Hi everyone,
I have decided its time for me to stop composing my lead melodies with just using single keys at a time, and move onto chords, since when using chords they will make the melody bigger and richer.
I am mostly creating trance type lead melodies in cubase 4.
Can anyone suggest a website/video/book for this?
Does Cubase have any functions which can replace single keys for chords in the midi layout, and is this a good solution?
Thanks,
Jinn
Learning Music Theory for Lead Melodies
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- KVRAF
- 1595 posts since 17 Nov, 2007 from Seattle, WA
In case you haven't already discovered it, there's a MIDI plugin that comes with C4, called chorder. You can set it to play a chord based upon the root key you press. There's a number of common chord type presets.
I experimented with that for a bit, and it helped me get an idea of what those chords were, at first.
Although, I recently undertook an exercise which I think may be more helpful -
Find a melodic song whose lead is chorded, load it into your DAW and COPY IT. Measure by measure, enter the precise notes. If you're a 'visual' kind of person, like me, then the association between what you hear, and what you see on the DAW will help you connect a bit. After you've done that, try out playing it manually on your keyboard (which can be quite difficult, but is still extremely effective practice to reinforce the association).
The song I used was . Worked out great, as it was relatively simple to hear it. Later, I'm going to see if I can find another, more complex song that strikes my fancy, so that I can kick it up a little extra notch.
I experimented with that for a bit, and it helped me get an idea of what those chords were, at first.
Although, I recently undertook an exercise which I think may be more helpful -
Find a melodic song whose lead is chorded, load it into your DAW and COPY IT. Measure by measure, enter the precise notes. If you're a 'visual' kind of person, like me, then the association between what you hear, and what you see on the DAW will help you connect a bit. After you've done that, try out playing it manually on your keyboard (which can be quite difficult, but is still extremely effective practice to reinforce the association).
The song I used was . Worked out great, as it was relatively simple to hear it. Later, I'm going to see if I can find another, more complex song that strikes my fancy, so that I can kick it up a little extra notch.