Honestly, I’m not sure I’ll ever find another song as perfect as this one. This might be one of the more difficult posts for me to write; this song excites me so much, it will be hard to find the right way to describe it without completely understating. I’ll try to wrap my head around it anyway.
Jason’s song, from my understanding, was co-written with an unbelievably talented jazz pianist named Jason Brown. I highly encourage you to read about his journey into the making of this song, which appears on his personal blog here. http://jasonrobertbrown.com/2016/09/19/wrote-song-ariana-grandes-album/ You can also listen to the piano track stripped away from the percussion, strings and vocals, and if you’re a total geek for jazz piano (*ahem* Shagun) try to keep your head from exploding, like mine did.
The piece starts off with a few minimalist jazz chords in a funky, syncopated rhythm. After a few bars, some clear snapping enters on beats 2 and 4, to keep the track bouncy. Jason’s left hand starts introducing a monstrous baseline; one of the best things about this song is the fact that the piano part is ever changing. The piece moves you along at a pretty fast pace, especially compared to some of Ariana Grande’s other, less exciting works (see my last post).
The first time I heard Ariana’s vocals to this song, I was heavily impressed. The melody that she sings barely coordinates with the rhythm of the piano at all, and it took a bit of energy to wrap my head around it. Just as soon as I was satisfied with the simple one-note vocals, it switched into something else.
At 0:35, the chord progression changes, and some thick background vocals enter. The baseline and piano part maintain their upbeat rhythm, but Ariana starts really showing off her incredible range. It’s not often that a verse will split off into a completely different melody, and its even more rare that they both are good. Another interesting aspect of these phrases is the random appearances of various instruments. Instead of having a guitar strum the entire time, the producers added sudden, tinny embellishments at the beginning of each phrase: A fun strings rhythm here, a funky slap-bass solo there. As courageous as all of this is, the aspect of the bridge that threw me the biggest loop happens right at the end.
Throughout all of music history, from Gregorian chants to Katy Perry, four bar phrases have been the norm, and only some serious musical ballers have dared stray from this. Ariana Grande is now one of these serious musical ballers; she joins the hall of fame that includes classical composers like Schubert and Liszt. Instead of the predictable four bar phrase, she adds another measure of music and the line becomes an almost unheard-of five bar phrase. The harmonic function of this fifth measure is an extension of the dominant chord, meaning she adds an incredible amount of tension and build-up by delaying the entrance of the chorus. For four whole beats, she continues her vocal theme, the piano plays some very obscure chords one after the other, and the percussion thins away into nothing more than a loud snap. Baller move.
After really building up the chorus, it becomes very difficult to introduce a new melody thats impressive enough to live up to the hype. Surprise, surprise, Ariana comes through for us. This chorus (starting at around 0:55) starts heavy on the downbeat, which adds a lot of movement to the song. Some other background aspects are also introduced, such as some female vocalists, electric guitar, and thicker percussion. I was almost disappointed with the lack of piano in the chorus, until I got to the piano solo.
Often, in today’s music, piano is used as nothing more than a filler instrument, or something to arpeggiate stupidly simple chords so that Adele can sing a power ballad overtop. Jason Brown’s solo is literally a dream come true for a hopeless piano enthusiast like myself. I by no means consider myself an expert at the piano, but usually I know enough to analyze chord progressions or offer some insight into the creative process of the soloist. In this case, however, Jason has played circles around me. For this specific minute of the song, I’d prefer to just listen and fangirl instead of try to nitpick Jason Brown’s creativity; pretending to understand the genius of the man would be borderline offensive.
Jason’s song is a true example of everything I wish today’s artists produced. Its creative, catchy, and I still haven’t tired of it. It’s complicated enough to engage its entire audience, but the vocals are simple enough to comprehend. I’m exceptionally impressed with the courage that Ariana put into this song, and I hope to see more like it.
I’m so glad to see that the subtleties of jazz are being incorporated into recent pop releases, there’s a lot to be said about the delicate and often understated character of an individual component of a good jazz tune. For me, this is most obvious when I listen to early Jimi Hendrix or Cream; the drummers are so damn good, but it can be hard to appreciate it on the first listen because of the inclination to focus on Jimi or Eric Clapton play guitar.