songwriting 1 week 7 1701

SONGWRITING 1Week 7: Melody

LEARNING OUTCOMES

By the end of today’s session, students will be able to:

1. Identify and describe 2 fundamental elements of melody

2. Identify and define 5 different types of melodic contour

3. Use 5 different ways of creating contrast with pitch

4. Use 5 different ways of creating contrast with rhythm

MELODY

➤ Fundamental elements of melody

➤ Rhythm

➤ Pitch

➤ Melody is a succession of pitches in rhythm

➤ Melody comes in phrases - just like we uses sentences in language to covey ideas

➤ A melodic phrase usually defines itself by come to some point of rest or resolution

➤ In vocal music, this is usually where the singer breathes!

➤ Short melodic phrases join together to form longer phrases, which in turn form sections

CREATING CONTRAST WITH PITCH

1. LOWER/RAISE PITCH

➤ Lower or raise the pitch of the melodic motif between sections

2. FOLLOW/AVOID CHORD ROOTS

➤ Follow the roots of the chords you are playing

➤ Or avoid the roots of the chords your are playing

3. CHANGE SHAPE

➤ Ascending

➤ Descending

➤ Arch

➤ Inverted Arch

➤ Stationary

4. PASSING/CHORD TONES

➤ If you mainly are using passing notes (non-chord tones) as melody notes in one section, try using chord tones in the next section.

5. INTERVALLIC/CLUSTERED

➤ Is there lots of space between the notes of the melody intervallically?

➤ Or are all the notes clustered together?

➤ If they’re clustered in the first section, make them intervallic in the next section

CONJUNCT/DISJUNCT MOTION

➤ There are two kinds of melodic motion

➤ Conjunct motion is stepwise motion - moves by interval of a second

➤ Disjunct motion goes in leaps - intervals greater than a second

CREATING CONTRAST WITH RHYTHM

1. SYNCOPATED/STRAIT

➤ If your melody is catching anticipation beats etc in one section, make it on the beat in the next section

2. LENGTHEN/SHORTEN NOTES

➤ If one section consists of fairly short notes, make the next section have more sustained notes etc

3. PHRASE POSITION

➤ Are your phrases positioned before the down beat, on the down beat, or after the down beat?

4. LONG/SHORT PHRASES

➤ If your melodic motifs are a bar long in one section, make them half a bar, or two bars long in the next section

5. MORE/LESS REST SPACE

➤ If you have lots of space between motifs in one section, jam your motifs closer together in the next section