How To Arrange A Song

Learning how to arrange a song is critical to it sounding . . . well, good.

Not only will it improve your songwriting skills, but it will help you grow as a musician in a number of ways as well.

It will improve your aural skills, allow you to communicate your ideas to your bandmates better, and teach you more about the instruments that make up your songs. 

But to successfully learn how to arrange, you first need to learn the components that make up arrangement.

Arrangement can cover multiple stages of a song’s life.

It can simply be the decision to a repeat a section when first creating the song, or as complex as adding an orchestra to your studio version years after.

What’s nice is the same components that work to create simple arrangements also work for more in-depth arrangements, and you’re probably already familiar with most.

Picking your tool of choice

This may seem obvious, but paying attention to the instruments that make up a song is one of the first steps in arranging.

First though, you need to decide which instrument will be your tool for arranging, and don’t worry - this instrument doesn’t have to be the main instrument you play. 

The main three instruments most people arrange a song with are: piano, guitar, or computer.

The piano is most likely your best bet, as writing parts on the piano often translates to other instruments the easiest, and piano is more ingrained in western music compared to any other instrument. 

Maybe you’re not a great pianist or guitarist though, and can’t translate what’s in your head with them.

This is why using a computer can be great, as it allows you to write and arrange parts on various instruments that may be above your playing level.

Knowing the key(s) your song is in, is important for a few reasons.

First, it allows your band members to have a better idea of what notes they should and shouldn’t play. But most importantly, knowing how to transpose your key to another key is a crucial component of arranging.

Most singers would say they have preferred keys which highlight their best tones and allow them to sing more comfortably.

It’s usually a smart move to change your key if your singer isn’t gelling with it.

I love this scale-finder tool. You just plug in one or more notes you want to use and you get an assortment of scales you could use. 

Using dynamics to your advantage

Dynamics can mean both volume and climatic range, and is useful for creating tension and highlighting certain parts. A song with no dynamics is an easy way to have a boring and monotonous tune on your hands. 

Working on a melody

Melody is often what gets a song stuck in your head.

If you’re happy with your melody, but the song feels off, try and mess with other factors first before changing your melody.

Melody and your song’s identity often go hand in hand.

A simple change in melody may completely change up how your song feels, and force you to radically change your arrangement to work with the new melody.

Understanding tempo and groove 

Figuring out how to sit your instruments in with the drum groove is critical to having a natural sounding song.

When changing tempo, remember, too fast of a song can leave you and your song feeling fatigued, but too slow can leave your listeners bored and falling asleep. 

Creating structure

Most song structures resemble something like: intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, interlude, chorus, and outro.

This is typically called the pop standard. You’ll usually want to stick close to this formula and learn how to manipulate it while keeping the core the same. 

Adding transitions 

If your transitions into sections are terrible, your brilliant section arrangements won’t make an impression.

Transitions can be simply be hitting a chord harder as it goes into the chorus or it can be an entirely new section of the song.

Now let’s put those arrangement components to good use and get the most out of your song. Which, brings us to our first note: it’s all about listening to your song!

When we say that, we mean listening to the song and being critical of it. It’s listening for boring moments, for parts where there is too much going on, areas where the song falls apart, etc.

It’s things like respecting the instruments that are already there and highlighting their best moments before adding anything else.

Basically, you’re listening for ways to improve your song.

Arrangement can and will make you uncomfortable, folks. You’re purposely poking holes in your song, which often can feel like a child to you, but it is needed if you want to create something great.

And if the song comes out great, you won’t care that you tore it asunder before. Ok, back to the action.

First, ask yourself what your song means and represents to you, what do you want to get out of the song?

If your song’s main highlight is its emotional and sullen lyrics, you don’t want a barrage of sounds obscuring that.

This may mean that you need to temporarily pigeonhole yourself, ask what genre your song is in, and decide if you’re highlighting the genre’s best attributes.

You also need to find the balance between what you want, what your band members want, and what your audience wants. There is no right or wrong ratio.

If you’re creating music for yourself, that’s great, as well as creating music for the sake for others. Again, you’ll want to think of the genre you play in and what others do.

Once, you’ve got all that in mind, you can start figuring out what your song exactly needs.

Give your song a general once-through and listen to it as a whole. Jot down how the song made you feel, what stood out to you, etc.

Then listen to the song again, listening to the main instruments one at a time.

Say there is bass in your song, but you’re not the bass player, take the time and listen solely to that. Listen to how it transitions through sections, denote where it falls flat or sits back, etc. Understand the part as if you wrote it.

1.) Listen to your song as if it’s not your own.

It sucks, we know, and we are hitting it over the head, but you need to listen to your song with a critical ear!

Often, when you’re arranging a song, it’s still fresh and sounds like the greatest thing in the world, so you’re afraid to touch it.

But remember, that honeymoon period will wear off, and you may find your now old song needs a lot of work.

​2.) Listen, listen, listen to the experts and professional musicians.

Sit down with a song you love and apply the same arrangement listening techniques you learned above. Find out why exactly you love the song.

3.) Know how to communicate your ideas to your bandmates.

Knowing basic music theory like keys, scales, and time signatures will make the songwriting and arrangement process so much easier and will result in a better song.

​4.) The intro makes the first impression.

You’ve probably heard that people have worse attention spans than goldfish, and whether that’s indeed true doesn’t matter, because you know and we know that we suck at paying attention.

Time yourself whenever you listen to a new song and see how fast you make a decision about it.

You probably barely make it past the intro before you decide whether you like it or not.

​5.) Lastly, let’s talk about clichés.

Personally, we think they’re called that for a reason because people are attracted to and like certain sounds.

Yeah, they may be overplayed but there is a reason we like 4/4 time signatures, perfect 5th harmonies, and a verse-chorus formula.

Our brains are wired to create and like certain patterns - this is what music theory is all about; because it describes why we create what we create.

Instead of writing them off, try to work with them and put your own spin on them.

Rather than going from a verse to chorus, add a pre-chorus in between that not only gives you a better transition but adds additional material that makes your song more interesting.

I hope you have enjoyed this article!
If you have any questions, feel free to drop a comment below and we will get back to you.