Styles of Music Videos

There are different styles in which music videos can take. These include performance, narrative, mixture and cameo.

Performance- A performance music video is when you can see the artist performing within the video and this will take up the majority of the video. Many performance music videos will consist of continuous shots of the artist performing the song and will have no narrative or any other shots. For example, in Beyoncé's song 'Love on Top' in which she just performed the song, however costume and lighting was used to make this video more appealing and interesting. Music videos that just include performance are not very common as they are not very popular as there in no way that the audience can engage with the artist or the song.

Narrative- A narrative music video is one in which includes a storyline within the video and is one that reflects the story behind the song itself. The most common form of narrative is a linear narrative, which is a story that has a beginning, middle and end all within the music video so the music video essentially becomes a short film. An example of a linear narrative would be Katy Perry's music video for 'Thinking of you'.




Mixture- A mixture is a music video that include both performance and narrative. This is the most common form of  music video as it is the most interesting to watch as the audience can engage with the video as you can see the actual artist performing but also creates a visual of the songs story. For example, Kelly Clarkson's 'Since you've been gone'.

Cameo- A cameo is when the artist or band appears in the music video but as part of the narrative, as they do not actually perform in the video. An example of this would be the music video for 'What's my name', as both Drake and Rihanna appear in the narrative of the music video, which is effective as both artists are famous enough to know that that they are the artists behind the songs as there is no need to see them actually performing to know this.