If you’ve never heard about this concept before, I guarantee you, it will blow your mind and it will be of so much use to the improvement of your songwriting. Of course, you shouldn’t overdo this because it would make your melody too all over the place, but throwing in a large interval every once in a while can sometimes create the most memorable parts of a melody. Are you staying too much in one area of notes for too long? Try using some larger intervals sometimes like making a large leap from the 1 to the major 6th. Try using arches in your melodies, and become aware of the lines that you are making. Play with different intervals in your phrasesĪ mistake a lot of beginning songwriters make is to always use the same intervals in their melodies, and especially small intervals (like the 2nd and 3rd). The repetitive pre-chorus where Kurt Cobain is singing not too loud: “Hello, hello, hello, how low?” is being followed up by a different motif in the chorus, that is sung extremely loud with a much higher melody. Example:Ī great example of contrast in a chorus melody is “Smells Like Teen Spirit” by Nirvana. ![]() So if you have been writing your melody in a certain way for your verses (maybe a fast-paced rhythm with short notes), you should definitely explore the opposite of that in your chorus to create contrast and to surprise your listeners. But the great thing that they do notice when listening is contrast every change between fast and slow, loud or quiet, consonant or dissonant, long notes or short notes, etc. ![]() Most people that listen to your song are non-musicians, and they don’t really care for all the cool music theory tricks that you are pulling off in your melody-writing. This doesn’t always need to be the case of course, but it can give you a great starting point of writing a melody since you are writing everything around this line. Knowing the title of your song and where to place it is everythingĭo you already have a title or catchphrase for your song lyrically? Well, it is rather necessary that you have at least a global idea because the title of the song is preferably in the chorus, and the strongest positions where you can put your song title are most definitely at the beginning and/or the end. Secondly, it is important to realise that the ending of your phrases is rather important and that the most common way to end a phrase, is on the first count or the third count of the second measure (see example). If you are new to this concept, I recommend you write phrases of two bars. So that leads us ultimately to our next question: how to create a motif? How to create a motifįirstly, you need to decide how many bars long your motif is going to be. So that is the challenge: keep our listeners interested enough by showing them what is happening with this motif that we’ve got. The trick is to constantly find a balance between enough repetition and change, expectation and surprise, all for the sake of keeping the listener engaged in our song. A motif can be repeated, or slightly altered every time it occurs in the chorus. The motif functions as a “hook” (hence the word) for the listener to hold on to and to follow. A motif is a short melodic phrase that holds both melodic and rhythmic information. ![]() Well, I’d rather use a different term in this article: a motif. You’ve probably heard this word at least once when people give you feedback on your music: the song needs a great “ hook”.
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