8

Melodies

In This Chapter

◆Creating a melody from tones and rhythms

◆Analyzing existing melodies

◆Composing your first melody

◆Discovering what makes a melody memorable

Lesson 5, Track 36

In the first part of this book (Chapters 1 through 4), you learned all about notes
and pitches. In the second part (Chapters 5 through 7), you learned all about
note values and rhythms. By themselves, pitches and rhythms don’t amount to
much. But when you combine them, they create something wonderful—a melody.

Melody is defined as a logical progression of tones and rhythms—a tune set to a
beat. But pay close attention to that word “logical.” A melody isn’t a random
conglomeration of notes; the notes have to relate to and follow from each other.
In other words, a melody has to make sense, or else it’s just a bunch of noise.

That textbook definition of melody, however precise, doesn’t go far enough for
my tastes. To me, a melody is the most memorable part of a piece of music. It’s
the song you sing, the notes you hum, the musical line that stays in your mind
long after the record is over or the band has stopped playing. The best melodies
pack an emotional punch; they make us jump with joy or weep with sadness.
When done right, melodies can tell a story without words, or reinforce the
meaning of a song’s lyrics.

If you want to compose or arrange music—or even improvise to an existing
song—you have to know how to create a memorable melody. That’s where this
chapter comes in—it’s all about the art of melody.

Combining Tones and Rhythms

If you think back to Chapter 1, you’ll remember how we discussed various ways
to describe the tones in the song “Mary Had a Little Lamb.” We finally settled

Chapter