Resources

I’ve been seriously kicking around the idea of sharing some of my analysis into certain popular pop and rock tunes and what makes them work so well. I’m a total student of production, so I often tear apart a favorite production to figure out what makes it tick. What is it, when you strip away all the exterior and get down to the bare bones of the tune, that makes it such a kick-ass hooky piece of musical genius?

Well, in searching around to see if anyone had already beat me to the punch on this, I discovered several cats who are doing just that, with varying degrees of success, of course. I was excited to discover, though, that my buddy Jeff Tolbert, a successful composer and producer, is doing a version of this at his site filmscoring.info, but with a unique bent that might be interesting to musicians of all types. Jeff is delving into pop and rock tunes with the perspective of theory chops and the musicality behind each of them, and if that stuff lights your fire, his site is definitely one you’ll want to become familiar with.

The one I just read a few days ago was his treatise on the theory chops behind “Stairway to Heaven” by Led Zeppelin. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t regard Stairway as one of the greatest pieces of rock music in the modern compositional and production pantheon, so it was nice to read Jeff’s unique peek into the mechanics of such an iconic track.

Jeff also explores more than simply pop and rock analysis. In fact, the majority of his site is built around film scoring and the ins and outs of our profession. Let me urge you to check out what Jeff has to say and to consider adding it as a component to your daily reading and study. His perspectives are awesome and he’s always framing up something interesting to talk about.