I kinda did a short study of a "Africa" by TOTO a few months back with some of my students. Totally forgot about it until Slain performed a kickass acoustic rendition of it this Sunday. This song has genius written all over it. So thought i'd share what my students n I learnt and shed some light on this song and probably show u how analyzing a song can be helpful.
Now, to understand this you need to know a bit about music theory and chord progressions. For those of you who are not familiar with chord progressions i'll try to explain a bit of it.
Chord progression, as the name implies, is a sequence of chords which are in a particular key. You wud've heard musical jargon like "Beethoven's 3rd in C minor" or "Let it be" by the Beatles in C major. What they are referring to, is the key of the song/piece. Each key has a set of chords which are derived from the major scale.
Ex: The chord progresson of the first four bars of "Let it be" is C major-Gmajor-A minor-F major. Now all these chords belong to the C major progression or are in the KEY of C major.
Hopefully this gives you a basic idea about chord progressions. I'll post a more detailed blog on it if you guys are really interested.
Ok now to Africa ! This song was written by the keyboardist David Paich & the drummer, the late Jeff Porcaro.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GU_1t8kK6wA
The song was written in 3 Keys : E major, B major & A major
lets look at the chords in these 3 keys.. you'll need to keep referring to the table below.
B major key: Bmaj C#min D#min Emaj F#maj G#min A#dim
A major key: Amaj Bmin C#min Dmaj Emaj F#min G#dim
The chords in Africa are made up only these chords (almost all - dimished is never used though)
Lets look at it section by section:
Intro : |Amaj | G#min | C#min |
Which is in the key of E maj. This is also the catchy main "motif" of the song.
Verse : | Bmaj | D#min | G#min | F#maj |
| Emaj | F#maj | G#min | Amaj|G#min| C#min|----> n we're back to main motif.
The verse is in B major , a completely different key. But Paich just din't pick up the key at random. See how he uses C#min, which a common chord in the E major and B major key (the VI of E major & II of B minor) to bring about a smooth change in keys.
This also can be heard in the last bar of every verse line where there is jump to the main motif of the song as the word ends. Here he connects the two keys using G#min (another common chord in the E & B major key).
This concept is known as PIVOTING around a common chord or PIVOT CHORD MODULATION and is used extensively by song writers and composers. Helps in creating a flowing key change.
Chorus: | F#min | Dmaj | A maj | E maj |
The chorus is in the key of A major. To get to the this key the C#min chord (the last line of the verse ends with the main motif) is used, which is a common chord in Emajor & A major to again bring about a smooth key change.
Last line of the chorus leading back into main motif :
| F#min | Dmaj | Amaj | C#min | Emaj | F#min | G#min | Amaj | G#min | C#min|
|-------------------------------|--------------------------------------------------------------|--------------------------------
| last chorus line |key change to E using Amaj chord as pivot| n back to main motif|
Lets look the keys themselves. E major, B major & A major... no, these key weren't picked up randomly !
B major and A major are the IV & V chords of the E major scale !!
Paich probably decided to take the IV & V of the Emajor key after writing that catchy intro, n make them the keys for the verse and chorus. just brilliant !!
We now have a basic idea of how Africa was composed. Some of these chords are extended to give a bit of flavour and feel. When combined with the extremely groovy rhythmic drum pattern of Jeff Porcaro, the end result is simply brilliant. In essence, this song has everything that a good song should have; its technically awesome, musically brilliant n most importantly, its so freakin catchy !!
Ok.. So how does this help you??
Here's how you can use the same procedure to write a song of your own.
1) Write a catchy motif.
2) Use the IV & V chords as the key changes for verse and chorus.
3) Use pivot/common chord to have smooth transitions between key changes.
So use the same procedure in a different key. Extend chords add sevenths, ninths, thirteens, suspend them, invert them etc. Then work on the rhythm itself. Do it bossa nova style, jazz, country, fusion, pop, rock, metal and what-not. There are no limits.
As Picasso stated "a good artist copies, a great one steals". The Beatles happily and proudly admitted to stealing ideas. You can find a lot of Beatles ideas in Radiohead songs.
Heard "Holiday" by Green Day ? u'll find Africa in there somewhere ;)
Hell, just take that thunderous Beethoven's Fifth intro (DA DA DA DUM !!) n arrange it for a hip-hop/pop rythym and u'll see how close it sounds to today's crappy music.
So steal the idea (not the song itself) n when you steal make sure you change something in it so it doesn't sound like a complete rip-off ( think of stolen cars - a fresh coat of paint and a change of license plates and the cops won't know :D).. Just don't end up getting sued like Colplay :P
The point of this BS:
Musicians want to be great song writers. They all want to write "original" material, extremely complicated riffs, lightning speed solos, have chords with names as long as a police inspectors. Sure, this is a free country and there are no rules against it. But sometimes we forget the most fundamental aspects of music. That is the simple difference between great artists and us. They don't need the flashy stuff. They can blow our minds away with 3 simple chords !!
So, if you want to know how they do it, you need to learn from their songs.
TO BE A MASTER YOU NEED TO LEARN THE MASTER'S ART !
That is the whole point of learning covers, which we so casually take for granted. Memorizing chords n belting them on stage is not learning (remember the idiots in school who mugged up the whole damn text without actually understanding shit n puked it out on paper the next day?). To understand a song completely you need to rip it apart and study it inside out. Thats how you learn !!
So plz go download/buy some old albums.. pick up Pet Sounds, Sgt. Peppers, OK Computer (in fact get every Beatles n Radiohead album), Toto IV, A Rush of Blood to the Head and anything else you can find and start learning !!
Trust me, you'll find something amazing in every song !! ;)
Peace.
Leslie.
Buy me some beer now.
Now, to understand this you need to know a bit about music theory and chord progressions. For those of you who are not familiar with chord progressions i'll try to explain a bit of it.
Chord progression, as the name implies, is a sequence of chords which are in a particular key. You wud've heard musical jargon like "Beethoven's 3rd in C minor" or "Let it be" by the Beatles in C major. What they are referring to, is the key of the song/piece. Each key has a set of chords which are derived from the major scale.
Ex: The chord progresson of the first four bars of "Let it be" is C major-Gmajor-A minor-F major. Now all these chords belong to the C major progression or are in the KEY of C major.
Hopefully this gives you a basic idea about chord progressions. I'll post a more detailed blog on it if you guys are really interested.
Ok now to Africa ! This song was written by the keyboardist David Paich & the drummer, the late Jeff Porcaro.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GU_1t8kK6wA
The song was written in 3 Keys : E major, B major & A major
lets look at the chords in these 3 keys.. you'll need to keep referring to the table below.
I II III IV V VI VII
E major key: Emaj F#min G#min Amaj Bmaj C#min D#dim (diminished)B major key: Bmaj C#min D#min Emaj F#maj G#min A#dim
A major key: Amaj Bmin C#min Dmaj Emaj F#min G#dim
The chords in Africa are made up only these chords (almost all - dimished is never used though)
Lets look at it section by section:
Intro : |Amaj | G#min | C#min |
Which is in the key of E maj. This is also the catchy main "motif" of the song.
Verse : | Bmaj | D#min | G#min | F#maj |
| Emaj | F#maj | G#min | Amaj|G#min| C#min|----> n we're back to main motif.
The verse is in B major , a completely different key. But Paich just din't pick up the key at random. See how he uses C#min, which a common chord in the E major and B major key (the VI of E major & II of B minor) to bring about a smooth change in keys.
This also can be heard in the last bar of every verse line where there is jump to the main motif of the song as the word ends. Here he connects the two keys using G#min (another common chord in the E & B major key).
This concept is known as PIVOTING around a common chord or PIVOT CHORD MODULATION and is used extensively by song writers and composers. Helps in creating a flowing key change.
Chorus: | F#min | Dmaj | A maj | E maj |
The chorus is in the key of A major. To get to the this key the C#min chord (the last line of the verse ends with the main motif) is used, which is a common chord in Emajor & A major to again bring about a smooth key change.
Last line of the chorus leading back into main motif :
| F#min | Dmaj | Amaj | C#min | Emaj | F#min | G#min | Amaj | G#min | C#min|
|-------------------------------|--------------------------------------------------------------|--------------------------------
| last chorus line |key change to E using Amaj chord as pivot| n back to main motif|
Lets look the keys themselves. E major, B major & A major... no, these key weren't picked up randomly !
B major and A major are the IV & V chords of the E major scale !!
Paich probably decided to take the IV & V of the Emajor key after writing that catchy intro, n make them the keys for the verse and chorus. just brilliant !!
We now have a basic idea of how Africa was composed. Some of these chords are extended to give a bit of flavour and feel. When combined with the extremely groovy rhythmic drum pattern of Jeff Porcaro, the end result is simply brilliant. In essence, this song has everything that a good song should have; its technically awesome, musically brilliant n most importantly, its so freakin catchy !!
Ok.. So how does this help you??
Here's how you can use the same procedure to write a song of your own.
1) Write a catchy motif.
2) Use the IV & V chords as the key changes for verse and chorus.
3) Use pivot/common chord to have smooth transitions between key changes.
So use the same procedure in a different key. Extend chords add sevenths, ninths, thirteens, suspend them, invert them etc. Then work on the rhythm itself. Do it bossa nova style, jazz, country, fusion, pop, rock, metal and what-not. There are no limits.
As Picasso stated "a good artist copies, a great one steals". The Beatles happily and proudly admitted to stealing ideas. You can find a lot of Beatles ideas in Radiohead songs.
Heard "Holiday" by Green Day ? u'll find Africa in there somewhere ;)
Hell, just take that thunderous Beethoven's Fifth intro (DA DA DA DUM !!) n arrange it for a hip-hop/pop rythym and u'll see how close it sounds to today's crappy music.
So steal the idea (not the song itself) n when you steal make sure you change something in it so it doesn't sound like a complete rip-off ( think of stolen cars - a fresh coat of paint and a change of license plates and the cops won't know :D).. Just don't end up getting sued like Colplay :P
(Ok.. i don't know which came first but this is a good example of stolen modified ideas :D)
The point of this BS:
Musicians want to be great song writers. They all want to write "original" material, extremely complicated riffs, lightning speed solos, have chords with names as long as a police inspectors. Sure, this is a free country and there are no rules against it. But sometimes we forget the most fundamental aspects of music. That is the simple difference between great artists and us. They don't need the flashy stuff. They can blow our minds away with 3 simple chords !!
So, if you want to know how they do it, you need to learn from their songs.
TO BE A MASTER YOU NEED TO LEARN THE MASTER'S ART !
That is the whole point of learning covers, which we so casually take for granted. Memorizing chords n belting them on stage is not learning (remember the idiots in school who mugged up the whole damn text without actually understanding shit n puked it out on paper the next day?). To understand a song completely you need to rip it apart and study it inside out. Thats how you learn !!
So plz go download/buy some old albums.. pick up Pet Sounds, Sgt. Peppers, OK Computer (in fact get every Beatles n Radiohead album), Toto IV, A Rush of Blood to the Head and anything else you can find and start learning !!
Trust me, you'll find something amazing in every song !! ;)
Peace.
Leslie.
Buy me some beer now.
