So I am producing goa trance, here is my latest song for example:

http://soundcloud.com/radish2/sunrays-in-the-old-building

However I think it sounds good and even I still don#t know properly how to write melodies in the FL Studio piano roll. It is not so much about the notes used, since I know how a note will sound, but the big problem is the rythm. The FL Studio piano roll has 12 steps to enter until it is splitted and the next "beat" starts. Maybe I see the border and try to press one part of the melody into those 12 steps instead of making one part of the melody longer. When I write melodies should I use each step or should I fulfill only the steps that matter to the melody? Because I do not start msuic with a lot of ideas in my brain I just play with the piano roll and try things out until it sounds good, but maybe that is a wrong approach and I should know exactly what I am doing. Can anyone give mie tips how to use the piano roll better, so I have better command of the rythm and can create good sounding melodies faster. Listen also to my song so you know that I am not that bad, but not very good either.

why no answer still?

Do you have a midi controller? That might help.

Part of "learning" how to make a good melody is training your brain and ears to pick up on musical patterns that "sound good" for lack of a better term.

So when you're fiddling around in the piano roll, you don't get that same instant feedback of how the notes sound together as you do when you're pressing the piano keys and get to hear how it sounds right away. This helps your brain better associate the musical intervals with the keys that you pressed.

If you're JUST programming notes, you have to play the loop again and see how it sounds, so the sonic feedback you get, as far as how the notes sound together, is somewhat delayed. It's also harder to "feel" the music, so you might get something that sounds thrown together when just trying to program a melody that sounds good. Part of making a good song or beat is imbuing the music with so9me emotionality, it helps the listener connect to the music.

But as far as the song you made, I like it. It's definitely catchy and your production technique sounds pretty good IMO.

Making good/great melodies is extremely tough for me too. Just try to "feel" where the chords/beat/bass is taking you and let the melody come out of you; sometimes when you're programming notes, it's hard not to over-think it.

the problem is mostly, that i do not even have an imagination and just want to start programming. so I click the loop to be player and it sounds very wrong. I am wondering if it is because of the divisions in FL Studio that I somehow tend to make one part of the melody in one bar. The writting of melody is not even that hard but somehow it is difficult to get it in good rythm.

"writing melodies in FL Studio?"

did you ever approach melodies before you got FL Studio?

did you ever get any experience with rhythm before you picked up the pencil tool or whatever in the piano roll?

the question asks a cart to pull a horse. How is 'FL Studio' going to obviate getting experience with melody qua melody, or rhythm qua rhythm?

"i do not even have an imagination" well that's normal for just staring out. "and just want to start programming." Why? Do you think approbation will soon follow? 'Dude, that's so cool'. People today are in such a hurry.

So what do you suggest?

Are you sure you want to be writing trance in 3/4?

You might find it easier in 4/4...

I am writting in 4 4, I did not count correctly. But building good melodies is difficult.

Well trance is really easy rhythmically speaking. Different parts will generally be every beat, every half beat or every other beat.

But writing by numbers won't make for very interesting melodies.

The melodic side of things is very basic. Stay in key and don't use many "chord" changes. So if you don't know what scales are look into that. That said, trance isn't so much about the melodies as about the structure of the song - building up and taking away. Most of it's just basic arps (octaves, fifths and a couple of additional high notes) and a pretty steady bass. It's the filters that are the key to movement.

You can't just start out with no idea and expect to be as good as a musician with years of experience. You need to practice to learn. There's no quick fix. Maybe you can look at some of the youtube tutorials or download a couple of other people's tracks to see what they do.

youare right about that, but I want to produce more complex trance, with long melodies, with undermined strings, with a lot of key changes in the bassline and more. i also want to produce mroe downtempo ambient peaces and I want to have mroe xcomplex sounding melodies.

I've done tons of stuff with strong melodic leads in FL Studio and never really experienced the type of problem you mentioned. I'm not even entirely sure what you mean. Regarding rhythm, the most common trait I find in beginner style melodies is a complete lack of syncopation which makes everything sound very rigid and stiff.

When i find myself in such a state i play with presets.

get busy with music outside of the DAW in some way.

as per rhythm, a really good way to get a grip on the fundamentals is getting what the drummer is doing.

You could listen to what you are into and on a tabletop or slapping your leg, anything and act like you're doing the drum part. listen to a drum part and try to detect how often the kick, the hat, the snare are hit; parse it out in your mind and make your body do one part, then add another part.

the rhythm in what you want to do right now is just simply dividing things by two. The most basic: hihat part might be eight times a bar straight up, the bass and snare alternate quarters.

syncopation is mentioned, that's doing things between the quarters, typically going into the next subdivision, 16ths.
The third of a group of four sixteenths for instance, in the hihat, right before the snare backbeat.

in the public library here there are actually books that lay out popular rhythms.

but if you are coming out of the blue, clicking around a piano roll is just too random and you'll waste time and energy you ought to be using to get a foundation in musical activity.

If you have some instrument or drum rex files,and you choose to use a drum loop from the rex file, you can then extract the midi information from the rex file with all the beat, groove,rhythm or melody timing from within the file. You can then use the midi file with a synth or instrument to play along with the original drum groove. 9 times out of 10 with a synth it will be all over the piano roll, but the timing is intact. If you then put all the notes onto 1 note you can then listen and move the notes around till you hear something you like the sound of. Ive come across some proper good melodic content this way and so with it being derived from a beat or percussion its always in time, then it becomes just a matter of what notes I want to play or how long they are within the midi file, so its just a matter of selection and deleting. Its a really good way for when you have no inspiration or are just bored and want to try something new, or are stuck for music theory stuff. A basic example would be, get a simple funky drum beat, kick+ snare and a few hats, extract the midi information and stick a slap bass patch underneath and experiment. Anyway, this might help, it might not, but it works for me so it might also work for you...who knows.

'writing melodies' is in the topic title.

trakstar, you're grabbing other people's midis and 'selecting and deleting', in place of creating.

I cannot see what kind of melodic FLOW comes out of that actitivity. Melody is something you hear and bring out through your voice or another instrument. The path to that is playing or singing melodies. It really is. You may prefer not, it might be too hard... but you're not writing melodies, you're playing a kind of game, as if to get around the work of learning how to come up with something by your own hand. You've chosen crutches instead of taking baby's first steps.