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The Perfect song...length3/19/2014 An interesting topic came up at the Raleigh chapter of the Nashville Songwriter's Association meeting last month about song length. The comment was made that it would be a good exercise to keep your songs at or below the 3 minute and 40 second mark. It got me thinking about great songs and wondering if they followed this "rule". The first song that came into my head was "Blackbird" by Paul McCartney which I think is the greatest composed song ever for it's simplicity, profundity and beauty. It comes in at 2:18. "Let's Stay Together" by Al Green is top 5 on my list and it's 3:18. A quick look through my iTunes yielded some big surprises: "Big Yellow Taxi" by Joni Mitchell which seems to me to be a very important song is only 2:17! "Eleanor Rigby" 2:08. "Hit the Road, Jack" only 1:58!
I was recently working on a demo for a song a wrote a while back and discovered that its 2 verses, 3 choruses, bridge, and guitar solo only came to 2:35. My husband/producer commented that it hardly seems worth the effort when you consider the trifling amount of time that is. Think about it. I get my studio time for free (Trust me, I have PAID.) but studio time is expensive. Even back in the day, studio time was astronomical considering that bands camped out in a studio in New York, LA or Montserrat with giant bowls of cocaine and humongous bags of weed for months at a time. How did George Martin decide that "Eleanor Rigby", a song that's just over 2 minutes, was worth hiring a string quartet for? He just KNEW. And tell me, what would the world be without "Hit the Road, Jack"?
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