Ritornello: Song Form

The shape of the song, before the notes. Every other songwriting tool starts with a chord or a groove. Ritornello starts with the FORM — how long the verse is, where the chorus lands, whether the bridge actually goes anywhere — then fills it with the parts you have written and plays them back as one song. HOW IT WORKS • Lay out the sections: bars, key, meter, tempo, and a 1–5 energy rating that is your own judgement, not a measurement. • Attach the parts as you write them — chords from one app, a bassline from another, a groove from a third, stacked in the same bars — and press Play to hear them together, transposed into the section's key and laid along the form. • Read what the form is doing. Six checks: where the first chorus lands, whether the bridge departs harmonically, whether three choruses are identical, whether the energy arc goes anywhere, whether a section contrasts with its…