"A great songwriter is one who can say the most, in an entertaining and/or arresting way, in the shortest possible amount of time?? Discuss!"

Well, there's such a thing as too short a song. It takes few moments to establish a mood or "groove," and then you want to spend a modicum of time enjoying what's been established. The more interesting and compelling the song, the longer you can get away with stretching it out, but the generally accepted "happy medium" seems to be about three minutes.

I just wonder whether this is a "natural" optimum length for songs, based upon some inborn attention-span parameters shared by all humans, or if it's something that has been imposed upon our generations by our shared experience of recorded music, nothing more than our becoming accustomed to the song-length limitations of first the 78 rpm single and then the 45.

As a solo performer, I don't generally include the instrumental "breaks" that are so often part of the original (or at least the best-known) recordings of many songs I "cover," and so my renditions may tend to be about a half-minute or so shorter than versions by groups/bands featuring instrumental soloists. In some cases, I'll compensate by repeating the bridge and the final verse/chorus an extra time, especially when the audience seems receptive and sufficiently caught up in the song.

Discuss!