VII. Popular Music
AABA Form and Strophic Form
Bryn Hughes and Megan Lavengood
Key Takeaways
- Strophic form consists only of repeated strophes. Its form would be abbreviated as AAA.
- AABA form, also known as 32-bar song form, consists of a twice-repeated strophe (AA), followed by a contrasting bridge (B), followed by another repetition of the initial strophe (A).
- AABA and strophic form were especially common in older pop music (1960s and earlier).
- AABA and strophic form both have strophe sections as the main section, which features the primary lyrical and musical content of the song.
Strophic Form
Songs that repeat the same basic multi-phrase unit throughout are in strophic form (sometimes abbreviated AAA because the same basic material, A, is repeated), and the basic unit that is repeated is called a strophe. Strophic form is more common in early rock-and-roll (1950s–1960s) than in the 1970s and beyond.
For an example of a strophic song, consider “Blue Suede Shoes” by Carl Perkins (1955).
This song contains multiple sections, all of which have the same basic underlying music. Though the instrumentation and the lyrics change, the section beginning at 0:19 contains the same—or, at least, very similar—melody, harmony, and phrase structure as the sections that begin at 0:58, 1:37, and 1:54. Listening a bit more closely, we can hear a similar, but abbreviated, version of the same patterns at the opening of the song. Even the instrumental sections at 0:41 and 1:21 have the same underlying pattern, just a different melody in the form of a guitar solo. The entire song is a repetition of this same basic pattern, or slight variations of it, modeled at 0:19–0:41.
is a bird’s-eye-view sketch of the form of “Blue Suede Shoes” to follow as you listen:
[table id=2 /]
While “Blue Suede Shoes” is composed entirely of strophes, it is important to note that strophic songs can also contain so-called auxiliary sections such as intros, outros, and codas. An example of a strophic song with auxiliary sections is “I Wanna Be a Cowboy’s Sweetheart” by Patsy Montana & The Prairie Ramblers (1935). Follow the form chart in as you listen to this song, and notice that the intro and outro do not change the fundamental strophic form significantly.
[table id=5 /]
However, if a song has more than one main musical idea other than strophes and auxiliary sections, it is not strophic, but AABA form, which is discussed below, or verse-chorus form, discussed in the next chapter.
32-Bar Song Form (AABA)
Another formal structure that is more common in early rock-and-roll is AABA form, also called 32-bar song form because in earlier “Golden Age” songs that make use of this structure, each section is eight measures long. AABA form, like strophic form, relies on the strophe to communicate the main lyric and musical ideas of the song, but it adds a contrasting bridge section in the middle.
As an example, listen to “I Want to Hold Your Hand” by the Beatles (1963).
https://open.spotify.c