Songwriting: melody first

Last time I talked about starting with chords and then adding a melody. This time we're going to reverse that and start with a melody.

Obviously you can just do this by ear, but there is a faster way. First find the key of your melody. After that's done try to determine if your melody is major, minor or perhaps some sort of modal tonality. Once you know this, look at your melody and try to find the strong notes of each measure. Here is a melody I composed quickly. It's in the key of C major,

I'm sure you're thinking, how do I know which ones are the strong notes. Look for long notes, notes that occurs on down beats or notes that are repeated. Of course use your ears, but in general those tips will help you identify them. Here are what I chose as the strong notes, but keep in mind this is more art than science, so it's possible to come up with different notes than what I have here.

Now you should have 1 or perhaps 2 strong notes for every measure of you melody. Once you have that look at the chords in the key you found before. Take the notes that make up the chord and assign them to measures containing those strong notes. Of course this doesn't have to be random. Use your ears and think of common progressions that sound good. After you've done that insert the chords into your song and see if it fits your melody.

I think it's best to consider the overall key and common chord movements. For example have the 1st chord be the Root major chord of the key and have the last be the V major chord of the key. Check out my post on common chord progressions for ideas. That said, you can try some new ideas and try to come up with something a little more original. Here I added some 7th chords with extensions to get a different sound.

Ultimately you have to decide for yourself though and as I always say let your ear be your guide. Also another method to use when there are few long notes is to look for arpeggios inside the melody as often then can be you guide. That's it for this article. I hope it helped and if you have any questions, leave them below.

Songwriting: Chords first