In the last few segments, we've taken a look at how your number of lines affects the feeling of the song. Now, let's take a look at the second element that you have to create prosody, your line length. So, here we go with creating stability or instability. Stability, as usual, stops us. Instability says, let's keep going, or we're missing something. So line lengths, when two lines match their lengths, when two lines are the same length, they feel stable. They feel balanced, they feel complete, they feel resolved. When two lines have different lengths, they don't feel stable. They don't feel balanced. They don't feel resolved. For example, and I'll try to stay away from rhyme here because that's, again, another one of the elements. Eenie meenie miney moe, catch a tiger by the foot. Now obviously, we're pointing with something that might fell a little unstable, just because you use to the rhyme. But listen again. Eenie meenie miney moe, catch a tiger by the foot. Feels like we don't have to move forward. Check this. Mary had a little lamb. Fleece was white as snow. Sescond line is shorter. So, eenie meenie miney moe, catch a tiger by the foot. Mary had a little lamb, fleece was white as snow. That makes us move forward. The shorter second line makes us move forward. The balanced second line says, okay, that's a wrap. That is to say, we're done and now we can move on to something else. Rather than, we've got to move on to something else. So, you can start building your sections, you can start building your verses, building your choruses, building your bridges, and so on, by creating a dance, as it were, between longer and shorter lines. Take a look at these two lines. Just a little shoebox in a package, Mama must have kept it all these years. Just a little shoebox in a package, Mama must have kept it all these years. It feels like we're done. It feels like we've finished with an idea. Feels like a fact, it doesn't feel like we need to move forward so that we could, you know, just put that into a little drum loop. [MUSIC] One, two, three four, two, two, two, three. Just a little shoebox in a package. [MUSIC] Mama must have kept it all these years. [MUSIC] Just a little shoe box in a package. [MUSIC] Mama must of kept it all these years. [MUSIC] And that feels like, okay, there we go. Now we can continue on, but those are just sort of facts I'm just saying. I'm just saying. [MUSIC] As opposed to, just a little shoebox in a package, she kept it all these years. Now we need to move forward, it feels like. Three, four, just a little shoebox in a package, she kept it all these years. Now we need something like[MUSIC] ba-da-da, de-da. [MUSIC ]Ba-da-da de-da. [MUSIC] Ba-da-da de-da. And then, we'd have a complete section. So that by shortening the second line, the school crossing guard, rather than saying stop, is saying, come on. Let's go, let's go. [MUSIC] Just a little shoebox in a package. [MUSIC] Mama must have kept it all these years. [MUSIC] Just a little shoebox in a package. [MUSIC] She kept it all these years. [MUSIC] Or perhaps, here comes the sun, fingers of gold. Here comes the sun, fingers of gold. That's feels like, yeah, I'm just saying. But, here comes the sunrise, fingers of gold. Here comes the sunrise, fingers of gold. And that makes the first line slightly longer than the second line. And the second line says come on, come on. Let's keep going. Ba-da-da-da-da, ba-da-da-da, ba-da-da-da-da, ba-da-da-da. So there, we have the sort of dance between longer and shorter lines that if you are creating say, a sense of this is what I mean, this is factual. Equal line lengths is probably going to be something that will be your friend. But if you're creating a section where you want to keep the motion going, where you want to keep it moving forward, all the way to the end of, say, the verse, then longer and shorter lines works pretty well. Now, having said that, take a look at the difference between the second line being shorter and the second line actually being longer that the first line. So, for example,[MUSIC] just a little shoebox in a package. Mama must have kept it with her all these years. [MUSIC] Just a little shoebox in a package. Mama must have kept it with her all these years. And at that point, we have a longer second line and the feeling there is still one of instability. But rather, then it's tipping us over and dropping us off the end of the building, and asking us please, please, please move forward. What it does, is it creates a spotlight. [MUSIC] Just a little shoebox in a package. [MUSIC] Mama must have kept it with her all these years. [MUSIC] And which puts a spotlight on all these years. Now, note that there's an interesting relationship between where we've just been with number of lines. And now, what we have here, let's say that what we've done in, Mama must have kept it with her all these years. Let's say that that's we're adding something. That is, we're adding extra length to the line. And that[SOUND] turns on spotlights. Remember, back to the great pretender, where when we had two verses that were exactly the same, verse one and verse two, then moving into the third verse, which added something extra. That the something extra, that fifth line had[SOUND] huge spotlights on it, because it was something that was added that we didn't expect. So, once you have a limelight establish like, just a little shoebox in a package. Now, it's up to you what you're going to do next. Are you going to match that line? Stable. Are you going to create a shorter line? Let's move forward, let's move forward. Or are you going to lengthen the line and spotlight an important idea? those are, you know, choices that you have. note that when you increase the length of that second line that on the way through, you've balanced the first line. And then, added something extra. So that in terms of it being really unstable, it doesn't feel that way. Adding extra stuff creates spotlights. Taking away stuff that you expect creates forward motion. In the next segment, we're going to look at some of the effects of line lengths. Just as we looked at some of the effects of number of lines, other than this whole relationship reciprocity.
