how do you go about creating vocal melodies ?

[dynasty32]

I know that most rock solos uses the minor pentatonic scale, and the chord progression used are the major triad chords i-ii-iii-iv-iiv. Im guessing notes sung in rock songs uses major or minor scales right or pentatonics?

 

Whenever most songwriters try to come up with a vocal melody do they actually go try to consciously borrow notes from the scale or does it all come naturally to them without even thinking of scales and still stay in key?

 

Also some notes of the vocal melody doesn't have to be in key with the song, right?

 

I've wondered what the process was like for songwriters to come up with a vocal melody.

 

Do some musicians possess a talent that allows them to create a vocal melody instantaneously without formally trying to create one?

[tspit74]

 

Do some musicians just have a vocal melody that just pops into their head without even trying to formulate one?

 

 

This.

 

For the most part, I come up with the melody and lyrics first and formulate the chords to support it after the fact. How else would you know what chord to go to and when, if you don't already know the melody and words?

 

In those times that I may put a melody to a pre-written music part, I do so away from an instrument. Memorize the music and come up with melodies free of any influence. Unless you've done a fair amount of ear training, it's easy to fall into the trap of singing the root to every chord when you have a guitar in your lap.

 

Just remember: Rhythm. A lot of space (just because your guitar arpeggios are 16 notes to the bar shouldn't make your melody a barrage of 16 straight notes with no rests). Make your melodies feel natural. Just keep at it until you hit on something you like. Once that happens, repeat it. Repetition is good. Build on a good hook by doing variations on it.

[kurdy]

There was just another thread on this subject less than a week ago: http://acapella.harmony-central.com/showthread.php?t=2348079

[dynasty32]

 

This. For the most part, I come up with the melody and lyrics first and formulate the chords to support it after the fact. How else would you know what chord to go to and when, if you don't already know the melody and words? In those times that I may put a melody to a pre-written music part, I do so away from an instrument. Memorize the music and come up with melodies free of any influence. Unless you've done a fair amount of ear training, it's easy to fall into the trap of singing the root to every chord when you have a guitar in your lap. Just remember: Rhythm. A lot of space (just because your guitar arpeggios are 16 notes to the bar shouldn't make your melody a barrage of 16 straight notes with no rests). Make your melodies feel natural. Just keep at it until you hit on something you like. Once that happens, repeat it. Repetition is good. Build on a good hook by doing variations on it.

 

 

if I try to come with vocal melodies without relying on anything, i tend to go off key, I really don't know any scales, i only know the minor pentatonics for lead guitar, so if I learn major,minor, ... etc scales, maybe I won't go off key when trying to come up with a melody. Also sometimes when I feel like i created a vocal melody, i realized it was an actual song that I hardly ever remembered and didn't know who sung it or what.

[Lee Knight]

 

if I try to come with vocal melodies without relying on anything, i tend to go off key, I really don't know any scales, i only know the minor pentatonics for lead guitar, so if I learn major,minor, ... etc scales, maybe I won't go off key when trying to come up with a melody. Also sometimes when I feel like i created a vocal melody, i realized it was an actual song that I hardly ever remembered and didn't know who sung it or what.

 

 

You've listened to music since you were a little kid I suspect. You still listen a lot I assume, if you're posting here. Your brain is digesting all that music you listen to uncritically. It's in there.

 

So you're saying you go "off key" when you try to "come up" with a melody. I'd look at how you "come up" with melodies then. Are you analyzing things? It sounds like you might be. You mention you don't know scales. You do... you just don't know it as such.

 

If you know the difference between the sound of a major chord and a minor one, you've got plenty of info to start. Sing...

 

Just hum or sing a melody. Keep the cheapo recorder going and sing into it. Those melodies are yours. If you find stuff that isn't yours, don't use that melody. Everybody does that. Don't use it or you'll regret it. So go mine for gold from your recording. No chords, just tunes...

 

Now learn to string the best of your bits into something resembling a song. Now put chords to it. Of course you might already have some chords. Then sing to those chords. and record what you jam. Don't sweat the suck you create, that's part of it. The answer is in learning to recognize what's good. Then using it. There, you wrote a cool melody.

 

Separating the two elements, melody and chords, separating them is a great way for you to better understand how it all works. The more you do that, the easier it will be to then have a cool melody and chords come from you all at once.

 

Of course it's not easy, but taking steps in the right direction is... then you just build from there. At first though, don't think, just let it out and capture. Then later peruse your purge and pick and choose.

[smallbutmighty]

 

You've listened to music since you were a little kid I suspect. You still listen a lot I assume, if you're posting here. Your brain is digesting all that music you listen to uncritically. It's in there. So you're saying you go "off key" when you try to "come up" with a melody. I'd look at how you "come up" with melodies then. Are you analyzing things? It sounds like you might be. You mention you don't know scales. You do... you just don't know it as such. If you know the difference between the sound of a major chord and a minor one, you've got plenty of info to start. Sing... Just hum or sing a melody. Keep the cheapo recorder going and sing into it. Those melodies are yours. If you find stuff that isn't yours, don't use that melody. Everybody does that. Don't use it or you'll regret it. So go mine for gold from your recording. No chords, just tunes... Now learn to string the best of your bits into something resembling a song. Now put chords to it. Of course you might already have some chords. Then sing to those chords. and record what you jam. Don't sweat the suck you create, that's part of it. The answer is in learning to recognize what's good. Then using it. There, you wrote a cool melody. Separating the two elements, melody and chords, separating them is a great way for you to better understand how it all works. The more you do that, the easier it will be to then have a cool melody and chords come from you all at once. Of course it's not easy, but taking steps in the right direction is... then you just build from there. At first though, don't think, just let it out and capture. Then later peruse your purge and pick and choose.

 

 

This is the perfect answer.

 

Going off key? So what. At least that's more interesting that just following along with another C-D-G progression.

[blue2blue]

 

I know that most rock solos uses the minor pentatonic scale [...]

I know you're just using that as a jumping off point, but it brings up one of my real pet peeves: limiting instrumental solos to pentatonic scales creates boring, infantile music, seems to me.

 

As someone who has been primarily self-taught, and spent a lot of time with the blues, I was horrified at one point to pick up a 'how to play blues guiar' book and see that the dork only talked about pentatonic scales.

 

There's no denying the power of the pentatonic scale intervals... I think of them as sort of the power nodes of the real scale.

 

But those who restrict themselves to pentatonic soloing simply because it offers a lowest common denominator of notes that will more or less work at any part of the blues modulations? That's just lame, it seems to me.

 

 

Back to the actual topic...

 

For me, melody flows up from harmonic context. (It's different for others, and more power to them.) When I was starting out, I would typically find some chords that seemed to work together and simply work different melodies that stayed within the implicit key. I didn't do that intellectually. That's, you know, too hard, and requires some knowledge which I didn't have.

 

I simply did it by sound. If a note doesn't fit with the chord under it, there's no complicated intellectual process required... it just sounds bad.

 

After a while, I figured out why different chords work in different combinations, seeing that the chords simply flow up from the underlying scale(s)... built with the notes in a given scale or mode. And I saw that those scales/modes could themselves be transposed up or down across the repeating range of the twelve basic tones of western music.

 

That knowledge provided me with a lot of intellectual shortcuts for figuring my way out of problems or suggesting a direction when I'm stumped -- but, at core, for me, when I write, it's still all about how it sounds and how it feels.

[Lee Knight]

 

For me , melody flows up from harmonic context. (It's different for others, and more power to them.)

 

 

Good post as always, Blue. I have noticed you and I chiming in on this topic with 2 very different perspectives. First off, let me say, I love your songwriting. It think you have an uncanny means of getting to the heart of it. Whatever "it" it is you're tackling in any given song you working.

 

Now the other side. Your point about the pentatonic scale "limiting instrumental solos to pentatonic scales creates boring, infantile music, seems to me". That is a great point and one that crossed my mind as well, as I read the OP.

 

But I feel your comment, "For me, melody flows up from harmonic context"... that method can lead to some of what you mention in your pentatonic scale observations. That comment is not too removed from what you object to in the blues scale example.

 

Once again, I'm not discussing your work. I love your stuff. But the "letting harmonic context guide a melody" method is frankly one of the huge shortcomings I see in a lot of modern music.

 

As much as I love Dylan, sometimes I feel folk guitar was the beginning of the end. Strum a C F and G and find some notes that don't clash and make sure you got a message...

 

...of course as the message waned, we were stuck with a half baked melodic sense. This is what I deal with when producing young bands. The melody follows the direction of chord movement and "Gee... where you come up with that melody?" He says with tongue in cheek.

 

So I suggest they move up when the chord move down. At least. Or left when they go right. Harmonic context is not the guide... it is another element altogether. It adds shade to a melody. It informs the melody. Sad? Uplifting? Whatever.

 

So I risk stating this only to point out how "letting the chords guide you", while certainly handy, is not always the best way to say what you're trying to say.

 

Not trying to contradict as much as encourage you to elaborate a bit on what you mean.

[blue2blue]

Great point, Lee.

 

And, actually, I would say that it is something that limits (I'd even say stunts) my development as a melodicist. I'm no McCartney, it's for sure true.

 

To the extent that one sticks within a narrow harmonic context (building his chords only from the natural notes in one scale without modulation), he is limiting himself as a writer as surely as a guitar player who only uses penta scales.

 

 

And there's no question that the relationship between chords and scales is a two way one... modulation and introduction of passing and other enharmonic tones (however one wants to slice that up) informs harmony. Still, those of us who approach writing from a chords down point of view may well incorporate those aspects of development without a fully conscious awareness of the inner mechanics.

 

(Let's face it... I'm a throw-it-at-the-wall-and-see-what-sticks kind of guy and always have been. A lot of times I don't even know what key a given song is actually in until I sit down and play a melody to it.)

[333maxwell]

I never think of singing (or playing for that matter) in terms of scales.. that to me would be akin to building with legos, and counting the nubs on each one berofe you stick it on the other, rather than just sizing them up and figuring they will either fit or they wont.

 

When it comes to the vocal parts, assuming I am writing them after the music is done (not always the case) I just tend to ask myself what it is I am trying to say, how I want to say it, what kind of mood I want to say it in.

 

If you think of it more like telling a story, then 'singing' that can be helpful too.

 

I also find it best, for me, a good percentage of the time, to come up with the words at the same time I am coming up with the melody they will be delivered in.. the two go hand in hand, seperating them seems counter productive to me.. one could be figuring out a melody, and the words don't quite fit, so they wrestle with it.. rather than doing both at the same time.. kind of like building the shoe around the foot, rather than trying on different ones till you find the right size.

 

Whatever that is worth.

[tim_7string]

I think you have to have a good sense of melody in order to create one for a song. It doesn't have to be the first thing written (melody, then chords), but it does have to be the most memorable thing at the end of the day.

 

The melody is everything in my mind. It's the reason the song is good or crap.

 

When I jammed with a band many years ago and just came up with vocal stuff off the top of my head, I was searching for notes and accents that made it sound cool. Some of it was pure off-key noise for a few seconds, until I hit upon a few key moments that sounded good and blended well with the racket the rest of the group was producing. After doing that a couple more times, a song started to take shape. It was cool.

 

A lot of bands use this method. Sometimes it works really well.

 

What works better for me is if something melodic pops in my head immediately after I play a riff, or I strum (or fingerpick) some chords. That should be a good indication that you're getting somewhere.

 

The next part of course is to make sure what you've written wasn't actually written by someone else. It still bothers me that Rivers Cuomo's falsetto vocal melody for "Hash Pipe" is essentially the keyboard part in Aldo Nova's "Fantasy." I'm amazed to this day that he never got sued over it. But, I digress.

 

 

I never think of singing (or playing for that matter) in terms of scales.. that to me would be akin to building with legos, and counting the nubs on each one berofe you stick it on the other, rather than just sizing them up and figuring they will either fit or they wont.

 

 

Me either. I never think in terms of scales and theory when I create. I only think, "Does this sound good to my ears?" If it does, I keep it. If something doesn't sound right, I leave it and try to rework it into something later.

[longstack]

I find the way to write a good song is to first write a lyric.

 

Then I try different chord progressions. If I find one I like I then try to fit the lyric to the chord progression. The tune should come from the tempo and the meter that the lyric is written in.

 

Its really amazing, how by just moving a capo up or down the neck can change the whole feel of a song.

 

I still think a good tune should be 2 verses a Chorous a verse and then the

middle eight followed by a verse or chorous.

[kurdy]

 

I find the way to write a good song is to first write a lyric. Then I try different chord progressions. If I find one I like I then try to fit the lyric to the chord progression. The tune should come from the tempo and the meter that the lyric is written in.

 

 

That's pretty much how I do it too. I don

[tspit74]

There's no way to answer this question that doesn't make it sound academic.

 

How do you go about writing vocal melodies?

 

I suppose you could just go about doing it by just going about doing it (if that makes any sense). I suppose that for me, any song worth finishing hinges on the essential ingredient of inspiration. The gift. In other words, the part that I didn't actually "write." The part that appeared out of thin air and said, "I want to become a song when I grow up." Without that little gift of a chorus or a verse, or a bridge or all 3 coming at once fully formed, I don't get a song. I guess I could sit down and write any old uninspired thing but I doubt it would be any good. The best part seems to present itself and it's up to me to recognize it, nurture it, and help it be what it deserves to be. That's where craft comes in. Now my process is usually lyric and melody first. Music last. Perhaps, for a serious instrumentalist, the music comes in flashes of inspiration and the craft comes in the lyric/melody stage. I just know that's not how I tend to do it.

 

Back in college, before I ever tried to write lyrics, I would put the bass player's words to a melody and the singer would sing it. Being a drummer, I thought rhythmically first. Figure out a natural feeling rhythm to the pre written words and then assign notes to the rhythm. It always worked and sounded good. After those years, when I started writing on my own out of some mysterious need, I never did that again, because the words came with music. Probably my first ten songs just appeared out of thin air and didn't require me to write anything at all. All I needed to do was learn and record them. Then I got sucked into doing it and started working on it, but always with the unwritten gift first.

 

Really, you've just got to throw stuff at the wall and see if it sticks.

[rhino55]

 

(Let's face it... I'm a throw-it-at-the-wall-and-see-what-sticks kind of guy and always have been. A lot of times I don't even know what key a given song is actually in until I sit down and play a melody to it.)

 

 

ditto

[Bodyguard2112]

I have written hundreds of songs in the last 3 years. Some are very cool.

 

I have no idea what the scales are.

 

If one needs to use some formula to come up with a melody, I think... one may not be ready to write songs.

[Silent Heart]

Do some musicians possess a talent that allows them to create a vocal melody instantaneously without formally trying to create one?

 

Are there any that don't possess that talent? If there are, they're in the extreme minority. In other words, consider this another vote for the "theory is worthless for creative purposes and I've never seen any example to the contrary" point of view.

[StompboxMan]

By harmonizing to a chord progression!

[grace_slick]

I've been trying for the first time since I started creating songs (about a year or so ago) to try proper vocal melodies. Prior to this, I find I go overboard with my instrumental tracks, trying to fill all the spaces and add and layer more and more, and while it does sound pretty good (sometimes), it doesn't leave any room for a melody! lol

 

I have to go back to the first track or 2 that I record/create, and let the melody flow from there. I notice when I'm recording or playing/practicing to record the first few tracks, that I get a melody in my head as I play. So that's what I have to work on.

 

So in brief, it does tend to just appear in my inner ear/head and "play along" with the chords or other stuff I'm playing.

 

On the other hand, sometimes I get a melody in my head without any accompaniment, but this is hard cause I don't know any music theory or know chords very well or how to play properly, so...I find it hard to "match" chords and stuff to a singular melody. I can do it, but it's more difficult for me.

[maddrummerdude]

For me, the melody is the very last part of the song to materialize (besides the lyrics, of course).

 

I always start with a chord progression I like, and then I play the chord progression ad nauseum while improvising potential melodies with my voice. When I find one I like, I record a rough version of it, write the lyrics, and then change the structure of the melody as I feel necessary. It's a very organic process and I never consciously try to figure out if I'm staying within the chord structure that is being played at any one time.

 

Very rarely will I come up with a melody first. I'm more interested in what's going on in the background of the song than the foreground, and this probably comes from my love of baroque classical music as well as psychedelia. I love counterpoint, and I almost hate it when there is only one single melody standing out, which sometimes makes my music sound much too busy. Heh.

 

One way to figure out where your melody should be is to become very proficient with block chords on the keyboard.

[blue2blue]

 

 

 

Even though I already commented on this above, when I was rereading this thread just now, it struck me all over again.

 

Yes, if one sticks to chords that are all derived from one scale or standard set of modulations (like the blues form), and then derive the melody from that, I think one does risk a plain vanilla harmonic and melodic foundation.

 

The genius of someone like a McCartney or other great melodicist seems to be in their sense of when to break out of a given scalar/harmonic context, when to throw up an unexpected modulation.

 

I noticed this Frank Zappa quote from the Wikipedia page on musical harmony:

 

As Frank Zappa explained it, "The creation and destruction of harmonic and 'statistical' tensions is essential to the maintenance of compositional drama. Any composition (or improvisation) which remains consistent and 'regular' throughout is, for me, equivalent to watching a movie with only 'good guys' in it, or eating cottage cheese." [2] In other words, a composer cannot ensure a listener's liking by using exclusively consonant sounds. However, an excess of tension may disturb the listener. The balance between the two is essential. Contemporary music has evolved in the way that tensions are less prepared and less structured than in Baroque or Classical periods, thus producing new styles such as Jazz and Blues , where tensions are usually not prepared.

While those two paragraphs may fall a bit far from the Wikipedia guidelines (at least the writer of that section cited the Zappa quote), I think the opinions expressed are nonetheless well-observed.

 

Of course, there is dissonance implicit even in that most vanilla of musical entities, the major scale. But we create a sort of meta-harmonic context when we modulate within a work, seems to me...

 

Much to think about.

[Etienne Rambert]

how do you go about creating vocal melodies ?

 

White keys & black keys.

 

Tink around on them until it sounds right. When it sounds right -

try to sing it.

 

Even on my guitar compositions-I work the melody out on white keys & black keys.

[richardmac]

Hmm. Mostly I spontaneously write vocal melodies. I'll usually have a word, or a phrase of words, and I'll just sing the first thing that comes to my head. If that doesn't work, I'll sing the second thing. And so on. It's always spontaneous - I never stop and think about it. I'll just try different things that pop into my head. I almost never calculate them. But I will sometimes change them if I can think of something better.

 

Interesting topic. I used to write songs by writing chord progressions, and then improvising melodies over the top. But not so much any more... now, I mostly just get a word or phrase in my head and I sing it. Melodies come to me without much effort. Everything ELSE is like freaking pulling teeth.

[billeh]

Don't feel bad. I have the hardest time writing vocal melodies too. They just don't come as fast as I'd like. The Beatles, for instance, make me so mad because their so damn good at creating vocal melodies.