upper echelons of pop heavyweights, reliably producing smash hit after smash hit. He fills various roles in the process of production, but he’s most often celebrated for his “gift for melody, which is timeless, and owes as much to Edvard Grieg…as to any contemporary influence.” (Seabrook, 2015, p. 75, 97) According to Savan Kotecha, a successful producer and songwriter in his own right, Martin “has the best ear for catchy melodies––maybe the best in pop history… He can write great melodies, [and] he understands what’s wrong with other people’s melodies.” (Thompson, 2017, p. 76) Famously elusive and tight-lipped, Martin has given the public precious few insights into his creative process. However, when asked about the secret to his success, he has several times mentioned something called “melodic math,” (Seabrook, 2015, p. 40) hinting at a repeatable, algorithmic approach to the construction of his vocal hooks.

Martin may be exaggerating or misnaming his process, but he raises an interesting question: Are there quantifiable principles behind successful melodies and if so what are they? Is a hit melody the output of some mathematical formula that dictates ideal combinations of intervals and rhythms? 

To answer this, we must determine what constitutes a successful melody in the first place. For our purposes, we will be focusing specifically on the vocal melodies with lyrics attached that constitute the primary salient feature of top 40 pop. Rather than attempt to evaluate these melodies on the basis of pure quality (which would demand consideration of the aesthetics of western music, harmonic tension and release, counterpoint, etc.), we will confine our investigation to memorability or “catchiness”––that quality which enables a melody to successfully infiltrate the brain’s systems of recall and embed itself there as an earworm. "I will sacrifice everything,” Victorian songwriter Felix McGlennon famously said, “rhyme, reason, sense, and sentiment, to catchiness.” (Hamilton, 1998) To determine the viability of Max Martin’s supposed “melodic math” as it relates to memorability, we will delve into the science of catchiness, breaking melody down into its component parts––phrasing, pitch contour, rhythm, timbre, and text––and discussing some of the relevant psychological research into how the human brain responds to each. 

Along the way, we’ll be looking at Katy Perry’s “Roar,” one of Martin’s #1 smashes (penned by Martin in collaboration with Perry as well as Lukasz Gottwald, Bonnie McKee, and Henry Walter) as an example of his “melodic math” at work.

1. Structure

“Repetition,” in addition to being the mother of all learning, “is the god particle of music,” according to author Derek Thompson. And its power “is fractal, appearing at every level. Repetition of rhythm is necessary to build a musical hook. The repetition of hooks is necessary for choruses. Choruses repeat several times in each song, and people often honor their favorite songs by putting them on repeat.” (2017, p. 79) Repetition is the obvious catalyst for memorability––the key ingredient when brewing an earworm. (Stafford, 2012)

Anyone who has had the experience of getting a song “stuck in his/her head,” however, can tell you that pure repetition is not necessarily a positive thing. Neurologist Oliver Sacks speaks of earworms in almost pathological terms: “These repetitions…are apt to go on for hours or days, circling in the mind, before fading away. This endless repetition and the fact that the music in question may be irrelevant or trivial, not to one’s taste, or even hateful, suggest a coercive process, that the music has entered and subverted a part of the brain, forcing it to fire repetitively and autonomously (as may happen with a tic or seizure).” (2012, p.44)

So, while the human brain responds positively to repetition, there is a negative side to it as well.  A listener could easily become annoyed by an overabundance of motivic recurrence. Or, alternatively, he/she may become habituated to it to the extent that the music loses his/her attention altogether. “Catchiness,” however, has more of a positive connotation, describing something that is not only memorable but memorable in an agreeable way. (Catchy, n.d.) Industrial designer Raymond Loewy sought a balance in his own work between familiarity and novelty as is reflected in his MAYA principle: Most Advanced Yet Acceptable. Loewy felt that people had an innate preference for the familiar––the comfortable and recognizable––mixed with a penchant for seeking out the novel and it was necessary for a designer to cater to both. (Thompson, 2017, p. 56) Musically speaking, Loewy’s MAYA principle could be expressed as a balance of motivic restatement and development. According to BBC resident psychologist Tom Stafford, “tunes that become earworms have a little twist or peculiarity.” (2012) When pursuing catchiness, repetition must be tempered with variation.

One example of this balance can be seen in the score below. Figure 1.1 demarcates (via color coding) the melodic phrases within the first verse and chorus of Katy Perr’s “Roar.” The repetition is obvious: the first melodic phrase (labeled A) repeats exactly three times within the verse. This repetition is tempered by simple alternation with phrase B and subsequent abandonment. This is possibly the first clue as to Martin’s “melodic math” approach. “If you’ve got a verse [that has] a lot of rhythm,” he once told an interviewer, “you want to pair it with something that doesn’t. Longer notes. Something that might not start at the same beat… You need a balance, at all times. If the verse is a bit messy, you need it to be less messy right after. It needs to vary.” (Gradvall, 2016) Far from being messy, the phrasing in this example is meticulously exact. The repeated phrases, in every aspect except text, are carbon copies of one another. According to songwriter Bonnie McKee, Martin is “really stubborn about syllables... If you add a syllable, or take it away, it’s a completely different melody to him.” (Seabrook, 2015, p. 263) This motivic symmetry is encouraged by songwriting instructor and author Jason Blume who promotes the use of “lines that have the same number of notes, with stresses and emphases in the same places.” (Blume, 2004, p. 111) “Roar” is a pristine example of this. Nearly every note in the verse and chorus belongs to a phrase that is repeatedly exactly at least once.

The overall structure of the song reflects this balance of repetition and variation as well. “Anything repeated (straight or varied),” writes Richard Middleton, “is defined as a unit, and this is true on all levels, from sections through phrases.” (1990) Thus, it is repetition that gives pop its modular structure. Figure 1.2 shows the overarching songform of “Roar.” This form––Verse-Chorus-Verse-Chorus-Bridge-Chorus or ABABCB––is “the most common pattern in the last fifty years of pop music.” (Thompson, 2017, p. 84) And while there are probably myriad reasons for this, David Huron, a musicologist at Ohio State University, has an idea about how songforms like this one may be rooted in a biological response to habituation and surprise. Huron performed a study in which mice were startled with a loud noise and then habituated to that noise through repetition. After a certain threshold of exposure, the noise ceased to elicit a surprised response from the mice. In the next phase of the study, other noises were introduced in various sequences with the first. “To scare a mouse for the longest period of time with the fewest notes, scientists…found success with variations on the following sequence: BBBBC–BBBC–BBC–BC–D.” (ibid.) The tail end of that sequence (BBC–BC–D) resembles the songform of “Roar” and other songs like it. Obviously, the similarity is not exact, mice are not people, and startling noises are not melodies. As T.W. Adorno believed, this structure may have simply gained its ubiquity within pop music by conforming to societal norms. (Middleton, 1990) However, there may be a biological/neurological connection between songform and habituation that researchers could further explore.

Figure 1.1  

Figure 1.2  

2. Pitch Contours

We’ve examined motivic symmetry and structure of melodic phrases, but can a phrase be catchy in and of itself? Are some figures or intervals more objectively memorable than others? One clue can be found in the concept of expectancy––how listeners anticipate a melody will continue once begun. A study by psychologist Mark Schmuckler suggested that “melodies in which endings fit with listeners’ expectancies [are] better remembered than melodies that did not fit listeners’ expectancies.” In other words, if a melody continues the way we think it will, there is a better chance we’ll remember it.

In the early 90s Eugene Narmour wanted to find out if listeners universally anticipated melodic motion in a certain way. His research led him to develop the Implication-Realization (I-R) model of melodic expectation, a set of principles that describes the way listeners expect melodies to continue. Research conducted by Schellenberg (1996) reveals that the model holds true across cultures and varying degrees of musical training. In his experiments, researchers played fragments of melodies to three sets of two dozen students at Cornell University and asked the subjects to rate various tones for perceived continuity. As a result, Schellenberg was able to further simplify the I-R model into the following principles:

• Registral Direction: An interval of 6 semitones or less implies the melody will continue in the same direction, whereas intervals greater than 6 semitones imply the direction of the melody will reverse.

• Registral Return: When a pitch contour reverses direction, large intervals will be followed by smaller ones.

• Proximity: Listeners have a tendency to predict smaller intervals overall.

Taken together, these principles describe a melody that hovers in a narrow register, moving mostly in a series of small steps, occasionally punctuated by large intervals that quickly return to the register from which they leapt. Schellenberg’s sample size is small, but it suggests that, for whatever reason, people tend to expect melodies to continue this way. “The predominance of small intervals (proximate tones) in melodies across musical cultures,” he posits, “could…stem, in part, from vocal production limitations, because small intervals are easier than large intervals to sing.” (1996)

“Roar,” as shown in Figure 2.1, seems to follow the principles of the revised I-R model to some extent. The chart shows the incidence of intervals within the first verse and chorus of Katy Perry’s “Roar.” Minor thirds and major seconds together account for over 80% of intervals used. The largest interval used, the perfect fifth, is the only interval over six semitones used in the song and when it is used, the melody reverses direction as per the principle of Registral Return.

Keeping melodies proximate and easy for non-musicians to sing along with is another idea promoted by songwriter and author Jason Blume as expressed in his acronym K.I.S.S.: Keep It Simple and Singable. “Many developing songwriters,” he writes, “…make the mistake of composing complicated melodic lines that are too intricate for a nonsinger to retain.” (2004, p. 104) With “Roar,” Martin and his collaborators have written a melody that largely conforms to the revised I-R model, making it (in theory) easier to sing along with and easier to remember.

One could argue, however, that some of pop’s most memorable melodies are near impossible for non-musicians to replicate. Consider, for example, Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” or the virtuosic prowess of divas like Mariah Carey. Research by Kubovy demonstrates that “people experience pleasure from displays of extraordinary musical skill or virtuosity.” (Hallam and others, 2009, p. 155) Perhaps the pleasure derived from a simple, singable tune and the pleasure derived from hearing a virtuosic melisma stem from different but connected parts of the brain. Celebrated songwriter and One Republic frontman Ryan Tedder spoke to The Times about the importance of repetitive, tightly structured phrasing with an important caveat: “…Unless you’re Beyonce.” (Potton, 2016) Elizabeth Margulis, a musicologist at the University of Arkansas Music Cognition Lab puts it this way: “People like new and surprising melodies. But when we feel like we can accurately make tiny predictions about how a song is going to go, it feels really good.” (Thompson, 2017, p. 80)

Figure 2.1 

3. Rhythm

Melodies are not simply sequences of notes. They owe their identities to rhythm, duration, and rests as much as pitch. What makes a rhythm easily memorable? In one study conducted by Schaal, Banissy, and Lange, participants including musicians and non-musicians were challenged with a rhythm span memory task evaluating their capacity to memorize rhythmic sequences of varying lengths. Their results indicate that memorizing longer rhythmic patterns is a task that favors listeners with “many years of formal musical training.” (2015, p. 3) Likewise psychomusicologist Judy Edworthy “demonstrated that contour information becomes less precise in memory as melody length increases.” (Hallam and others, 2009, p. 102) If the goal is memorability, then, it is best to deploy brief patterns of durations and rests.

Referring back to our example in Figure 1.1, the longest phrase in “Roar” is the first instance of phrase E which, including its pickup note, measures only six beats in length. Most of the phrases in Figure 1.1 fit within one bar. In Schaal’s rhythm span task, most non-musician participants’ capacity for rhythmic retention capped at around four seconds. (See Figure 3.1) At 90 beats per minute, four seconds is the exact time that “Roar’s” longest phrase takes to sing. Whether this is a coincidence or knowledge of research like this informs Martin’s “melodic math” is unclear, but the example cooperates with the data.

Figure 3.1 

(Schaal and others, 2015, p. 6)

4. Timbre

Pitch contour and rhythm are the most obvious components of melody, but there are other aspects to consider, including surface features such as key, tempo, and timbre. Research by Schellenberg and others suggests that while features like key and tempo are encoded in long-term memory after abundant exposure, first-time or second-time listeners do not retain this information as integral to a melodic identity. (2014, p. 84) In other words, you might notice a difference when you hear your favorite song played in a new key, but you’re not likely to perceive the key of a freshly-heard tune. Timbre, however, is different. 

In a study conducted in Brasilia and São Paulo, a selection of both musicians and non-musicians heard forty-eight British and Irish folk melodies in four different timbres (voice, piano, banjo, and marimba). Participants “showed a…memory advantage for vocal melodies. Moreover, pianists [remembered] melodies played on piano [no better] than on other instruments.”  (Weiss and others, 2015) These findings suggest the human brain more easily retains musical information that is sung rather than played on an instrument. A separate study by Lim and Goh explored the effect of differences in articulation on memorability and found that differences in articulation interfere with listeners’ ability to retain melodies. (2013) Marrying a melody to a particular voice ensures a certain degree of consistency of articulation and, therefore, may further enhance recall.

It is no wonder, then, that pop songs are almost universally “a composite of melody, lyrics, voice, and instrumental arrangement [not to] be confused with the way we think of music in the strict sense.” (Hesmondhalgh & Negus, 2002, p. 33) The catchiest hooks are delivered on the instrument we all possess and use on a daily basis––the human voice.

5. Text

Obviously not all melodies have lyrics attached to them, but in pop music text is a ubiquitous and apparently essential ingredient to success. Between 2005 and 2015 only one instrumental track (“Harlem Shake”) entered Billboard’s Top 10 (Nawrocki, 2015) and it is worth noting that even that song has a spoken vocal sample for a hook. Why this preference for words in pop music? Studies by Serafine, Davidson, Crowder, and Repp have identified a phenomenon known as the integration effect––“the tendency for a melody to be better recognized when the text was the one with which the melody was originally heard than when the text was different.” (1986, p. 123) 

In short, melodies are more easily remembered when attached to text. In fact, one could say that lyrics function as a mnemonic device for melody. According to Serafine et al., this holds true even for nonsense words, ruling out the idea that semantic connotation is the driving factor behind the integration effect. “This does not imply, however, that semantic integration of melody and text never occurs. Indeed, especially in those cases where the melody directly symbolizes textual meaning (e.g., repeated eighth notes on ‘tapping’), integration on the semantic level seems likely.” (1986, p. 129) Jason Blume encourages aspiring songwriters to make use of semantic integration or prosody. “Ideally the final version of your song should sound as though the words and music fit together so perfectly that the listener cannot imagine another melody accompanying that lyric, or another lyric working with that melody.” (2004, p. 106)

There is one component of song text that makes special use of the integration effect: the hook. The hook is the fulcrum of pop song structure. Author John Seabrook describes it as “a short, sung line that grips the rhythm with melodic talons and soars skyward.” (2015b, p.7) A less flowery definition furnished by Blume (2004, p. 7) describes it as simply the most addictive of the song’s various motifs. Textually, it is most often the point at which the title is sung, thereby serving to “summarize the idea and emotion of the song in a general way and to hammer home [the] title.” (ibid.) Songwriters employ various musical devices to make the hook stand out, including altering the melodic range, varying the rhythm, or inserting carefully timed pauses. (ibid., p. 105) 

Songwriters often ensure maximum integration with the hook by repeating the lyrics of choruses, though not those of verses. Thus, verses develop lyrical themes while the chorus repeats and summarizes them. In Figure 5.1, the hook of “Roar” is shown in red text along with repetition of lyrics within the verse and chorus (shown in blue, green, and yellow). The repetition of the phrase “I am a champion” sets up the following hook: “You’re gonna hear me roar.” The hook is further emphasized melodically as the highest note of the song’s tessitura (circled in red) falls squarely within it.

Figure 5.1

Conclusion

Max Martin’s catchphrase “melodic math” alliterates nicely and hints tantalizingly at the prospect of a foolproof mechanism of hit-composition. However, without more evidence of his actual working processes, it’s impossible to know how methodical or “mathematical” his personal approach actually is. What we can conclude from examining the relevant literature is that there are several psychological factors behind the phenomenon of catchiness: a human proclivity for repetition both in terms of musical phrasing and text, a connection between expectancy and memory, a comfort found in small, singable intervals, and limitations on the length of phrases that listeners can remember. The example we have studied, “Roar,” seems to apply these principles. Martin’s melodies are tightly structured and highly symmetrical. The pitch contours are predictable according to the I-R model. He knows how to place a hook and make it stand out. Regardless of whether his approach is studied or instinctual, the data supports the techniques he and his colleagues implement in their songwriting, suggesting that “melodic math”  (though perhaps, in the absence of a discussion of ratios and formulas, “method” may be a better word) may a viable discipline that other writers can emulate..

This is not to say, of course, that the data supports a one-size-fits-all approach. There are fundamental principles at work here but songwriters are free to conform to or subvert these norms as they wish. And, as Raymond Loewy believed, people need a healthy dose of novelty to balance out familiarity and convention. They are caught in a “tug-of-war between the opposing principles of neophilia versus neophobia.” (Thompson, 2017, p. 56) If hit melodies were nothing but math, every song would resemble a sort of Platonic ideal––the mean of all  other songs. Rather, it is the X factor––variation––that gives music its life. 

Martin knows this. When elaborating on his “melodic math” in an interview, he once said, “I’m afraid it might sound like I’ve got a whole concept figured out…But it’s not like that. The most crucial thing is always how it feels.” The feel he’s talking about might be “the instinct that develops from being around music, musicians and studios your whole life…the reason that DJ’s with no musical or technical ability can still become excellent producers. They have listened to many, many records, logged the way people responded to the music and subconsciously programmed their instinct to be able to reproduce those excitement factors in their own records.” (McIntyre, 2007, p. 3) The knack for writing great melodies must be learned whether by study or by sheer cultural osmosis. It is a subtle art of finding just the right amount of variation in a world of repetition, just the right leap among the melodic steps––just the right surprise among the familiarity. Perhaps Ron Simpson, professor of Media Music at Brigham Young University said it best: "We build our musical walls with familiar bricks but there has to be a golden brick in there.” (Sheahan, 2009)

Bibliography

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Leroi, A. (2017) The Secret Science of Pop. London: BBC4, 28 February, 21:00.

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On the Latest Iteration of Kong

On a clear day in New York City, some time in the early 1930s, Merian C. Cooper was walking through Manhattan and happened to glance up at the Empire State (then the tallest building in the world) as a warplane passed overhead. At this moment, a novel image crystallized in his imagination: a giant gorilla atop the building, swatting biplanes from the sky.

He couldn't have known in that instant just how many giant gorilla movies would spawn from this one epiphany. Cooper's 1933 King Kong was the classic that started it all, followed by Son of Kong (1933), Mighty Joe Young (1949), a string of Asian films in the 1960s and 70s including a Toho version of Kong as well as even more bizarre offerings like Konga (1961) and The Mighty Peking Man (1977), and more. These are only a few of the many, many films based on the concept of a gargantuan ape toppling trees and buildings and defying military might with his formidable monkey flesh. Oh, and there's usually a tiny blonde in there, trembling in the shadow of the monster's giant palm.

What exactly is the appeal? One might say that a gorilla as a pop icon is a projection of hyper-masculinity––the rife body-hair, bulging muscles, etc. This would explain the unfortunate pervasiveness of the quivering damsel trope in so many of these films. However, I believe there's more to it than that. Merian C. Cooper got his inspiration from the memoirs of French zoologist Paul Du Chaillu, arguably the man who first brought knowledge of the gorilla out of Africa to Europe. One imagines what Du Chaillu's first encounter with these imposing beasts must have been like. Gorillas share something like 98% of our DNA. If you'd never seen one before, you might well think you had happened upon some sort of half-man. And considering adult males weigh as much as 400 pounds, you might well be terrified. But gorillas aren't really as brutish as they're made to appear in pop culture. They're massive and dangerous, yes, but also gentle, family-oriented, and shy.

Not interested in climbing any skyscrapers, bruh

Therein, I think, lies the rub. Gorillas look like hairy pro-wrestlers but they're more interested in munching on bamboo than they are in body-slamming something. To observe one is to experience a sort of potential energy for monster behavior. The giant gorilla movie, then, is the realization of that primal fantasy.

The question is, if you flesh out that fantasy, does it make for good cinema? And if so, what's the trick to getting it right? The original 1933 Kong is an undeniable masterpiece, marred as it is through a modern lens by its hammy acting and sexism. It imbues Kong and his island with an abundance of mystery and finds the sweet spot between Kong's beastliness and anthropomorphism. And its ape-on-dinosaur mayhem is brilliantly choreographed for maximum visceral effect. I loved it when I was a kid. It was, for me, what the tales of Paul Du Chaillu were for Merian C. Cooper, Kong's creator.

Seriously evocative

The 1976 Kong remake from Dino de Laurentiis is basically unwatchable. As in, I tried to watch it and just didn't make it. The human characters are unbelievably boring, except for the damsel in distress Dwan (that's right––Dwan) who is only interesting because she is so objectified by the script and the direction that she comes off as thoroughly bizarre. No human woman behaves like she's made to. And the action sequences are all just kind of meh.

Seriously uncomfortable

Peter Jackson's 2005 remake is a loving homage to the original, complete with action sequences that are beat-for-beat lifts from the 1933 version. I know some people who consider this film unwatchable as well, as it's 187 minutes long, Kong doesn't even appear in the first hour, and Jackson is pretty self-indulgent in all aspects of the production. But you can't deny the breadth of its scope, nor the depth of its themes. It contains Heart of Darkness references, clever homages to the original, a foil for Kong manifest in a writer living in a cage, a plausible geological explanation behind its island gigantism, and a masterful mirrored shot in which Kong is symbolically sacrificed to western civilization while an actress is faux-sacrificed to him. Jackson's Kong revels almost too much in its own mystery and majesty. It's an overlong, sprawling masterpiece and I love it dearly.

Seriously poetic

Which brings us to 2017. Legendary pictures have rebooted the Kong franchise as part of their cinematic Monsterverse which means that Kong now inhabits the same world as Gareth Edwards' 2014 Godzilla and will face off against said giant lizard in 2020. Speaking of Edwards' film, it takes a similar approach to Jackson's Kong in that it's a very slow burn and takes a while to show its monster, but it works because it attempts to make every shot of Godzilla meaningful by showing him exclusively from the POV of the tiny humans struggling to stay out of his way. The human story of that film is pretty boring, but when Godzilla is even partly on camera, he captures one's sense of wonder firmly in his reptilian grip.

Apparently, Legendary heard fans didn't like the less-is-more approach and have done a complete 180 with Kong: Skull Island. In this year's update of Kong, the eponymous gorilla is revealed in the film's first five minutes, and the pace of the movie is fleet and brisk. Action sequences are plentiful nigh unto gratuitous. I might go so far as to say the film abandons any sense of mystery, but what it lacks in suspense it makes up for in unabashedly over-the-top monster mayhem. This is the John Woo MI:2 of the Kong franchise. It also features the tallest Kong ever put onscreen (if you don't count the Japanese version of the character in his old Godzilla face-offs). This is a Kong who uses trees like baseball bats and ship anchors like brass knuckles. In several shots he's portrayed as a hulking silhouette against an impossibly huge, glowering sunset. In others, his eyes smoulder through the blooming fires of exploding helicopters. Good ole Samuel L. Jackson (who I can't really take seriously anymore) is often shown glaring defiantly at Kong when he really ought to be trying not to get squished by huge monkey feet or falling helicopter debris. And don't get me started on the ridiculousness of a certain character's gas mask/katana spree.

No similarities here

I don't mean to knock it; it's a fun movie. I was just a bit surprised by the cheese factor. There are quite a few human characters and not enough of them have arcs, but the 1970s setting is refreshing and the performances are good. John C. Reilly, in particular, is a big highlight. A lot of people will enjoy this movie as action-packed, low-maintenance escapism.

But I'm honestly not here to talk about the film per se so much as its portrayal of Kong as a pop culture icon. And there are a couple interesting things about his depiction here.

Firstly, his look is a big step away from Peter Jackson's overgrown silverback and a big step in the direction of his classic monster roots. He's bipedal. His eyes are buggy. His sagittal crest is reduced and his brow exaggerated. The director Jordan Vogt-Roberts has said, "We worked really hard to take some of the elements of the ’33 version, some of those exaggerated features, some of those cartoonish and iconic qualities, and then make them their own."

The second thing that interests me is his relationship to humans. In previous versions, Kong was separated from the tiny, hairless apes on his island by an ancient, impenetrable wall. He was placated with sacrifices and, once through the wall, happily stomped and munched on anyone in his path. In this film, he's less of a monster and more of a benevolent god to the natives and has no interest in devouring maidens or smashing villages. His one goal in life is to keep the subterranean skull-crawlers subdued and as long as he's keeping up on his goal, he's happy. "Keeps to himself mostly," says John C. Reilly's character.

Thirdly, Kong is poised for interaction with other monsters in Legendary's new Monsterverse. The tone of Kong: Skull Island is so different from that of Godzilla that it will be fascinating to see how they combine in 2020. In this film, Kong stands 104 ft. tall but is reportedly only an adolescent and will have grown substantially by the time he meets the radioactive lizard in a modern setting. That's good because Gareth Edwards' Godzilla stands at 350 ft. and it wouldn't be much of a contest if the current stats remained unchanged.

And, last of all, let's all be happy that Kong no longer comes with a half-dressed supermodel to tote around. Peter Jackson did his best to make Ann Darrow more of a volitional character and less of a prop, but in Skull Island the closest thing we get to the damsel in distress is Brie Larson's character who needs saving for about thirty seconds tops, doesn't really scream if I recall, and also gets to shoot guns and stuff. I, for one, am happy that we can kiss that aspect of the Kong icon goodbye. Kong: Skull Island earned a 78% on Rotten Tomatoes and it did that without needing a damsel in distress. And so the giant ape continues to evolve.