how to harmonize a melody whitout a specific scale?
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crazyfiltertweaker crazyfiltertweaker https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=277536
- KVRian
- 918 posts since 25 Mar, 2012
I want to harmonize a melody which consists of no specific scale. How can I create chord progressions like turn arounds without knowing the function of each specific note?
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crazyfiltertweaker crazyfiltertweaker https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=277536
- KVRian
- Topic Starter
- 918 posts since 25 Mar, 2012
If you have a melody with many chromatic tones, different root keys or many modulations.
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- KVRAF
- 2210 posts since 20 Sep, 2013 from Poland
Try starting at the end and working your way backwards.
Does the melody feel like it resolves to the last note? If it does, that can be your tonal center. Try a minor or major chord under that note. Then see what chord would resolve to that note and hopefully contain the next-to-last note. Maybe you can make one chord work for a few notes before the last one. Keep going backwards and trying to find chords that make sense given the notes in the melody and lead to the chords that follow.
Try to use chords that fit the style associated with the melody and the sounds that will be playing those chords - if it's jazzy sax and you want to add piano, then you can pull out some flat fives and flat nines, but if it's metal guitar and you're doing pads then try to keep the chords simpler.
Does the melody feel like it resolves to the last note? If it does, that can be your tonal center. Try a minor or major chord under that note. Then see what chord would resolve to that note and hopefully contain the next-to-last note. Maybe you can make one chord work for a few notes before the last one. Keep going backwards and trying to find chords that make sense given the notes in the melody and lead to the chords that follow.
Try to use chords that fit the style associated with the melody and the sounds that will be playing those chords - if it's jazzy sax and you want to add piano, then you can pull out some flat fives and flat nines, but if it's metal guitar and you're doing pads then try to keep the chords simpler.
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- KVRian
- 1035 posts since 19 Jun, 2006 from Berlin, Germany
What about posting a score or MIDI file of that obscure melody?
Feel the energy...
https://youtube.com/hienergymusic/
https://youtube.com/hienergymusic/
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- KVRAF
- 5440 posts since 4 Aug, 2006 from Helsinki
Simple answer: try which sound nice.crazyfiltertweaker wrote:I want to harmonize a melody which consists of no specific scale. How can I create chord progressions like turn arounds without knowing the function of each specific note?
A bit longer answer: every melody can be defined by terms of "a scale", learn
the theory of intervals.
Then there are of course atonalic music (which is a generic term, in special
cases e.g. dodecaphony, serialism etc.) - also in these cases the rule # 1 is valid: try which sound nice and fits to your holistic artistic vision. H.
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crazyfiltertweaker crazyfiltertweaker https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=277536
- KVRian
- Topic Starter
- 918 posts since 25 Mar, 2012
this is one part of a melodie I try to harmonize. And you see it has no specific scale...HiEnergy wrote:What about posting a score or MIDI file of that obscure melody?
And on the second screenshot you see how I try to do that.
(This is not my own melody and it has copyright)
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- KVRAF
- 5440 posts since 4 Aug, 2006 from Helsinki
crazyfiltertweaker wrote: this is one part of a melodie I try to harmonize. And you see it has no specific scale...
It looks that you don't know what the "scale" is. I recommend spending
at least 30 minutes reading the very basic of the music theory (scales - intervals).
H.
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crazyfiltertweaker crazyfiltertweaker https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=277536
- KVRian
- Topic Starter
- 918 posts since 25 Mar, 2012
Harry Hh, you are a funny guy! 
so if you here are the guru, tell me which scale should it be??
I try to harmonize it with a minor cis in its first inversion and second a major ais with added note. But there is no scale related cadence progression possible or a faster harmonic rhytm, ir is it?
please help me..,
so if you here are the guru, tell me which scale should it be??
I try to harmonize it with a minor cis in its first inversion and second a major ais with added note. But there is no scale related cadence progression possible or a faster harmonic rhytm, ir is it?
please help me..,
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- KVRAF
- 5440 posts since 4 Aug, 2006 from Helsinki
crazyfiltertweaker wrote:Harry Hh, you are a funny guy!
so if you here are the guru, tell me which scale should it be??
I try to harmonize it with a minor cis in its first inversion and second a major ais with added note. But there is no scale related cadence progression possible or a faster harmonic rhytm, ir is it?
please help me..,
I'm not trying to be funny, I think learning things yourself will help you most.
But give the necessary information, i.e. notation print or if you use the piano
roll, you should take a screen shot with the note names, the e.g. I can suggest
you the scale/chords. H.
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- KVRAF
- 2210 posts since 20 Sep, 2013 from Poland
Most of those notes would be an F minor harmonic scale except for the third note. Whether F harmonic minor would make sense with the rest of the melody, I don't know - I don't recognize it. But given those pictures of the piano roll, that's where I'd start. Faster harmonic motion is definitely possible under those notes. Is that the final part of the melody?
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- KVRian
- 1002 posts since 1 Dec, 2004
Yeah this looks like it's in F minor. You really need to know the scale of something to make a chord progression (otherwise the chords have no function and don't really go anywhere)
Suggested progression (in F minor):
Fm Db7 G7 C7 (two bars per chord)
Once you have the chord progression and the melody, you can use a technique like big-band style 4 voice harmonization.
The melody goes F F B Bb Ab F G Bb Ab F E E
Chord: Fm
F: This note is part of the Fm chord, so we want an Fm chord of some sort, with F on top. Fm6 will work nice here, so let's start with Ab C D F.
F: Repeat
B: This one is not part of Fm, so we need another strategy. Since we have Ab coming up soon on the chord of Db7, we can use parallel chords to get there. So to get the parallel chord with B on top, we use E7, which gives us D E G# B.
Chord: Db7
Bb: We use a parallel chord here too. This is a half step down, so Eb7 gives us Db Eb G Bb.
Ab: Last of the series of parallel chords, this note is part of Db7 so we want to use that, with Ab on top, so we get Cb Db F Ab.
Chord: G7
G: This one is part of G7 so we can simply use G7 with G on top, giving B D F G.
Bb: Ok this one is pretty dissonant over G7! We'd like to use the #9 formed by Bb over G7, which means we should use either G7b9 or G7alt. G7alt forms a nice parallel chord with the next note (Ab) so it would be really nice to have G7alt as a polychord (G7 + Eb on top, which makes a really nice alternation with G7 + Db on top). Since we're using 4 notes per chord, we need an extra note, and turning Eb into Eb7 seems to work best here, so let's use Eb7, which gives us Db Eb G Bb.
Ab: Now that we've prepared the Eb over G7 vs Db over G7 thing, let's have Db. As previously, we need 4 notes, so let's turn Db into Db7 (which gives us some nice dissonant parallelism), which gives us Cb Db F Ab.
F: This one is in G7 so we don't need any fancy trics. G7 with F on top will do, giving us G B D F.
Chord: C7
E: We could simply use C7 with E on top, but since you used F#7 in your example, this gave me a really nice idea: since the previous chord is G7, and F#7 over C7 works (it turns it into C7b9), we can voice this one as F#7 which gives us a nice parallel progression and all sorts of cool notes. With E on top, this gives us F# A# C# E.
E: Last note. We could repeat the F#7, but resolving F# up to G would be really nice (especially if this is followed by another Fm chord, which gives the really nice F#-G-Ab motion on the bottom note of the chord). This forms a C7b9 chord and gives us G A# C# E.
There you go. This is a kinda brash jazz harmonization with a lot of bite so it might not work in the context of your song, but it should give you an idea of how to do it.
Suggested progression (in F minor):
Fm Db7 G7 C7 (two bars per chord)
Once you have the chord progression and the melody, you can use a technique like big-band style 4 voice harmonization.
The melody goes F F B Bb Ab F G Bb Ab F E E
Chord: Fm
F: This note is part of the Fm chord, so we want an Fm chord of some sort, with F on top. Fm6 will work nice here, so let's start with Ab C D F.
F: Repeat
B: This one is not part of Fm, so we need another strategy. Since we have Ab coming up soon on the chord of Db7, we can use parallel chords to get there. So to get the parallel chord with B on top, we use E7, which gives us D E G# B.
Chord: Db7
Bb: We use a parallel chord here too. This is a half step down, so Eb7 gives us Db Eb G Bb.
Ab: Last of the series of parallel chords, this note is part of Db7 so we want to use that, with Ab on top, so we get Cb Db F Ab.
Chord: G7
G: This one is part of G7 so we can simply use G7 with G on top, giving B D F G.
Bb: Ok this one is pretty dissonant over G7! We'd like to use the #9 formed by Bb over G7, which means we should use either G7b9 or G7alt. G7alt forms a nice parallel chord with the next note (Ab) so it would be really nice to have G7alt as a polychord (G7 + Eb on top, which makes a really nice alternation with G7 + Db on top). Since we're using 4 notes per chord, we need an extra note, and turning Eb into Eb7 seems to work best here, so let's use Eb7, which gives us Db Eb G Bb.
Ab: Now that we've prepared the Eb over G7 vs Db over G7 thing, let's have Db. As previously, we need 4 notes, so let's turn Db into Db7 (which gives us some nice dissonant parallelism), which gives us Cb Db F Ab.
F: This one is in G7 so we don't need any fancy trics. G7 with F on top will do, giving us G B D F.
Chord: C7
E: We could simply use C7 with E on top, but since you used F#7 in your example, this gave me a really nice idea: since the previous chord is G7, and F#7 over C7 works (it turns it into C7b9), we can voice this one as F#7 which gives us a nice parallel progression and all sorts of cool notes. With E on top, this gives us F# A# C# E.
E: Last note. We could repeat the F#7, but resolving F# up to G would be really nice (especially if this is followed by another Fm chord, which gives the really nice F#-G-Ab motion on the bottom note of the chord). This forms a C7b9 chord and gives us G A# C# E.
There you go. This is a kinda brash jazz harmonization with a lot of bite so it might not work in the context of your song, but it should give you an idea of how to do it.
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crazyfiltertweaker crazyfiltertweaker https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=277536
- KVRian
- Topic Starter
- 918 posts since 25 Mar, 2012
Madbrain, thank you for your effort!
because my problem is to create a function based chord progression because of the one non diatonic note which makes the melody chromatic.
so it would be nice if you mention every function of every single chord. The one note should require a modulation but where and can I interpret the other following chords into other functions or must I modulate back?
maybe I can solve it just to harmonize the important steps and let the rest quite of harmonies?
and what do you think about my solution?
because my problem is to create a function based chord progression because of the one non diatonic note which makes the melody chromatic.
so it would be nice if you mention every function of every single chord. The one note should require a modulation but where and can I interpret the other following chords into other functions or must I modulate back?
maybe I can solve it just to harmonize the important steps and let the rest quite of harmonies?
and what do you think about my solution?
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- KVRAF
- 2210 posts since 20 Sep, 2013 from Poland
One chromatic note doesn't require modulating and modulating back. It could just be an altered note in the chord, for example just play an Fm7b5 ove rthe first three notes, with that flatted fifth leading very nicely to the fourth note which is a Bb. Or use it in a passing chord, like MadBrain did with the Fm - E7 - Eb7. Either way you're not modulating, you're just getting a little chromatic, and either one of those will work if you are allowed to be jazzy.
If it's trap, I'd try an Fm for the first two notes then Abm for the next three. It'll work, and it could lead to a Db chord next. Then, E dim, Db, C7 (assuming an F minor chord will work with whatever happens next after this fragment of the melody). It will be kind of dark and dramatic, a lot more dramatic than the melody seems to be by itself, but that could work very well for trap.
If it's something like trance and you want things to sound smooth and not dramatic, that would be more tricky but also doable.
If it's trap, I'd try an Fm for the first two notes then Abm for the next three. It'll work, and it could lead to a Db chord next. Then, E dim, Db, C7 (assuming an F minor chord will work with whatever happens next after this fragment of the melody). It will be kind of dark and dramatic, a lot more dramatic than the melody seems to be by itself, but that could work very well for trap.
If it's something like trance and you want things to sound smooth and not dramatic, that would be more tricky but also doable.