In this video, I’m going to be breaking down the science of rhyming patterns. This is the 2nd video of this series and I’ll post a link to the first video which covers the sounds of rhymes in the video description below.
My name is Cole Mize and I’ve been helping rappers perfect their rap skills on this channel for the past 9 years. Now let’s get straight to it.
Two types of patterns
Now when it comes to rhyming theirs two types of patterns that we create. Rhyme schemes and internal rhymes.
1: Rhyme Schemes
A rhyme scheme occurs when a rhyme is placed relatively in the same spot for at least two bars
For example I placed “vocation and makin’ on the 4th beat of these two bars
End Rhymes
This is also one of the most common places that we will place a rhyme which are known as end rhymes. End rhymes don’t always have to land on the 4th beat but they are typically towards the end of the bar or one of your last words in your phrase.
Now if you struggle with determining where the 4th beat is by ear just know that there are typically two snares per bar. The first snare typically lands on the 2nd beat and the second snare typically lands on the 4th beat.
With that in mind, let’s listen again and pay attention to how both of my rhymes land on the 2nd snare which is the 4th beat.
Also, just so you know. The instrumental I’m using in this tutorial is a beat that I produced called “Spaced Out” and I’ll post a link to it in the video descripton below.
2: Internal Rhymes
Now let’s talk about internal rhymes. An internal rhyme occurs when two words only rhyme within a bar and that rhyming pattern does not carry over to another bar.
For example, notice how I only rhyme with “eh” sounds using business, with it, and pimpin’ on the 2nd bar but I don’t rhyme with these words at all on the 1st bar.
Also did you notice that business landed on the 1st beat which is where a kick drum or 808 is typically placed and pimpin’ landed on the 2nd beat which is the first snare?
The Placement of Rhyme Schemes
You may be noticing that I’m putting alot of emphasis on where I’m placing my rhymes within each bar and that’s because the placement of your rhymes are very important.
The key to making your raps sound catchy is creating patterns. A pattern is simply something that repeats itself which makes it familiar and predictable to the listener so they can follow along to it and make sense of it.
In rap we don’t only create patterns with our delivery and our cadences, but we also create patterns with our rhymes. And it’s common for us to stack all 3 of those patterns on top of each other at the same time to make our raps sound ulta catchy.
So let’s talk about the placement of rhyme schemes. Where should you put them within your bars?
You may have noticed by now there seems to be a trend. All my rhymes are landing on a beat. I’m not rhyming on every single beat of each bar but where there are rhymes they are landing on beats.
This is a great starting point if you struggle to determine where to place rhymes. Kicks and Snares are typically some of the loudest elements of an instrumental so it’s common for us to place rhymes on them while putting a little more emphasis and stress on our rhymes to make them pop out from the rest of the lyrics to give them almost like a 3D Effect. This ties into that delivery pattern I just mentioned.
But I want to stress, this is just a really good generic starting point that will get your rhymes to sound great, but don’t limit yourself to only rhyming on the beats. You can rhyme anywhere within a bar.
RHYMING OFF BEAT
What’s most important is that you’re mindful of where you’re placing your rhymes, especially ones that are apart of a rhyme scheme, so that you place the word that rhymes with it in close proximity to it on the following bar.
For example, I’m going to modify my lyrics so that station, mation, and pimpin land before the snares which is before the beats and they will still sound perfectly fine.
Distant Rhyme Schemes
Now for demonstration purposes, I’m going to mess up the structure of my station and mation rhymes so that they don’t land at the same time on both bars.
Now I have Station landing on the 1st beat of bar 1 and mation landing on the 4th beat of bar 2. And notice how it still sounds good but mation and station don’t have as strong of a connection with each other so it doesn’t sound as catchy.
Know Your Place
As you can hear, it’s really important to be mindful of where you’re placing your rhymes to ensure they’re hitting as hard as possible.
Also, I want to state that there’s nothing wrong with placing your rhymes as far apart as I did either. Just be intentional about it. If you’re going to do it, do it on purpose and not as an accident.
Neighboring Rhymes
For example, one technique I like to use sometimes is something I like to call “Neighboring Rhymes”.
A neighboring rhyme is when a rhyme is placed 1 or 2 beats before or after where the other rhyme is placed.
In this example I placed station on the 3rd beat of bar 1 and mation on the 4th beat of bar 2 and it sounds really cool!
Break The Rules
Once you know the rules feel free to break them. As I always say at the end of my videos, when it comes to rapping theirs no rules, only techniques.
But there’s one major problem. It’s going to be impossible for you to structure your rhyme schemes correctly if you can’t identify each beat of every bar correctly. That’s why I recommend that the 1st thing any rapper should learn is how to establish their rhythm.
By Rhythm, I mean your ability to listen to an instrumental and identify the 4 beats of every bar correctly and keep count of each beat by moving your body to the beats.
If this is something you struggle with I highly recommend you check out my video called establishing rhythm part 3
And stay tuned because my next video will be part 3 to this series where I’m breaking down how we juggle multiple rhyme schemes, transition into new rhymes, and even break rhyme schemes while making it sound awesome!
And feel free to spit some bars in the comments section below and show off some of the awesome techniques you just learned!
Again my name is Cole Mize with colemizestudios.com where I strive to make you a better rapper now! Check below for links to my free eBook The #1 fundamental to rapping, and my website for my 1 on 1 coaching service, and my quick rap guides. And always remember, when it comes to rapping, theirs no rules, theirs only techniques. peace!
