For the Wikipedia policies regarding the use of lyrics, see WP:LYRICS.

Lyrics in sheet music. This is a homorhythmic (i.e., hymn-style) arrangement of a

traditional piece entitled "Adeste Fideles", in standard two-staff format for mixed
voices. About this soundPlay (help�info)
Lyrics are words that make up a song usually consisting of verses and choruses. The
writer of lyrics is a lyricist. The words to an extended musical composition such
as an opera are, however, usually known as a "libretto" and their writer, as a
"librettist". The meaning of lyrics can either be explicit or implicit. Some lyrics
are abstract, almost unintelligible, and, in such cases, their explication
emphasizes form, articulation, meter, and symmetry of expression. Rappers can also
create lyrics (often with a variation of rhyming words) that are meant to be spoken
rhythmically rather than sung.

Contents
1 Etymology
2 Poems
3 Shifter
4 Copyright and royalties
5 Academic study
6 Search engines
6.1 Riskiest search
6.2 Google
7 See also
8 References
9 External links
Etymology

A lyrist on the Standard of Ur, c.?2500 BC.

"Lyric" derives via Latin lyricus from the Greek ??????? (lyrik�s),[1] the
adjectival form of lyre.[2] It first appeared in English in the mid-16th century in
reference, to the Earl of Surrey's translations of Petrarch and to his own sonnets.
[3] Greek lyric poetry had been defined by the manner in which it was sung
accompanied by the lyre or cithara,[4] as opposed to the chanted formal epics or
the more passionate elegies accompanied by the flute. The personal nature of many
of the verses of the Nine Lyric Poets led to the present sense of "lyric poetry"
but the original Greek sense�words set to music�eventually led to its use as
"lyrics", first attested in Stainer and Barrett's 1876 Dictionary of Musical Terms.
[5] Stainer and Barrett used the word as a singular substantive: "Lyric, poetry or
blank verse intended to be set to music and sung". By the 1930s, the present use of
the plurale tantum "lyrics" had begun; it has been standard since the 1950s for
many writers.[1] The singular form "lyric" is still used to mean the complete words
to a song by authorities such as Alec Wilder[6], Robert Gottlieb[7], and Stephen
Sondheim[8]. However, the singular form is also commonly used to refer to a
specific line (or phrase) within a song's lyrics.

Poems

This section may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. No cleanup
reason has been specified. Please help improve this section if you can. (November
2010) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

This section possibly contains original research. Please improve it by verifying

the claims made and adding inline citations. Statements consisting only of original
research should be removed. (March 2008) (Learn how and when to remove this
template message)
The differences between poem and song may become less meaningful where verse is set
to music, to the point that any distinction becomes untenable. This is perhaps
recognised in the way popular songs have lyrics.

However, the verse may pre-date its tune (in the way that "Rule Britannia" was set
to music, and "And did those feet in ancient time" has become the hymn
"Jerusalem"), or the tune may be lost over time but the words survive, matched by a
number of different tunes (this is particularly common with hymns and ballads).

Possible classifications proliferate (under anthem, ballad, blues, carol, folk

song, hymn, libretto, lied, lullaby, march, praise song, round, spiritual). Nursery
rhymes may be songs, or doggerel: the term doesn't imply a distinction. The ghazal
is a sung form that is considered primarily poetic. See also rapping, roots of hip
hop music.

Analogously, verse drama might normally be judged (at its best) as poetry, but not
consisting of poems (see dramatic verse).

In Baroque music, melodies and their lyrics were prose. Rather than paired lines
they consist of rhetorical sentences or paragraphs consisting of an opening
gesture, an amplification (often featuring sequence), and a close (featuring a
cadence); in German Vordersatz-Fortspinnung-Epilog.[9] For example:

When I was a child, [opening gesture]

I spoke as a child, [amplification...]
I understood as a child, [...]
I thought as a child; [...]
But when I became a man, I put away childish things. [close]
- 1 Corinthians 13:11
Shifter
In the lyrics of popular music a "shifter"[10] is a word, often a pronoun, "where
reference varies according to who is speaking, when and where",[11] such as "I",
"you", "my", "our". For example, who is the "my" of "My Generation"?

Copyright and royalties

See Royalties
Currently, there are many websites featuring song lyrics. This offering, however,
is controversial, since some sites include copyrighted lyrics offered without the
holder's permission. The U.S. Music Publishers' Association (MPA), which represents
sheet music companies, launched a legal campaign against such websites in December
2005. The MPA's president, Lauren Keiser, said the free lyrics web sites are
"completely illegal" and wanted some website operators jailed.[12]

Lyrics licenses could be obtained worldwide through one of the two aggregators:
LyricFind and Musixmatch. The first company to provide licensed lyrics was Yahoo!,
quickly followed by MetroLyrics and Lyrics.com. More and more lyric websites are
beginning to provide licensed lyrics, such as SongMeanings and LyricWiki.[13]

Many competing lyrics web sites are still offering unlicensed content, causing
challenges around the legality and accuracy of lyrics.[14] In the latest attempt to
crack down unlicensed lyrics web sites a federal court has ordered LiveUniverse, a
network of websites run by MySpace co-founder Brad Greenspan, to cease operating
four sites offering unlicensed song lyrics.[15]

Academic study