Natural Melodies?

[John W Selleck]

What really strikes me as funny, is I have never studied music theory, and would have no idea how to write a melody if I had to, but a few decent musicians I have sent acapella MP3 files to, for feel alone; have said I gave them a great melody and used it for our co-writes. Imagine that! Every lyric I write, I sing afterword to make sure they flow. I don't consider the melody, just what feels right. When I first started using a professional studio guy, I would use Band In A Box to auto-generate chords and drum tracks in the style/genre/tempo I wanted, and then take that to him. The first time I did that he said I would have to sing along with it to give him a sense of the melody I wanted. We did this for about 200 demos, some of them very good, and some of them flops, at least to my uneducated ears.

My question to all, is can someone why has not studied how to do it, write melodies based on their own feel; kind of like how some musicians play by  ear?

[Cody]

Not to sound like a complete stoned hippie, but natures melodies are pretty natural  birds,waves, wind, etc....

[snabbu]

Language contains melody naturally.

if you take a small section of say someone reading the news, and loop it. Then do something else like make a cup of coffee, you will hear the melody in the spoken word.

 

inter verse

lyric writers very often write this wrong it is very rarely picked up even when tuned and not sounding quite right.  They have a section in one verse that naturally rises the same place in another that naturally falls. This creates a prosody issue, and the lyric never reaches its potential.

 

it is possible that someone who has studied nothing can write melody. 

It would be the same as someone not taught mathematics discovering multiplication for themselves. Rare, unlikely, a hell of a lot of effort, but possible. 

 

Note a well written lyric determines 80% of the melody content.

matters determined by the lyric. 

Genre

BPM

Rhythm

pace

Some of the pitch.

 

the melody fir most part starts on the tonic so the listener can know the key it’s in. In the middle of the phrase there needs to be a pause, a musical comma, this is normally  the 3rd of the scale and will be a longer duration. At the end of the phrase there needs to be a cadence. The last note of which will be the tonic. The genre you are writing will determine the other note.

the natural form of the language will determine some of the intervening notes. 

And of course there is pattern variation and repeat. So when you have two bars of notes you have the whole section. Because it’s repetitive with variations.

 

I would see maybe once a month a lyric posted in a forum where I go oh yea that goes like this. 

 

Cheers

 

Gary

 

 

 

 

[John W Selleck]

19 hours ago, Cody said:

Not to sound like a complete stoned hippie, but natures melodies are pretty natural  birds,waves, wind, etc....

Hi Cody,

Yes, lots of bird song has repeated notes, but if you were to hear that song over and over again, no matter how sweet it sounds; you'd get a bit bored with it.

What I'm talking about, is a person coming up with different melodies, for different songs; without any training.

[John W Selleck]

19 hours ago, snabbu said:

inter verse

lyric writers very often write this wrong it is very rarely picked up even when tuned and not sounding quite right.  They have a section in one verse that naturally rises the same place in another that naturally falls. This creates a prosody issue, and the lyric never reaches its potential.

 

it is possible that someone who has studied nothing can write melody. 

It would be the same as someone not taught mathematics discovering multiplication for themselves. Rare, unlikely, a hell of a lot of effort, but possible. 

 

Note a well written lyric determines 80% of the melody content.

matters determined by the lyric. 

Genre

BPM

Rhythm

pace

Some of the pitch.

Hi,

And thanks for the read and the thoughtful response. While I understand much of what you are saying, some of it is like trying to describe colors to someone who has been blind all his life.  I don.t sit down with pen and hand and write melodies. All I do is sing what the lyric makes me feel. I have had many different melodic suggestions from musicians involving all the above: genre, BPM. etc; from one set of lyrics I put up on different websites. And some of them not even close to what I was hearing from it. Some of what I write can fit into multiple genres so I can't see one lyric to fitting just one melody. I have played around a lot, with different lyrics using BIABox starting with all different genres/singing styles/BPM/rhythms; and come out with sometimes 3-5 totally different sounding songs.

I am not trying to sound like any kind of a musical genius, I am not. I think what is happening is the result of playing anything brass for a few years, listening to and singing along with tons of music, from many different genres, over many years. There used to be a TV game show called "Name That Tune" where you had to identify the song from the first few notes of the intro. I used to do quite well with that. One of my grandfathers was able to start playing any musical instrument he ever tried after just having it his possession for a day or two. He was also able to play almost any song on the piano after hearing it a time or two, and he never learned to read music at all. To tell the truth, he was a chronic alcoholic most of his life.

I don't want to seem contentious but I don't see myself as the monkey that picks up a typewriter and writes the encyclopedia either. My studio guy, who plays any stringed instrument he wants, and has multiple gold records on his wall from top country singers he has played lead for, had his own big studio in Nashville, and was a song picker for Sony: told me I have a very good feel for where a melody should go. Yes, I was paying him, but less than 1/2 what he was charging his other clients, of which he had many. I was also paying a heck of a lot less than charged by other studios out there.

[John W Selleck]

17 hours ago, Patchez said:

Yes. 

You've possibly read enough of my comments to know what the explanation may be, -- so won't   I don't want to be to redundant. 

Thank you,

Actually, not so many, but I am fairly new to this site and then  I was outta here for a while. While it is not my genre, I love the blues, and sing tons of it, and jazz, on karaoke stages around the world. Like I said above, I have no idea how to create a melody, I open my mouth, and my mind to the lyric, and what comes out, comes out. I have been told, about my karaoke singing, a few different things. 1) I don't always stick to the melody. 2) I often stick in many notes that weren't there. 3) I sing many harmonics. 4) I am almost always on pitch.  and 5) Even when I am not on pitch they like it because I "Feel" what I am singing. I know I am not a perfect singer. I really don't like hearing playbacks of me singing. It amazes me that others like it. But I will be singing, and singing melodies, my own or others till I die.

[Cody]

3 hours ago, John W Selleck said:

Hi Cody,

Yes, lots of bird song has repeated notes, but if you were to hear that song over and over again, no matter how sweet it sounds; you'd get a bit bored with it.

What I'm talking about, is a person coming up with different melodies, for different songs; without any training.

Understood, but most of what I hear in nature isn't repeated, verse chorus verse chorus oh no look out! it's a bridge! chorus.....rinse, repeat, regurgitate another....make sure to keep it all tidy and middle of the road so everyone "likes" it, but nobody loves it

 

Wind gusts rustling trees isn't on a set cycle or "formulaic" mockingbirds, even coyotes....rarely on repeat mode.  

 

I get a bit bored with most "songs" 

 

I understand what you're asking, not sure I understand the difference though.....just me being dense.

 

Keep on singing!

[John W Selleck]

18 hours ago, Cody said:

Understood, but most of what I hear in nature isn't repeated, verse chorus verse chorus oh no look out! it's a bridge! chorus.....rinse, repeat, regurgitate another....make sure to keep it all tidy and middle of the road so everyone "likes" it, but nobody loves it

So you have no songs you love? You don't enjoy writing songs? For me, yes nature makes some beautiful music but it has only one message, I am nature, love me or hate me or fear me, but this is what I am. It doesn't tell anything in so many varied ways as we can with song. Words can paint pictures to be shared, and as long as the language is understood, they can be shared with many others, and touch many others. This is why I write.Yes, many written songs are formulaic, because we have found that these formula are the best ways to reach the biggest audience. Isn't that the idea?

[MikeRobinson]

"Music theory is actually easier than you think."  Skipping all the junk that college music students had to rote-memorize, a lot of it has to do with something that's also relevant to melody writing:  the study of intervals.

 

The unique arrangement of black vs. white keys on a keyboard shows that "E-F" and "B-C" do not have "a black key in-between them."  The arrangement of black-key groups is not symmetrical.  Two "adjacent" notes in the scale are a so-called "half-step" apart; the rest are "whole-steps."

 

Digging deeper into melody-writing, then, "a melody also consists of intervals," the jump from one note to the next, which is sometimes short and sometimes long.  The melodic line also has a shape:  ascending or descending.  It also of course has a rhythm.

 

Chords consist of some possibly-decorated version of a triad, which is "stacked intervals," and each note in the chord also forms an interval with the melody line.

 

"Music theory" looks at music-making from that perspective.  As the name implies, it is a "theoretical, abstract" view that is sometimes quite informative and which might suggest creative possibilities that you otherwise wouldn't have thought of.  You don't need a college degree, nor even formal study, to pluck useful nuggets out of it.

[John W Selleck]

21 hours ago, Patchez said:

What were we talking about again? 

Inventing melodies without knowing music theory, but just by "Ear".

 

Yes I can appreciate music in a different language but not the song if I can't understand the words. And yes, I love many instrumental.

I'm a Believer, The Monkees was, and is still loved the world over...

 

[John W Selleck]

21 hours ago, Patchez said:

Hey JW, -- just came to mind to tell you, -- your ID pic, Icon... was confusing to me when first saw it. (How do people see things?) Anyway, to me, with my cultural munging you looked like an andlishman during the India occupation.

Sorry, but that's quite a bit off. I am wearing traditional Thai formal dress. My Thai girlfriend, at the time, wanted her family to think we were married so we took a bunch of these dress up pics. No oppression involved.

Good Mornin' too.

[Cody]

11 hours ago, John W Selleck said:

So you have no songs you love? You don't enjoy writing songs? For me, yes nature makes some beautiful music but it has only one message, I am nature, love me or hate me or fear me, but this is what I am. It doesn't tell anything in so many varied ways as we can with song. Words can paint pictures to be shared, and as long as the language is understood, they can be shared with many others, and touch many others. This is why I write.Yes, many written songs are formulaic, because we have found that these formula are the best ways to reach the biggest audience. Isn't that the idea?

Yeah there's tons of stuff I love(doubt any of it has ever even sniffed the bottom of any "charts" though........I'm not sure enjoy writing is the right way I would put it either, just something I do....helps organize thoughts/feelings......I am nature, love me or hate me  

I'm usually quite content,  just playing for myself and the dog, but then do something right or not at all.........doesn't mean I don't always strive to be better and appreciate any and all feedback.    

[John W Selleck]

20 hours ago, MikeRobinson said:

"Music theory is actually easier than you think."  Skipping all the junk that college music students had to rote-memorize, a lot of it has to do with something that's also relevant to melody writing:  the study of intervals.

Hi Mike,

Thanks for the explanation. But can someone do that naturally, without the studying at all, simply by hearing tons of music and feeling where the notes should fall?

 

I have always had what most would call a learning disability. If something doesn't engage my mind, for whatever reason, it just doesn't stick, no matter how many times I read or see it. The things that do, I learn, and remember, very easily. It was super hard for me to learn to read music at all, and now that I haven't, for 50+ years, I couldn't play  from sheet music if I was paid to.

[Cody]

5 hours ago, Patchez said:

 

Nahhh, not understood ist gut2:

 

 

 

 

 

 

I needed that........I remember when the cover of this got big, and I said meh I liked the other better.......couldn't remember her name, and I try not to resort to Google for arguments..   ....."yeah, yeah, you're right, I must of just dreamed I heard a better version of this a loooong time ago" haha

 

 

[John W Selleck]

17 hours ago, Cody said:

Yeah there's tons of stuff I love(doubt any of it has ever even sniffed the bottom of any "charts" though........I'm not sure enjoy writing is the right way I would put it either, just something I do....helps organize thoughts/feelings......I am nature, love me or hate me  

I'm usually quite content,  just playing for myself and the dog, but then do something right or not at all.........doesn't mean I don't always strive to be better and appreciate any and all feedback.    

Hi Cody,

I guess that's where we differ, I love an audience, appreciation, and applause. Some of the songs I love never hit the charts either but lots of them did. But it takes lots of different kinds to make up the world and sometimes what in not "In" today will be tomorrow.

[John W Selleck]

On 6/16/2020 at 3:31 PM, snabbu said:

it is possible that someone who has studied nothing can write melody. 

It would be the same as someone not taught mathematics discovering multiplication for themselves. Rare, unlikely, a hell of a lot of effort, but possible. 

I forgot I wanted to answer this part. In the 7th grade my math teacher gave us a word problem. I quickly raised my hand with an answer. Because I had done it in my head he asked me how I had done it I answered and he took me right to the principal's office. They decided then and there to start an advanced math class at the school, which they had never had. It turns out I had solved the problem using algebra, which I had never had, and at that time; wasn't being taught in grade school.

[John W Selleck]

22 hours ago, Patchez said:

Yes. 

Don't even need to have heard tons of music. 

Hi Again,

And thank you. I do remember picking up a guitar at a very young age and plucking the strings randomly and saying to my self, "Hey, this sounds pretty good." This, of course, was before I found out that, due to nerve damage to my wrist, my left hand was about a second behind my brain. This makes it impossible for my to play any 2 handed instrument. I did OK with anything brass, even the slide trombone as long as I played it right handed. I could even play the melody on a keyboard, or play a song as long as I let it play the chords automatically.

[MikeRobinson]

Honestly, John, it is very plain that "you know more about melody-writing than you know."  There is no objective standard for "what makes a great song" other than it is yours.

 

"Just ask your dog." 

[John W Selleck]

17 hours ago, Patchez said:

Well, I appreciate the topic. It seems for me it's a never ending discussion. Not that, that's a problem, it's not. I am just amazed at some curriculum approach to things. 

Thank you.

Before I forget, which at my stage of life I often do, I do want to say I admire all those that really know what they're doing with music. knowing your shortcomings, as well as your strengths is a great thing in life. I know I could never do what composers do. It just isn't in me.

I used to sing karaoke at a big club in Knoxville,TN. The audience was varied, and usually good and I sang a very eclectic mix of songs. One night we had a table full, about 8, middle aged white guys that wouldn't applaud, or even seem to notice any of the singers. I got up and did "All I Could Do Was Cry", Etta James. I do all songs my way, and I can  scat. After it was over, they all got on their feet and applauded like crazy. I stopped by their table and one guy said to me: "You didn't hit all her notes but you hit your own!" People will never cease to amaze me. Who would ever think a group of middle aged guys in the south would have any notion who Etta was, or like her music. Anyway, though I don't know much about music, sometimes I do things accidentally well.

[John W Selleck]

17 hours ago, MikeRobinson said:

Honestly, John, it is very plain that "you know more about melody-writing than you know."  There is no objective standard for "what makes a great song" other than it is yours.

 

"Just ask your dog." 

I don't think I know anything about melody writing, other than I can do a bit, but it is mostly by accident, or a gift from above.

One of the biggest things in life I am thankful for, as much as I love music, is getting my pitch mostly back after losing it for 30+ years. I came back from Vietnam in 1968, tried to play a little slide trombone with some friends, they told me I  was way off, so I went to an audiologist and was diagnosed with cracked and scarred eardrums. It came back in 2001 from singing my melodies to my studio guy, he forced me to, after about a year or so. Now, people say they love my singing. I still don't, but as long as they like it I will keep doing it.