I went to a songwriting workshop a few years back, a full weekend deal where you emerse yourself in the process with other songwriters and hopefully come out with some fresh perspectives and new enthusiasm. I highly recommend experiencing one of these at least once, just to see what you might learn from it.

One of the fellows who was leading this workshop was from a moderately succesful band, and he had had some success writing for others and being involved in various projects. At one point when we were all taking turns playing our songs, he piped up how much he hated song bridges. Never wrote them, usually didn't like songs with them...just had a kind of disdain for them. I feel quite differently. I don't always use them because a song may not call for one, but I do see the value in them.

So what is a bridge, and what is its purpose? If the verse is the storyteller that leads to the chorus, and the chorus is the pay-off, the bridge is a kind of pause to reflect. Technically speaking, the bridge is usually musically and/or lyrically different from the rest of the song. It normally appears only once about 3/4 of the way through the song. I've always felt that bridges give you a break from the repetitiveness of the rest of the song, so when you come back to the chorus, for instance, it's fresh again. Lyrically, you can use it to take a different viewpoint in the song.

So let's take a look at a couple of relatively well-known popular songs and their bridges.

First we'll look at an old song by the Beatles called "Hard Day's Night". The bridge in this case, doesn't change key (it's in the key of G), instead it goes to the relative minor, Bm, which isn't used in the rest of the song. This is a classic thing to do, musically speaking, and is probably the most common tactic in a bridge...stay in the same key, but either put the chords in a different order or change to a chord in the same key that hasn't been used yet.

Lyrically, the song is a pretty simple ditty about working all day to "make you money, to buy you things". The bridge, on the other hand focuses on what it's like to be home..."when I'm home, everything seems to be right." It breathes a little more, the phrases are longer and more lingering, contrasting to the shorter, slightly more frenetic phrases of the verse. This is another common trait of bridges, they often change pace in terms of phrasing and meter.

Another song we'll look at is Eric Clapton's "Tears In Heaven", a huge hit for him at what was a very sad time in his life. The song is obviously about the death of someone (his 4-year-old son died tragically by falling from the window of a 52nd story apartment), but it was actually written by Eric and Will Jennings for the movie "Rush". The song doesn't have a chorus, so the phrase "tears in heaven" is the refrain, which is a line that is repeated somewhere in the verse that "resolves" the verse, elminating the need for a chorus.

The bridge (also referred to as the "release" by Will Jennings) in this case, is a very distinctive section of the song. It modulates (changes key) and creates a different view lyrically. Where the verses are filled with the sadness of parting and questions about what a relationship would be like in heaven ("would you know my name, if I saw you in heaven"), the bridge or release, is all from the perspective of time: "Time can bring you down, time can bend your knees...".

Because the song has only verses and no chorus, the bridge stands out even moreso as a breath of fresh air, before the song goes back and repeats the first verse at the end. An interesting side note to this song: Clapton no longer performs it because he feels that he finally got past his own grief and therefore can't put the same emotional power behind it anymore.

An interesting bridge is in the song "Black Horse and the Cherry Tree" by KT Tunstall, where there are no chords at all! The song itself is a metaphor for a relationship breaking up and it has a very infectious chorus. The bridge breaks all the rules, but it's definitely a bridge because it is different structurally from the rest of the song...even though it has virtually the same lyrics as the chorus and no chords. It consists of drums and percussion, topped by KT singing "no, no, no, no, no, no, you're not the one for me." over and over.

This goes back to my #1 Rule...there are no rules! You can study a hundred songs like "Hard Days' Night" and "Tears In Heaven" that follow the so-called "rules" structurally, lyrically, and musically, but the most fascinating song is the one that breaks them and still works, sometimes even standing out from the rest because of it. On the other hand, if you get too loose and lose any identifiable structure, then you can blow it completely.

So take a look at your songs...do you use bridges? Do you use them when they don't really need one? Or maybe a bridge, in one of your songs, would be the perfect solution to something that sounds draggy and uninspired. You be the judge!