Yesterday Once More

20 Sep 2016

Sounds

Music

Hi Listeners

The essence of all music is sound. But not all sound is music. Songwriters have cleverly matched sounds in their music to produce different effects. Sometimes sounds are used for novelty, or to emphasise some theme or to invoke emotions around certain familiar sounds. Shirley Ellis. an exponent of novelty sound, sang ‘The Clapping Song’ which also tapped into nursery rhymes and dance. Other singers used sounds for the catchiness of a chorus such as Crash Craddock’s ‘Boom Boom Baby’ and our own Aussie singer, Anne Hawker’s version of ‘Boom Bang A Bang’.

Familiar sounds are often used in pop songs. Bells are popular. The Browns homely story of Jimmy Brown is punctuated by ‘The Three Bells’ while the Fifth Estate cashed in on witchcraft with the catchy ‘Ding Dong The Witch Is Dead’. The Maguire sisters tap into a sound we all recognise – the school bell – in their bright song ‘Ding Dong’.
Shouting is another favourite sound. Both Style Council (Shout To The Top) and the Beatles (Twist And Shout) use the shouting sound to good effect. More subtle use of natural sound is in the Cascades ‘Rhythm Of The Rain’ while Herman’s Hermits sing about the absence of sound in ‘There’s A Kind Of Hush’. Buffalo Springfield utilised the sound of guns to emphasise their anti war theme in the classic sixties song ‘Stop Children What’s That Sound?’.

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