But when used in single sections, one-note melodies create tension and enhance contrasts. Not all the way through a song that would be silly. So, impose clear shape on what you write, even if most of it comes to you in a rush. But the best melodies recycle patterns of rhythm and pitch and don’t sound like improvisations. Solos and ad-libs excite us with their narrative qualities. What we can learn is that repeating rhythms and varying pitch creates melodies that are easy to remember and, very importantly for a pop song, easy to join in with. Waterloo Sunset and bury a friend both contain these elements. Mozart, Tchaikovsky, JP Sousa, Jerome Kern, Richard Rodgers, Leonard Bernstein, Burt Bacharach, John Williams all have great lessons to teach – balanced phrase construction, internal reflection of rhythmic patterns, and distinctive intervals jumps. Study great tunes – they are tutorials in plain sight Remember, there are plenty of successful songs with a great tune and weak lyrics, but not many with great lyrics and a weak tune (OK, Lou Reed is different). Abba and The Bee Gees did this, as does Max Martin. If melody is the most important thing to you, write the tune first. Writing a melody to a lyric is harder than writing a stand-alone melody Can’t Feel My Face uses the same chords all through but has three vocal sections, each in a different vocal range, using different metric patterns, starting on a different step of the scale and on a different beat of the bar. Kurt Cobain did this in Smells Like Teen Spirit and the modern master is Max Martin. If your chords are not providing dynamics and contrasts, your melody has to. In songs that rely on repeated chord sequences, vary your melodic approach Remember, jazz musicians spend a lot of their time rewriting chords under given melodies. Good melodies have internal correspondences that give them grip and character regardless of harmonic content. Melodies imply chords, chords don’t imply melodiesĭon’t write chords and expect that a tune will grow out of them. Build your melody in short or long sections, but make sure that you inject a clear sense of rhyme. They rhyme, meaning they have a correspondence in sound that listeners can unconsciously detect. These ‘motifs’ are the staple ingredient of all memorable melodies. Strong melodies rhymeĬlassical and pop melodies both use distinct metric repeat structures. If your melody sounds like part of its own accompaniment, keep going. A melody is a series of notes that attracts and retains our attention, so it must have a high degree of coherence that gives it an independent life. Good melodies don’t obey rules, they follow principles – of attraction and of independence. 1 Monkey (1988) and Basement Jaxx’s 'Where’s Your Head At?' (2002). He has appeared on numerous hit records, including George Michael’s US No. He has written styles of music that range from Hindi language pop songs to The Biscuit Rap from Two Pints of Lager, via country hoedowns, impressions of Bob Dylan and metal blitz-outs. Roddy has played for a selection of artists from Charles Aznavour and Mungo Jerry to Tom Jones and Roland Rat. We asked him to give us some valuable tips and insights on melody. Songwriter and composer Roddy Matthews has just released a new book titled: Secrets You Should Know About Writing Great Songs.
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