Music–The Rhythm of Your Writing

Chapter 4’s Main Takeaway: Readers will enjoy your writing more when the sentences are varied and the sound is rhythmic. In this chapter you’ll learn to put rhythm, or music, in your writing.

“The writer controls the pace for the reader, slow or fast or in between, and uses sentences of different lengths to create music, the rhythm of the story.” - Roy Peter Clark

Music. It’s one of the most important aspects of good writing, and it’s one of the least understood and written about. Music has to do with the sound of the writing to the reader’s ear. Is it rhythmic? Is it pleasant? Or is it dull, repetitive, or even irritating.

To illustrate the importance of rhythm in writing, think of one of your favorite songs. Likely, it’s a song with both lyrics and music. But what if you heard that song with the music tracks removed? Just the voice or voices. How would it sound? Lacking, at least, if not a little creepy. And then, what if you heard that song with only the instrumental tracks, without any lyrics? It would, again, likely sound lacking to you, even boring—think elevator music. The words and the music together make the song what it is, bringing it to its full potential.

It’s the same with writing. The meaning of the words is important, but the rhythm of the words bring the written expression to its full potential. Of course, what we write is not accompanied by literal music, but we can add rhythm and melody by such things as word choice, word order, variation of sentence and paragraph length, grammatical construction, and skillful use of punctuation.

There are two opportunities to add music to your writing. The first is during the writing process itself. Flow-writing, which we’ve learned mimics the spoken word, has rhythm built in. Most people speak with nicely varied sentences and with enough rhythm to keep their speech from sounding mechanical. So flow-writing practically takes care of the music by itself. It gets the rhythm of the words from your mind to the paper.

The other opportunity is during the editing process. Editors look for various qualities in the work they edit. They carefully examine grammar, spelling, punctuation, organization, and clarity of thought. But they also have their ears attuned to the sound of the writing. Is it rhythmic and pleasing? Does anything sound awkward and in need of reconstruction? The writer’s goal is to get the point across to the reader and to make it a pleasant experience. If the writing sounds pleasant to the ear, the reader is more likely to continue reading.

The connections of language and rhythm are deep-seated within us, going back to, well, before we were even born. Note these excerpts of an article that reported the results of a fascinating study concerning newborn babies and language:

“‘Only days after birth, babies have a bawl with language. Newborn babies cry in melodic patterns that they have heard in adults’ conversations—even while in the womb,’ say medical anthropologist Kathleen Wermke of the University of Würzburg in Germany, and her colleagues.

“‘By 2 to 5 days of age, infants’ cries bear the tuneful signature of their parents’ native tongue, a sign that language learning has already commenced,’ the researchers report in a paper published online November 5 in Current Biology.

“‘Fluent speakers use melodic patterns and pitch shifts to imbue words and phrases with emotional meaning. Changes in pitch and rhythm, for example, can indicate anger. During the last few months of fetal life, babies can hear what their mothers or other nearby adults are saying, providing exposure to melodies peculiar to a specific language,’ Wermke says. Newborns then re-create those familiar patterns in at least some of their cries, she proposes.

“‘German newborns’ cries tended to start out high-pitched and gravitate to increasingly lower pitches. French newborns’ cries started out low-pitched and then moved higher. Comparable high-to-low and low-to-high intonation patterns characterize words and phrases used by fluent speakers of German and French,’ Wermke says.” — Bruce Bower, Science News, November 5, 2009

This research highlights the importance of the sounds and rhythms of natural speech. They are an integral part of us, linked to events occurring even before childbirth. We bonded to the patterns of music and speech before we took our first breath of air. We take comfort in them. Logically, if readers find the cadences of our writing comforting, they’ll stay with it longer and enjoy the process more along the way.

Another series of studies shows the importance of music and rhythm to human activities. Specifically, this has to do with the effect of music on those who exercise. Note excerpts of the following article, which was written by Ferris Jabr and published in Scientific American on March 20, 2013:

“Research on the interplay of music and exercise dates to at least 1911, when American investigator Leonard Ayres found that cyclists pedaled faster while a band was playing than when it was silent. Since then psychologists have conducted around a hundred studies on the way music changes people’s performance in a variety of physical activities, ranging in intensity from strolling to sprinting.

 “In the last 10 years the body of research on workout music has swelled considerably, helping psychologists refine their ideas about why exercise and music are such an effective pairing for so many people as well as how music changes the body and mind during physical exertion. Music distracts people from pain and fatigue, elevates mood, increases endurance, reduces perceived effort and may even promote metabolic efficiency. When listening to music, people run farther, bike longer and swim faster than usual—often without realizing it. In a 2012 review of the research, Costas Karageorghis of Brunel University in London, one of the world’s leading experts on the psychology of exercise music, wrote that one could think of music as ‘a type of legal performance-enhancing drug.’

“In some cases, the rhythms of the underlying melody may not be as important as the cadence of the lyrics.

“Participants who cycled in time to music required 7 percent less oxygen to do the same work as cyclists who did not synchronize their movements with background music.”

Do you see the correlation to reading? If your words present a pleasing cadence, an enjoyable rhythm that replicates music, readers will stay with you longer. Reading will be less taxing for them and more enjoyable. Thus, writing with a pleasing rhythm is simply better writing.

Therefore, when you edit your own writing, in addition to looking for all the mechanical things that need to be corrected, you should also pay close attention to the melody. If it doesn’t sound pleasing, take steps to move things around until the same thoughts are being communicated in a rhythm that satisfies.

Language. Music. There is a close and unbreakable connection between the two. A good writer takes advantage of this connection, making sure the words do their work in a way that sounds sweet to the reader’s ear.

Ways to Add Music to Your Writing

Again, flow-writing is the number one way to add music to your writing. We tend to speak with a natural rhythm, as our ear monitors what we are saying and influences us to add variety to our words and sentences. Flow-writing helps us capture that natural rhythm on paper.

Three factors that help create pleasing writing patterns are 1) variation of sentence length, 2) variation of sentence structure, and 3) word choice.

We all know that the word “monotone” is not held in high esteem. And why should it be? It indicates monotony, boredom, and an impending nap. If most of our sentences follow similar patterns, having the same structure and approximately the same number of words and syllables, our writing will sound monotonous and will be boring.

It’s better to vary sentence length. Find a rhythm. Keep it. Then break it. Write a few short sentences. Then change the pattern by writing a longer sentence or two. But don’t use too many long sentences, as shorter ones tend to create better rhythm. Is it helpful to occasionally throw in a one-word sentence? Yes! Strive to pay attention to the rhythm, and rewrite whatever sounds awkward or painful to the ear. Good songs make skillful use of variation. So does good writing.

When sentence structure is varied, our writing sounds better to the reader’s ear. Notice this in the following four sentences, which say essentially the same thing, but each sentence begins with a different word class. (“Word class” refers to nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, etc.):

You might begin a sentence with a pronoun, like this one. Or you might begin a sentence with a conjunction, like this one. Consider beginning a sentence with a verb, like this one. Finally, begin a sentence with an adverb, like this one.

The variety of words that begin those sentences—“You” (pronoun), “Or” (conjunction), “Consider” (verb), and “Finally” (adverb)—give the sentences rhythm. Without this variety all four sentences would essentially be the same and would sound monotonous. There are usually multiple ways to construct any given sentence. Strive to use variety in the makeup of your sentences. Writing with your natural speech patterns will help you accomplish this. (Sentence length and structure is further discussed in chapter 18, “Sentence and Paragraph Structure.”)

The third factor is word choice. Each word has its own sound, its own feel. Sometimes two words can mean the same thing, but one word might sound better in a certain sentence. Words, like musical notes, work in harmony with each other, creating sounds and rhythms.

When deciding between words with almost identical meanings, let your ear be the judge. Take, for instance, the words “tranquil” and “serene.” They are intertwined as synonyms. Look up one in a thesaurus and perhaps the first choice given is the other. Both words mean “peaceful,” but some think the actual sound of one is more peaceful than the other. Can you guess which one most people select as the more peaceful sounding? It’s “serene.” “Serene” sounds like it’s dominated by soft vowels, whereas “tranquil” sounds like it’s dominated by harsh consonants, and it has a more nasal quality. It’s probably for this reason that “Serena,” which is based on the word “serene,” is a common girl’s name, whereas “Tranquila” is not. To most ears, likely, one of them just sounds better.

How Important is Sound to Writing?

How important is rhythm, or sound, to writing? That depends, more than anything, on the type of writing you’re producing.

Note the words of Jack Prelutsky: “Writing is not a visual art any more than composing music is a visual art. The sound of a word is at least as important as the meaning.”

Is the sound of the word really as important as the meaning? To Mr. Prelutsky, yes, because he’s a writer of children’s poetry, and children’s poetry needs to be lively and rhythmic to engage the young mind. Percentage-wise, with children’s poetry, sound is perhaps 80 to 90 percent of the task.

On the other end of the spectrum is technical writing. How important is sound to technical writing? Close to zero; maybe 10 to 20 percent, if even. Sound and rhythm definitely take a back seat to accuracy and clarity.

Most writing is somewhere in the middle. Your writing should sound as good as possible, but never at the expense of clarity or accuracy. Depending on the type and purpose of your writing, strive to achieve a balance.

An Example of Rhythmic Writing

Poetry, by its nature, is normally rhythmic. The words don’t necessarily have to rhyme, but the sound of the words is of great importance.

A wonderful example of rhythmic writing is found in the poem “Casey at the Bat.” If you’d like to read it now, please turn to page 201 of this book, where it’s included in its entirety. Notice the fine rhythm author Ernest Lawrence Thayer established. Again, keep in mind that this is poetry, and while general writing can’t quite match these precise rhythms, it’s beneficial to make your writing sound as good as it possibly can.

In Summary

To conclude this chapter, note the words of Elmore Leonard, who wrote: “I’m very much aware in the writing of dialogue, or even in the narrative too, of a rhythm. There has to be a rhythm with it . . . Interviewers have said, ‘you like jazz, don’t you? Because we can hear it in your writing.’ And I thought that was a compliment.”

Note, by the way, some aspects of Leonard’s quote that give it rhythm. He skillfully used commas in the first sentence to begin to create a beat: the word count, separated by commas, is a precise 9-6-3. He consecutively started sentences with “because” and “and.” This added pace, speeding things up. Because those words act as connectives, they made the pause at the periods seem just a little more brief. He threw in a question. His sentence length was descending: as he continued, he used shorter sentences.

By the way, if it’s true that you can hear distinct types of music in an author’s work, you might hear lots of ‘60s and ‘70s music in my writing. Musically, I’m sort of stuck, but happily so, in those glorious decades. But whatever your taste, put the sounds and rhythms of music in your writing. Your readability will soar.

End Quote:

“To write is to create music. The words you write make sounds, and when those sounds are in harmony, the writing will work.

“So think of your writing as music. Your story might sound like the ‘Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2,’ or it might sound like ‘Satisfaction.’ You decide. But give it unity. It should not sound like a musical battle between the Cleveland Symphony Orchestra and the Rolling Stones.

“Read aloud what you write and listen to its music. Listen for dissonance. Listen for the beat. Listen for the gaps where the music leaps from sound to sound instead of following as it should. Listen for sour notes. Is this word a little sharp, is that one a little bit flat? Listen for instruments that don’t blend well. Is there an electric guitar shrieking among the whispers of flutes and violins? Imagine the sound of each word as an object falling into the eardrum. Does it make a soft landing sound like the word ‘ripple,’ or does it land hard and dig in like the word ‘inexorable’? Does it cut off all sound for an instant, like the word ‘brutal,’ or does it massage the reader’s ear, like ‘melodious’?

“There are no good sounds or bad sounds, just as there are no good notes or bad notes in music. It is the way in which you combine them that can make the writing succeed or fail. It’s the music that matters.” – Gary Provost, 100 Ways to Improve Your Writing

This is chapter 4 from my book, Write With Your Speaking Voice, in its entirety. It’s a reader favorite, and one of my favorites too. I highly recommend applying its advice if you want to be a better writer.

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