Writing a melody.

[triwel]

Hey.

For the last month I have sitting down everyday and trying to get a good melody. And everyday I can't come up with a good strong repetitive melody. I do get frustrated also when I have been sitting a couple of hours.

I know pretty much the basic music theory, scales and so on. And sound design, it's just when I'm gonna lay down the melody just nothing comes up.

So I wonder if you guys have any tip or something that can help me through this?

thanks you.

[george]

Try recreating popular melodies and do a original one later.

[trewq]

Also sing!


with chords...

[triwel]

Okey will try, anymore tips is much appreciated.

[seanandroid]

I usually like to get a progression down first before doing a melody. It gives me direction on where to go with my melody and an idea on what notes are going to give me what type of feel. Then depending on the harmonic rhythm, I feel out the melody from there.

Now I am not saying that is the only way to do it, just the way I do it. Some people do the complete opposite and feel out the harmony after knowing the melody. Do what feels right to you.

[tapper mike]

[jancivil]

Get mucho experience with melodies as a player. you can't force this absent the understanding out of experience, or out of just some 'theory'; which isn't even a theory, 'music theory' is just some collected information after the fact via language and symbols.

[skipscada]

I think that to come up with melodies, you need to surround yourself with melodies. If you want to come up with something fresh for your genre, it's probably a good idea to get some ideas from other genres Traditional folk music from around the world should be a good source of inspiration.

Keeping it simple is a good idea if you want that can't get it out of my head effect. Few notes, moving gradually up and down scales instead of long jumps. Another good idea is to play the notes of a chord one by one, mess around with timing and see where it takes you. If there are melodies in your head, that should be enough to make them come out.

[cron]

Don't be scared to play the same note twice or more in a row. Sounds daft, but it's one of the best bits of advice I've ever received.

[tapper mike]

Yes Jan,
How could Michael Wolff dare to present musical ideas not dreamt of in your philosophy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Wolff

[jancivil]

what philosophy is that?

Here I indicated I believe one needs to get some experience with melodies before expecting to 'write melodies'; since the OP isn't having any luck sitting in front of a computer armed with some basic theory I surmised that the person hadn't any real world experience with melodies. Do you have a disagreement with that?

or would you rather re-rehearse our last ideological disagrement off-topic here? I think I won't bite at that bait.

[tapper mike]

Borrowing from others is a method of developing melodic ideas. However it also can feed the idea that because someone else already did something similar you really aren't inventing something new.

Music is about both exploration and education. To deny one is to deny both.

[UncleAge]

For the last month I have sitting down everyday and trying to get a good melody.

First off stop doing that. It isn't giving you the results you seek so stop it. Now for the hard part... Step away from the computer. Go anywhere and try to remember how you used to listen to music before you thought you had an idea about how musicians do what they do. Ok, now stay there for a bit. And most important, try to remember how to get back there. Now the next part is easy, if you have a cellphone that records or some other type of portable recording device you should learn how to use it. Frequently. Away from the tools that you have right now.

The next time you hear a melody in your head, no matter where you are, find a way to get that idea into that recorder. Don't just sing or hum the idea, say other things into the recorder to remind yourself of what was going on at that moment. And yes, include any songs you were listening to as well. Later on, play it back to yourself when you are where ever it is that you write melodies. But this time treat it like an assignment. A project that someone else has given you that you must complete. Got that done? Cool, now rinse and repeat.

Will this help you write better melodies? I don't know. But if you haven't done it before why not try? If nothing else remember this...If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got.

I do the above from time to time. Quite often I find myself working on some other type of music that I would not normally attempt. Other times it will force me to work things out in a different sequence than I am used to. All in all it's just a tool onto itself. And just one of the things I do to break the norm a bit.

Another thing I take a swing at from time to time is trying to write a soundtrack for about a ten minute stretch of some random movie. It'll put your head in a different place for a while. And if you haven't tried it, well all I can tell you is it's tougher than you think. When all is done and said maybe you'll be in a different frame of mind when you sit down to write the next melody and the experiences above will provide little nuggets of fresh inspiration. Who knows...

[JJBiener]

I know pretty much the basic music theory, scales and so on. And sound design, it's just when I'm gonna lay down the melody just nothing comes up.

My suggestion is to start with a short snippet (called a motif). The is generally 3 or 4 notes that you like. From there use repetition and variation to extend the motif into a more fully developed melody. Ideas for variation include keeping the notes the same but changing the rhythm, keeping the rhythm constant and changing one of more notes, turn the melody upside down, reverse the notes, transpose all the notes up or down by a constant interval.

This is a starting point to get you inspired and past your writers block. Another thing you can do is something that Mozart was known to do. He would write down a number of motifs and then use dice to determine the order to put them in.

The biggest thing is to just keep experimenting.

[metalifuxx]

Unless you are a really proficient in composition and writing/programming (some people only work that way and are really good at it), it will be an arduous process, maybe trial and error and guessing, going back and manually changing notes. Me personally, I can not work like that. It is not conducive to my creativity, and musical fun in general.

Sing it, play any kind of instrument, or invest in a midi keyboard controller. Melodic ideas and experimentation will flow so much more easily when you can do it in real time, as well as getting happy accidents. You will be rewarded in hours of melodic noodling and wankery, and then the problem turns into what to use and choosing the best idea for that part at that point.

You will be a happier, more creative and experimental composer/producer, and also be more of a musician (maybe more productive) IMHO. I am not saying you can't do it by just programming/writing/editing notes, you will just have more fun and hence that will be more conducive to your creativity instead of hitting that frustrated wall of writers block and then stopping. But sometimes it can help walking away from that idea or music making for a few days, then approach again with a fresh mind/ears.

But if you got the money to spend, you can't go wrong with a smaller 2-octave midi keyboard. When I first bought my midi keyboard and low latency interface, my melodic/chord writing with synths/vsti just took off. Before that, I could only write simple parts or play them on a my pc's QWERTY keyboard with tons of latency, but they were simple and not too interesting at best (just filler background parts to go along my guitar playing).