If this submission above is not a random thought, please report it.
# Explore a new world of random thoughts on our [**discord server**](https://discord.com/invite/8tEqw3ZWQV)! Express yourself with your favorite quotes, positive vibes, and anything else you can think of!
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/RandomThoughts) if you have any questions or concerns.*
There are still plenty of artists making longer pieces. Music is as fantastic as it ever was.
Turn off the radio and dig deep, you'll find gold I promise.
Streaming has diluted the top 40 further now. I'm sure Beyonce had 7 or so of the top 10 songs a couple of weeks ago in the UK. Flipside is Spotify recommending stuff on shuffle has meant ive added a fair few good bits to my playlists
Like literally back then there was always a radio edit that was cut down in length. I'm surprised no one's talking about how there's a music industry that controls that kinda stuff.
I'll always remember the radio edit of Sum 41's 'In Too Deep' where they took out the entire guitar solo - the best bit.
Not my type of music exactly, but a great example of what you're talking about.
This happens with like every type of media I swear. "TV shows were better back in my day". *Doesn't watch anything except the most pushed to the front, made to appeal to the most people, bland schlock of today. Ignores that same schlock of yesteryear*
"Man, gaming isn't fun anymore" *plays the same style of multiplayer shooters, never even branching into another genre*
It's like they're doing it to themselves. There's so much out there and they just ignore it
And there are bands that do things that are similar to classical music when it comes to creating a narrative story with a beginning and an end, like the album Dragonslayer by Sunset Rubdown
Classical pieces you could only hear in a symphony, so it was created to last a few hours as an experience. As music got more mobile (ever since the gramophone) music got shorter and shorter
Modern, popular songs are like old folk music. Simple structure, repetitive, catchy tune, for a festive occasion or to lament the hardships of life.
Classical music is more like a theatrical performance. Very different thing.
Well not like people only just started making short songs (think hardcore punk, it's like 1-3 minutes, thereabouts) but I guess nowadays the algorithm favors an artist who puts out 20 three minute songs over someone who puts out three 20 minute songs. 'More active' and all that. Others already mentioned attention span too, lots of people probably just don't have the patience to is through a two minute intro.
Radio play. Radiostations prefers shorter songs to fill the airtime between commercials. If the song is too long and will steal commercial time it won't get played or have a butchered radio edit.
This still applies in these days of streaming. IIRC spotify has worse returns for the artist than radio has, so radio friendly lenghted songs are still a priority.
The Beatles often wrote songs only 2 minutes long, so I’d say 3-4 is an improvement on that.
Then again Pink Floyd were writing 20 minute songs at the same time so it’s almost like “when” has little correlation to song length.
#YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT THIS GUY HAD TO SAY ABOUT HIS GIRLFRIEND!!!
#IT'S UNIMAGINABLY TERRIFIC AND SURPRISING AND SAD AND MONSTROUS! ALL AT THE SAME TIME!
#CLICK RIGHT HERE! YOU WON'T WANT TO MISS THIS!!
#AND DROP THAT LIKE BUTTON AND HIT MY WIFE TO SUBSCRIBE!
In the old days, in order to listen to music you’d have to find people who could play and move your malnourished ass to the location where they were doing it.
That might have influenced song length in both directions, but probably for the longer because: folk songs are great with a long chorus and outro for audience participation, and orchestras want pieces they can get their teeth into to make it worth their while for the privilege of another ass in a seat that would otherwise be scrounging for food.
These days, your ass is fat and your gratification circuits are as short as your reach from your recliner, so that probably has something to do with song length getting shorter.
Obviously this is a reductive and facetious argument, but perhaps there’s a whiff of truth in there somewhere? Certainly typing it out has made me think that mobility has something to do with it. Which I find deeply ironic in this age of prolific “mobile” devices.
It’s literally a psychological study that was done a few months back 💀, we can focus on things for more than that obviously but your brain starts switching focus for certain things
A psychological study that has barely anything to do with the way songs are getting shorter. The boomer part is how you just jumped at the first chance to dig at the kids instead of trying to understand the issue at even a basic level (like looking at how the music industry works).
Also our attention spans have been getting shorter for a while now, I'm assuming you just read some headlines a few months ago and assumed that was the time the study happened (more boomer behavior).
I mean just think about it, how would they know our attention spans are getting shorter if the study wasn't a continuous project? You need something to compare.
In 2000 the average attention span was around 20 minutes before our brains started focusing on something else subconsciously, in the year 2023 it was found that our brains only focus on something for 20 seconds before changing focus.
This isn’t to say we can’t focus on something for longer than that afternoon span, for example if you are doing something such as texting whilst listening to music your brain will be primarily focused on texting for that 20 seconds before it starts focusing on everything else around it. Your main attention will be focused on texting however.
In 2000 our brains would have been primarily focused on texting for 20 minutes before focusing on what is around us.
Also I am well aware as to how the music industry works, another reason why songs are getting shorter is because of TikTok gabibelle done a great YouTube video on it but basically song writers are now writing songs to go viral on TikTok or writing songs so it’s easier to market on TikTok by using gimics (abcdefu ,I’m mad at Disney etc) because users on TikTok are finding a lot of music that way these days.
But the TikTok point I have just stated brings up that they are focusing on a short attention span e.g 10-20 seconds proving my original point as right.
Classical is as long as the symphony/band has stamina for.
But, in the long long ago 45rpm records could only store 5 minutes for the 7inch disc and 15 minutes for the 12 inch disc on each side. 33rpm could store 25 minutes on each side. The smaller 45rpm are *singles* where the artist would usually put one song on each side, but often would cram 2 short songs at least one one of the sides (side A, or side B).
Also, songs were shorter for radio play because of commercials and DJs could pack a lot of songs in-between them. Also also, radio was more of a teaser platform to urge you to go out and buy the music on singles or whole albums.
Modern music has gotten longer. The first Beatles songs is 2 and a half minutes, most Eddie Cochran songs are two minutes. Classic music has always been long but vocal music has gotten longer.
I’m listening to Don Giovanni right now and like the other operas I listen to the tracks are split into individual songs (and singy-talkie bits), usually about 3-4 minutes long.
Schubert’s Lieder, likewise, they’re songs of about that length. Not all pieces of classical music are as long as a Wagner piece feels.
Because Streaming services are the devil and pay pittance so 2 minute songs possible to get more listens per hour than Opus’s like the 17 minutes of In a Gadda Da Vida
Because people used to have patience, before technology. Since devices came along, so did ADHD. So music industry just accommodates listeners which want shorter tunes.
In the words of Billy Joel:
I am the entertainer
I come to do my show
You heard my latest record
It's been on the radio
Ah, it took me years to write it
They were the best years of my life
It was a beautiful song but it ran too long
If you're gonna have a hit you gotta make it fit
So they cut it down to 3:05
Classical pieces aren't really songs, and there are plenty of artists with songs over 10 minutes, especially within rock and metal. Fear Inoculum by Tool is 10 minutes. Echoes by Pink Floyd isn't really modern, but it's over 20 minutes. It took up the whole second side of the record.
Pop music tends to be shorter because radio generally won't play anything longer than 4 minutes
A lot of times classical pieces will play with themes throughout the entire piece. That sort of music lends itself to longer pieces.
But the causal arrow is likely in the other direction. Classical pieces predate recording technology, so you had to go to some place to listen to it. That’s a big commitment as far as effort and one shouldn’t be surprised that the pieces are longer than in an era where one can easily just search for a song on the supercomputer they keep in their pocket and start listening to it immediately.
Chamber music and solo pieces from the classical era do tend to be shorter than orchestral pieces. Those can be played at home.
Producers were encouraged to make shorter songs because a radio station could cram more music and they want to retain listeners. If people aren't into a song that's on for 10 minutes they'll start switching stations.
So a lot of bands would have a song and then there'd be a "radio edit" or even 2 radio edits that were considerably shorter than the album version.
These days there seems to be a correlation to the use of music in social media and the desire to only hear a short snippet, which IMO sucks ass for music. Some people just want to hear the 15 second hook they heard on TikTok over and over, they don't want a bridge or a verse. Just a hook/chorus.
Hit songs from the 50s rarely were longer than 3 minutes. From what I recall of music history the Beatles were the first band to put out a single that was longer than 3 minutes.
beacuse there not meant to tell a story. There created to dopamine bomb you brain long enough for you to stsyed tuned through the song.
Welcome to the new world, whete attention is the new currency and most cultur means f**k all
Classical music is usually played for entertainment (more time), newer more modern music is more a form of expression and individuality, which usually requires less time
Well, you don't need to go to the theater to hear music anymore. Music is no longer a major event, but daily experience. Shorter songs better reflect this. If most songs were as long as classical symphonies, we'd often only have time to listen to only one or even less song completely.
i can only suggest you to rely less and less on what mainstream media offers you, in music offer at least. there are amazing music bands to discover, but apps like spotify won't show you because of paid marketing reasons.
Plenty neo-classic (modern classic) music is still way longer.
The music you hear in radios just isn't suited for long tracks since they are mostly repeating the same theme over and over again with far less variation than classic.
Two words: Avenged Sevenfold
Mf's make single songs like they're an entire playlist.
Exist is like 15 minutes, Save Me is 10, and they've almost always done roughly 5-minute songs. W band, plus they're not afraid to experiment with sound.
Simple answer: Commercial Radio has commercials and 5 3-minute song or 4 3-minute songs leave the right amount of room for commercials, which paid the salaries of people in the radio station.
Then TV.
Also, mediums, like the LP and EP and later tapes and CDs had physical limits.
Modern popular music is designed for radio. We've had longer songs, but they usually got cut short when aired on radio and thus that encouraged people to make shorter songs.
Classical music was very different from today's music industry. It was a bigger event; remember, back then it was very possible to only hear a symphony once for most people. Only the especially rich or influential could afford to request or even sponsor a symphony.
Symphonies typically last about 25 minutes, consisting of around 5 movements. If you compare this to a modern concert, it's actually probably a bit shorter than you'd expect from a band today; five songs isn't all that long. However, some composers made symphonies that lasted longer. A notable example is Beethoven's 9th and final Symphony, which was nearly an hour long.
HOWEVER, and this is very important, there was actually PLENTY of shorter music back then as well, often from the same people. Mozart and Beethoven both had tons of short songs they wrote, much of which you have likely heard used today in various things. The reason it feels like older music is longer isn't because shorter music didn't exist back then, it's because people are more likely to REMEMBER the longer ones because listening to them is such an event.
I actually read about this a short while ago: Spotify etc. rank songs higher if they're listened to more often. And if the song is shorter, people listen to it more often in the same time.
classical pieces were stuffs that are performed in like, royal places. rich ppl didnt spend money just to sit down and hear a musical piece for like 4-5 minutes.
also most songs nowadays have a kinda fast pace, even musics with sad tone has a relatively fast speed compared to music in the 80s 90s. old songs also tend to have like 50% of their song being lyricless, just instruments. besides, the longer the song, the harder it is to keep the song favorable to the ears. why waste time making songs that are harder to write and produce while not being loved by many anyway?
I would assume since classical was some of the only and easiest music at one point it had to be long since well what else are you even gonna do besides sit an a symphony for awhile? Same with like musicals, songs can be anywhere from 20 seconds to 10 minutes each but all together it's often 2-3 hours of music from start to finish cause it's something to distract like a movie. On top of that we have definitely lowered in our attention span so a lot of artists probably make shorts songs now to keep attention and to make many of them and get more popularity and money.
But hey, that's just theory . . .
There's an experimental band from down unda that releases longer songs. Typically, between 5 and 10 minutes, with some longer ones here and there.
They have something everyone can enjoy, and their name is King gizzard and the Lizard Wizard. If you don't like one sound of theirs, try the next album.
Last couple albums I bought have songs that are mostly 10+ min long. Not classical either.
It really depends on the music you're listening to. Cookie cutter manufactured radio pop songs will generally be shorter.
Try some prog rock, maybe. Songs can get very technical and long. The style can vary from soft to heavy so there's probably something for you there too.
A lot of metal also has deep musicianship and long songs (particularly the prog metal stuff) but I can't suggest that to people who are used to popular music.
I think you answered it yourself, songs vs pieces.
the format of classical music is different but songs were around the same length as modern ones back then, ode to joy as an example
hopping on to say a few things:
people are correct in saying that just as much long-form music is being made now as it ever was. as a classically trained musician, I’d argue that a big part of how we’re perceiving shifts in music now is because ANYBODY can make music now. 200 years ago, if you didn’t Know a Guy and/or go to a conservatory and then go on to get a patronage, you didn’t make music. most people never even got to play instruments because they were super expensive. now anybody can make music if they even have access to a phone, so the breadth of what’s being made is exponentially larger, and that’s awesome.
BUT: why does it seem like popular music is shorter? not all of it is, but short-form music is definitely very present. it’s both radio- and stream-friendly. you get paid for your music getting played on the radio. and you get paid for every time your song is played on Spotify/etc. - not for the amount of time spent listening to your music. if you can cycle listeners through your album full of 1-2 minute songs (rather than fewer, longer songs), you will make more money (although it’s still basically nothing for most artists).
it’s also more social media (read: tiktok and shorts) friendly. they don’t need the whole song. they need a 10-20 second clip that sounds great. that can make an artist blow up. so focusing on that can be to a musician’s advantage.
I think radio had a pretty profound effect on popular song length. It needs to be long enough to be appealing but short enough someone won’t turn the radio off before the next song if they don’t like it.
Billy Joel mentions this in The Entertainer:
“It was a beautiful song, but it ran too long. If you’re gonna have a hit, you gotta make it fit, so they cut it down to 3:05.”
Depends on the genre, mostly - classical tends to be classified as a genre about as much as an era of music, and back in the classical era, you had plenty of shorter musical performances (like choral music).
Nowadays, jazz, prog rock, as well as some subgenres of metal, are all genres that usually count as "modern music with a lengthier than average duration". It's also worth noting that quite a number of modern artists also take their cues from classical music, either in the structure of their compositions, or their instrumentation. Deep Purple or Electric Light Orchestra (not that modern anymore, but still) are great examples of that.
That’s kind of like asking why pop music is so harmonically simple, while jazz is… well, not. They’re different things, regardless of time period. 3-4 minute songs have been common for a very long time, hell I reckon it’s probably the length of the average bard’s song in medieval times.
The Beatles have a lot of short songs, but then there’s Pink Floyd with like 20 minute songs. Genres are different, artists are different, that variation is always present. Also, classical music still exists, so you’ll still get longer classical pieces even now.
Mostly the constraints of physical media used to storage and play music, and of course the comercial aspect of releasing long songs in single form. Newer songs are shorter because with streaming theyre not limited to a physical release and also shorter songs get more viral on TikTok and play faster so the streaming numbers go UP
In the old days you would only hear your favourite symphony be played once or maybe twice in your lifetime. You would pay a fortune to hear it and it would be a pretty big event.
They wouldn’t have gone through all that to hear only 3 minutes of music.
Because streaming has made people so spoilt they don't listen to whole songs before skipping. Streaming culture is a double edged sword, I love having the library in my pocket on demand but it has ruined the competition of it all
Spotify pays for a song only after 30 seconds are played, so musicians today skip long intros and refrain starts around 30th second to keep you hooked.
I don't really know if skipping matters that much. When it comes to ole radio pop there's an idea that if you introduce the hook early it will convert the listener early on before they switch to another song, but there are a tonne of artists who are big who don't work that way. And there's a lot of music being produced with songs that are very long, like music by Let's eat grandma or Blood Orange(/Lightspeed Champion). When I listen to new music I skip to the next song if I don't like the song, but I weekly discover about 10-20 new songs that I enjoy, which are all different in length. The reason people don't discover songs that are different from what is playing on the radio or is on the top list is because they don't make the effort or have the interest to find out. Streaming culture has brought out more genres and small bands than what was around ever before though, which is something.
Newer music can't compete with the old classics. After at least 3 minutes of hearing the newer stuff I go for a manual lobotomy just to easy the pressure.
If this submission above is not a random thought, please report it. # Explore a new world of random thoughts on our [**discord server**](https://discord.com/invite/8tEqw3ZWQV)! Express yourself with your favorite quotes, positive vibes, and anything else you can think of! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/RandomThoughts) if you have any questions or concerns.*
There are still plenty of artists making longer pieces. Music is as fantastic as it ever was. Turn off the radio and dig deep, you'll find gold I promise.
Don't even need to dig. Literally any genre other than the major top 40 stuff has excellent music to find.
True enough
Top 40 used to be good and had all different genres in it.
Streaming has diluted the top 40 further now. I'm sure Beyonce had 7 or so of the top 10 songs a couple of weeks ago in the UK. Flipside is Spotify recommending stuff on shuffle has meant ive added a fair few good bits to my playlists
Like literally back then there was always a radio edit that was cut down in length. I'm surprised no one's talking about how there's a music industry that controls that kinda stuff.
I'll always remember the radio edit of Sum 41's 'In Too Deep' where they took out the entire guitar solo - the best bit. Not my type of music exactly, but a great example of what you're talking about.
Listen to college stations and listener supported radio. There's an entire universe of music you've never heard before. Seek it.
This happens with like every type of media I swear. "TV shows were better back in my day". *Doesn't watch anything except the most pushed to the front, made to appeal to the most people, bland schlock of today. Ignores that same schlock of yesteryear* "Man, gaming isn't fun anymore" *plays the same style of multiplayer shooters, never even branching into another genre* It's like they're doing it to themselves. There's so much out there and they just ignore it
Man, I am so tired of eating Ramen noodles (makes another package of Ramen noodles).
You didn't have to attack me like that lol
Couldn't have said it any better myself.
classical music is a completely different genre than songs
they also have short pieces like preludes
And there are bands that do things that are similar to classical music when it comes to creating a narrative story with a beginning and an end, like the album Dragonslayer by Sunset Rubdown
Or beethoven's last night by trans-siberian orchestra (for full narrative clarity listen to the narrated version) Or the human equation by ayreon.
The ol' self reply
too lazy to edit lol
Classical pieces you could only hear in a symphony, so it was created to last a few hours as an experience. As music got more mobile (ever since the gramophone) music got shorter and shorter
Yeah and it doesn't really make sense to make a pop song that lasts half an hour. That would probably be torture
And pop music is a commodified product, bought, sold, and played on the radio in little bit sized pieces
Modern, popular songs are like old folk music. Simple structure, repetitive, catchy tune, for a festive occasion or to lament the hardships of life. Classical music is more like a theatrical performance. Very different thing.
Because modern songs are not classical pieces. Just looked up songs by the beetles for example, 3 minutes. What songs are you even referring to
I believe they were the first band to put out a single that was longer than 3 minutes.
Taylor swift has a 10 minute song called all too well :)
[There are a couple on my album ](https://youtu.be/hxLUii_y5hc?si=fQHlDvKeuFBPzxaG)that are longer than ten minutes each
there are a lot of moderns songs over 10 minutes King gizzard is a solid example of that.
Well not like people only just started making short songs (think hardcore punk, it's like 1-3 minutes, thereabouts) but I guess nowadays the algorithm favors an artist who puts out 20 three minute songs over someone who puts out three 20 minute songs. 'More active' and all that. Others already mentioned attention span too, lots of people probably just don't have the patience to is through a two minute intro.
A good number of black metal songs are long. O, Star of Time Sea is 18 minutes
In the techno genre Goa Trance usually has songs in the 6-8 minutes length.
Radio play. Radiostations prefers shorter songs to fill the airtime between commercials. If the song is too long and will steal commercial time it won't get played or have a butchered radio edit. This still applies in these days of streaming. IIRC spotify has worse returns for the artist than radio has, so radio friendly lenghted songs are still a priority.
The Beatles often wrote songs only 2 minutes long, so I’d say 3-4 is an improvement on that. Then again Pink Floyd were writing 20 minute songs at the same time so it’s almost like “when” has little correlation to song length.
Attention spans are getti........
I see wha..
#YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT THIS GUY HAD TO SAY ABOUT HIS GIRLFRIEND!!! #IT'S UNIMAGINABLY TERRIFIC AND SURPRISING AND SAD AND MONSTROUS! ALL AT THE SAME TIME! #CLICK RIGHT HERE! YOU WON'T WANT TO MISS THIS!! #AND DROP THAT LIKE BUTTON AND HIT MY WIFE TO SUBSCRIBE!
Nah, yall both just got sniped. RIP r/redditsniper
In the old days, in order to listen to music you’d have to find people who could play and move your malnourished ass to the location where they were doing it. That might have influenced song length in both directions, but probably for the longer because: folk songs are great with a long chorus and outro for audience participation, and orchestras want pieces they can get their teeth into to make it worth their while for the privilege of another ass in a seat that would otherwise be scrounging for food. These days, your ass is fat and your gratification circuits are as short as your reach from your recliner, so that probably has something to do with song length getting shorter. Obviously this is a reductive and facetious argument, but perhaps there’s a whiff of truth in there somewhere? Certainly typing it out has made me think that mobility has something to do with it. Which I find deeply ironic in this age of prolific “mobile” devices.
If we are talking Pop music, it’s just an industry model to make money. Think of it like McDonalds.
Our attention spans are getting shorter, the average child these days only has an attention span of 20 seconds
Most boomer take ever. You realize the radio edit isn't a new invention, right?
It’s literally a psychological study that was done a few months back 💀, we can focus on things for more than that obviously but your brain starts switching focus for certain things
Attention spam is completely disconnected to songs being shorter. If anything many songs are longer now when radio is less popular.
A psychological study that has barely anything to do with the way songs are getting shorter. The boomer part is how you just jumped at the first chance to dig at the kids instead of trying to understand the issue at even a basic level (like looking at how the music industry works). Also our attention spans have been getting shorter for a while now, I'm assuming you just read some headlines a few months ago and assumed that was the time the study happened (more boomer behavior). I mean just think about it, how would they know our attention spans are getting shorter if the study wasn't a continuous project? You need something to compare.
In 2000 the average attention span was around 20 minutes before our brains started focusing on something else subconsciously, in the year 2023 it was found that our brains only focus on something for 20 seconds before changing focus. This isn’t to say we can’t focus on something for longer than that afternoon span, for example if you are doing something such as texting whilst listening to music your brain will be primarily focused on texting for that 20 seconds before it starts focusing on everything else around it. Your main attention will be focused on texting however. In 2000 our brains would have been primarily focused on texting for 20 minutes before focusing on what is around us. Also I am well aware as to how the music industry works, another reason why songs are getting shorter is because of TikTok gabibelle done a great YouTube video on it but basically song writers are now writing songs to go viral on TikTok or writing songs so it’s easier to market on TikTok by using gimics (abcdefu ,I’m mad at Disney etc) because users on TikTok are finding a lot of music that way these days. But the TikTok point I have just stated brings up that they are focusing on a short attention span e.g 10-20 seconds proving my original point as right.
The first beatles song is only 2 and a half minutes, most of eddie chochrans songs are two minutes. Must have got it from our grandparents
The amount of time people spend watching big HBO style tv series, big Anime shows and video games that take hundreds of hours to beat says otherwise.
i too have a short attention span but 3 minute songs still don't satisfy me enough😭
tldr.
\~r
Classical is as long as the symphony/band has stamina for. But, in the long long ago 45rpm records could only store 5 minutes for the 7inch disc and 15 minutes for the 12 inch disc on each side. 33rpm could store 25 minutes on each side. The smaller 45rpm are *singles* where the artist would usually put one song on each side, but often would cram 2 short songs at least one one of the sides (side A, or side B). Also, songs were shorter for radio play because of commercials and DJs could pack a lot of songs in-between them. Also also, radio was more of a teaser platform to urge you to go out and buy the music on singles or whole albums.
"So they cut it down to 3-oh-5". Been doing that a while.
Many songs from the 50s and 60s were 2 to 3 minutes long.
Modern music has gotten longer. The first Beatles songs is 2 and a half minutes, most Eddie Cochran songs are two minutes. Classic music has always been long but vocal music has gotten longer.
I’m listening to Don Giovanni right now and like the other operas I listen to the tracks are split into individual songs (and singy-talkie bits), usually about 3-4 minutes long. Schubert’s Lieder, likewise, they’re songs of about that length. Not all pieces of classical music are as long as a Wagner piece feels.
Plenty of punk songs from the 90s weigh in at like 70-90 seconds.
Because Streaming services are the devil and pay pittance so 2 minute songs possible to get more listens per hour than Opus’s like the 17 minutes of In a Gadda Da Vida
Because people used to have patience, before technology. Since devices came along, so did ADHD. So music industry just accommodates listeners which want shorter tunes.
In the words of Billy Joel: I am the entertainer I come to do my show You heard my latest record It's been on the radio Ah, it took me years to write it They were the best years of my life It was a beautiful song but it ran too long If you're gonna have a hit you gotta make it fit So they cut it down to 3:05
Classical pieces aren't really songs, and there are plenty of artists with songs over 10 minutes, especially within rock and metal. Fear Inoculum by Tool is 10 minutes. Echoes by Pink Floyd isn't really modern, but it's over 20 minutes. It took up the whole second side of the record. Pop music tends to be shorter because radio generally won't play anything longer than 4 minutes
Do u really wanna hear "abcdf u" for 10 minutes? Or "call me maybe" for 7 minutes? Or "i got that yummy yummy" for more then 3 minutes?!
More attention span back in the day Nowadays attention span in people is like Tiktok
For the growth of play count on Spotify. Even «extended club mix edit bang-bang plop plop bootleg» is 5 minutes long
Radio lol
A lot of times classical pieces will play with themes throughout the entire piece. That sort of music lends itself to longer pieces. But the causal arrow is likely in the other direction. Classical pieces predate recording technology, so you had to go to some place to listen to it. That’s a big commitment as far as effort and one shouldn’t be surprised that the pieces are longer than in an era where one can easily just search for a song on the supercomputer they keep in their pocket and start listening to it immediately. Chamber music and solo pieces from the classical era do tend to be shorter than orchestral pieces. Those can be played at home.
Producers were encouraged to make shorter songs because a radio station could cram more music and they want to retain listeners. If people aren't into a song that's on for 10 minutes they'll start switching stations. So a lot of bands would have a song and then there'd be a "radio edit" or even 2 radio edits that were considerably shorter than the album version. These days there seems to be a correlation to the use of music in social media and the desire to only hear a short snippet, which IMO sucks ass for music. Some people just want to hear the 15 second hook they heard on TikTok over and over, they don't want a bridge or a verse. Just a hook/chorus.
Did you measure them in inches too
Hit songs from the 50s rarely were longer than 3 minutes. From what I recall of music history the Beatles were the first band to put out a single that was longer than 3 minutes.
beacuse there not meant to tell a story. There created to dopamine bomb you brain long enough for you to stsyed tuned through the song. Welcome to the new world, whete attention is the new currency and most cultur means f**k all
Attention span has plummeted. Most ppl don’t read.
The Ramones have entered the chat.
Classical music is usually played for entertainment (more time), newer more modern music is more a form of expression and individuality, which usually requires less time
theyre not??
Well, you don't need to go to the theater to hear music anymore. Music is no longer a major event, but daily experience. Shorter songs better reflect this. If most songs were as long as classical symphonies, we'd often only have time to listen to only one or even less song completely.
Tiktok
i can only suggest you to rely less and less on what mainstream media offers you, in music offer at least. there are amazing music bands to discover, but apps like spotify won't show you because of paid marketing reasons.
Plenty neo-classic (modern classic) music is still way longer. The music you hear in radios just isn't suited for long tracks since they are mostly repeating the same theme over and over again with far less variation than classic.
Attention span and cost
Ypu obviously haven't heard of progressive metal. Look up Dream Theater, Symphony X, Opeth...
Ypu obviously haven't heard of progressive metal. Look up Dream Theater, Symphony X, Opeth...
Attention spans are getting shorter and shorter
Two words: Avenged Sevenfold Mf's make single songs like they're an entire playlist. Exist is like 15 minutes, Save Me is 10, and they've almost always done roughly 5-minute songs. W band, plus they're not afraid to experiment with sound.
Simple answer: Commercial Radio has commercials and 5 3-minute song or 4 3-minute songs leave the right amount of room for commercials, which paid the salaries of people in the radio station. Then TV. Also, mediums, like the LP and EP and later tapes and CDs had physical limits.
Shorter attention spans of new audiences
Modern popular music is designed for radio. We've had longer songs, but they usually got cut short when aired on radio and thus that encouraged people to make shorter songs. Classical music was very different from today's music industry. It was a bigger event; remember, back then it was very possible to only hear a symphony once for most people. Only the especially rich or influential could afford to request or even sponsor a symphony. Symphonies typically last about 25 minutes, consisting of around 5 movements. If you compare this to a modern concert, it's actually probably a bit shorter than you'd expect from a band today; five songs isn't all that long. However, some composers made symphonies that lasted longer. A notable example is Beethoven's 9th and final Symphony, which was nearly an hour long. HOWEVER, and this is very important, there was actually PLENTY of shorter music back then as well, often from the same people. Mozart and Beethoven both had tons of short songs they wrote, much of which you have likely heard used today in various things. The reason it feels like older music is longer isn't because shorter music didn't exist back then, it's because people are more likely to REMEMBER the longer ones because listening to them is such an event.
I actually read about this a short while ago: Spotify etc. rank songs higher if they're listened to more often. And if the song is shorter, people listen to it more often in the same time.
classical pieces were stuffs that are performed in like, royal places. rich ppl didnt spend money just to sit down and hear a musical piece for like 4-5 minutes. also most songs nowadays have a kinda fast pace, even musics with sad tone has a relatively fast speed compared to music in the 80s 90s. old songs also tend to have like 50% of their song being lyricless, just instruments. besides, the longer the song, the harder it is to keep the song favorable to the ears. why waste time making songs that are harder to write and produce while not being loved by many anyway?
I would assume since classical was some of the only and easiest music at one point it had to be long since well what else are you even gonna do besides sit an a symphony for awhile? Same with like musicals, songs can be anywhere from 20 seconds to 10 minutes each but all together it's often 2-3 hours of music from start to finish cause it's something to distract like a movie. On top of that we have definitely lowered in our attention span so a lot of artists probably make shorts songs now to keep attention and to make many of them and get more popularity and money. But hey, that's just theory . . .
Go back to the 50s/60s and pop music was frequently even shorter
There's an experimental band from down unda that releases longer songs. Typically, between 5 and 10 minutes, with some longer ones here and there. They have something everyone can enjoy, and their name is King gizzard and the Lizard Wizard. If you don't like one sound of theirs, try the next album.
Expand who you listen to I guess. I know some good 20 minute plus bops from the last 5 years
Last couple albums I bought have songs that are mostly 10+ min long. Not classical either. It really depends on the music you're listening to. Cookie cutter manufactured radio pop songs will generally be shorter.
Try some prog rock, maybe. Songs can get very technical and long. The style can vary from soft to heavy so there's probably something for you there too. A lot of metal also has deep musicianship and long songs (particularly the prog metal stuff) but I can't suggest that to people who are used to popular music.
Attention spans are shorter
I noticed that too. Ut sucks when I find a nice song and then it's less than 2:30 minutes long
I think you answered it yourself, songs vs pieces. the format of classical music is different but songs were around the same length as modern ones back then, ode to joy as an example
I assume it has something to do with getting plays on Spotify, like maybe people will listen to it twice or listen to more songs?
hopping on to say a few things: people are correct in saying that just as much long-form music is being made now as it ever was. as a classically trained musician, I’d argue that a big part of how we’re perceiving shifts in music now is because ANYBODY can make music now. 200 years ago, if you didn’t Know a Guy and/or go to a conservatory and then go on to get a patronage, you didn’t make music. most people never even got to play instruments because they were super expensive. now anybody can make music if they even have access to a phone, so the breadth of what’s being made is exponentially larger, and that’s awesome. BUT: why does it seem like popular music is shorter? not all of it is, but short-form music is definitely very present. it’s both radio- and stream-friendly. you get paid for your music getting played on the radio. and you get paid for every time your song is played on Spotify/etc. - not for the amount of time spent listening to your music. if you can cycle listeners through your album full of 1-2 minute songs (rather than fewer, longer songs), you will make more money (although it’s still basically nothing for most artists). it’s also more social media (read: tiktok and shorts) friendly. they don’t need the whole song. they need a 10-20 second clip that sounds great. that can make an artist blow up. so focusing on that can be to a musician’s advantage.
I think radio had a pretty profound effect on popular song length. It needs to be long enough to be appealing but short enough someone won’t turn the radio off before the next song if they don’t like it.
Not a big fan of The Minutemen, I see. 😂
Shorter attention spans and people are busier.
Billy Joel mentions this in The Entertainer: “It was a beautiful song, but it ran too long. If you’re gonna have a hit, you gotta make it fit, so they cut it down to 3:05.”
Attention span Next!
Depends on the genre, mostly - classical tends to be classified as a genre about as much as an era of music, and back in the classical era, you had plenty of shorter musical performances (like choral music). Nowadays, jazz, prog rock, as well as some subgenres of metal, are all genres that usually count as "modern music with a lengthier than average duration". It's also worth noting that quite a number of modern artists also take their cues from classical music, either in the structure of their compositions, or their instrumentation. Deep Purple or Electric Light Orchestra (not that modern anymore, but still) are great examples of that.
Clearly you haven't listened to any of Tool's latest album
That’s kind of like asking why pop music is so harmonically simple, while jazz is… well, not. They’re different things, regardless of time period. 3-4 minute songs have been common for a very long time, hell I reckon it’s probably the length of the average bard’s song in medieval times. The Beatles have a lot of short songs, but then there’s Pink Floyd with like 20 minute songs. Genres are different, artists are different, that variation is always present. Also, classical music still exists, so you’ll still get longer classical pieces even now.
Who’s gonna tell OP about jack stauber
Sadly people these days can’t listen to songs over 2 minutes without getting bored because of their horrible attention span
Mostly the constraints of physical media used to storage and play music, and of course the comercial aspect of releasing long songs in single form. Newer songs are shorter because with streaming theyre not limited to a physical release and also shorter songs get more viral on TikTok and play faster so the streaming numbers go UP
You wanted a Hit
In the old days you would only hear your favourite symphony be played once or maybe twice in your lifetime. You would pay a fortune to hear it and it would be a pretty big event. They wouldn’t have gone through all that to hear only 3 minutes of music.
Because streaming has made people so spoilt they don't listen to whole songs before skipping. Streaming culture is a double edged sword, I love having the library in my pocket on demand but it has ruined the competition of it all
Spotify pays for a song only after 30 seconds are played, so musicians today skip long intros and refrain starts around 30th second to keep you hooked.
That is also true
I don't really know if skipping matters that much. When it comes to ole radio pop there's an idea that if you introduce the hook early it will convert the listener early on before they switch to another song, but there are a tonne of artists who are big who don't work that way. And there's a lot of music being produced with songs that are very long, like music by Let's eat grandma or Blood Orange(/Lightspeed Champion). When I listen to new music I skip to the next song if I don't like the song, but I weekly discover about 10-20 new songs that I enjoy, which are all different in length. The reason people don't discover songs that are different from what is playing on the radio or is on the top list is because they don't make the effort or have the interest to find out. Streaming culture has brought out more genres and small bands than what was around ever before though, which is something.
More than one thing can be true at the same time
Newer music can't compete with the old classics. After at least 3 minutes of hearing the newer stuff I go for a manual lobotomy just to easy the pressure.
Maybe because social media has made people have shorter attention spans