random harmony tips

[IOS]

My fren, play in the key of W

Seriously though, thanks for these threads @brian trageskin, haven't got time to check them in practical terms on a DAW right now, but will get back to it. I was thinking it'd be nice to gather some of your harmony-related posts in a google doc or something, then add sound examples and piano roll screenshots etc. I reckon it'd be helpful.

[brian trageskin]

20 hours ago, IOS said:

haven't got time to check them in practical terms on a DAW right now, but will get back to it.

yeah the "tips" (tricks? moves?) i gave so far were mainly intended for beginners. although i guess those who aren't beginners haven't necessarily thought of playing a minor 7 voicing like this before - playing the b6 to indicate aeolian while omitting the b3 at the same time. btw my trick for basic pentatonic triads is imo a nice introduction to several things at the same time, how to build basic triads, diatonic shit 101, major/minor pentatonic, 4th voicings. plus they sound lovely - to my ears anyway. nothing new to someone who isn't an absolute beginner though. 

20 hours ago, IOS said:

I was thinking it'd be nice to gather some of your harmony-related posts in a google doc or something, then add sound examples and piano roll screenshots etc. I reckon it'd be helpful.

love the idea. let's do it. i can't at the moment but in a few days' time yeah. (obviously you could just do it yourself in the meantime, if you have the time and inclination - which you probably don't) 

Edited February 15, 2022 by brian trageskin

[zero]

lol. Brian you should start like a harmony help desk. start a 1 man call center so watmmers can call you to help troubleshoot when they get stuck on where to go next.

[xox]

2 hours ago, zero said:

lol. Brian you should start like a harmony help desk.

and a separate thread called ''brian's harmony help desk updates and bug fixes''

[IOS]

7 hours ago, zero said:

lol. Brian you should start like a harmony help desk. start a 1 man call center so watmmers can call you to help troubleshoot when they get stuck on where to go next.

 

4 hours ago, xox said:

and a separate thread called ''brian's harmony help desk updates and bug fixes''

you guys remind me of Statler and Waldorf, I even read your posts in those voices and add a 'uhuhuhuhu' at the end. I love it

[luke viia]

i have a request, perhaps the contributors to this thread can get me going... it's more melodic in nature, but harmonic tricks would definitely be helpful:

i've always been keen on the idea of having a running melodic motif on the albums i write, but i've never actually put this into practice. just to be clear, because i may be using the words incorrectly here, what I mean is: a melody that has a few specific traits: it captures the mood of the thing it is representing (typically a musical or movie) and is repeated with variations throughout the longer thing it is a part of, it is memorable but not intrusive (so that listeners pick up on its presence, but it is not like "O THERES THAT MELODY AGAIN LOL"), and it is both harmonically and timbrally (?) durable enough to do its thing above a variety of different contexts (so that it can feel at home with all those different sets of instruments, tempos, thematic settings etc, and most relevant for this thread, different chord progressions).

brian, that 8 bit theory video about the music in The Ocarina of Time was super interesting, though that's not quite what i'm after here, but the explanations in that video were marvelous and i am hopeful that this thread can give similar insights.

questions i'm thinking of:

- what tricks can be employed to really make a melody catchy while remaining versatile enough to do what was listed above? i generally go by the rule that the easier it is to whistle a melody, the catchier it will probably be. and the old saying that "less is more." what else?

- what ways do composers adjust these melodies for various contexts without losing their feeling or, err, "essence"? perhaps more importantly, what should not be done? i assume the relative pitches in a melody give a strong sense of identity to the thing as its surrounding context changes (so that, for example, even if the melody's intervals change between two versions, the qualitative relative pitch movement between notes is what gives it that solid identity), but what else?

- once you've got a melody you want to work with (generally it will already have a chord accompaniment, at least that's the case when i write tunes), what tricks might you employ to find those new and interesting chord progressions that give it different emotional context? if the context comes first, as it would in a movie or musical, what tricks line up with certain moods? i have some ideas and ways of doing this, but i'm curious what others would suggest. is anything beyond the most simple suggestion going to just be entirely dependent on the specific melody?

- what modes or scales might i look to for practicing the art of the motif?

idk if i'm asking any of this very clearly, lol. forgive me.

some examples that have been stuck in my head since childhood:

(it's probably not at all clear which parts of these tunes I am thinking of, lol. sorry. they're just the ones that stuck with me. i'm sure you all can think of far more famous examples.)

o, bonus points if the answers can be applied to electronic tunes/production specifically! i play piano, but i'm no jazzman (perhaps a funkman), and i take full advantage of piano rolls and midi (and "unconventional" midi controllers like 8x8 grids) because they're amazing. so tips about how to play specific chord shapes and such aren't really what i'm after, but if that's what i get, so be it!

thanks!!

[TubularCorporation]

One chord is enough chords

[exitonly]

music is rotted one note

[brian trageskin]

@luke viia i know these questions weren't adressed to me but i'll give you my uninformed opinion anyway, because that's what i do lol

14 hours ago, luke viia said:

a melody that has a few specific traits: it captures the mood of the thing it is representing (typically a musical or movie) and is repeated with variations throughout the longer thing it is a part of, it is memorable but not intrusive (so that listeners pick up on its presence, but it is not like "O THERES THAT MELODY AGAIN LOL"), and it is both harmonically and timbrally (?) durable enough to do its thing above a variety of different contexts (so that it can feel at home with all those different sets of instruments, tempos, thematic settings etc, and most relevant for this thread, different chord progressions).

sounds to me like you're thinking of themes, based on the examples you posted.

more importantly, you can hear the lick at 1:49 in that secret of nimh tune (if you don't know what the lick is, look it up on youtube)

14 hours ago, luke viia said:

- what ways do composers adjust these melodies for various contexts without losing their feeling or, err, "essence"? perhaps more importantly, what should not be done? i assume the relative pitches in a melody give a strong sense of identity to the thing as its surrounding context changes (so that, for example, even if the melody's intervals change between two versions, the qualitative relative pitch movement between notes is what gives it that solid identity), but what else?

what you said seems to indicate you already know about this but just in case - plus everyone needs to know about this very basic principle, which is that any melodic pattern can be transposed diatonically: 

other than this i'm not sure what you want to know specifically. how to add melodic/rhythmic variation to a theme without losing its essence? 

[luke viia]

yes, I suppose that's part of what I'm after. I actually found a decent article on this subject after posting that wall of text, but it's also nice to have a back & forth about techniques like a forum allows.

and yeah - themes. That word seems so generic that I figured it couldn't be what I was talking about, haha. 

anyway I feel like I already asked a boatload of questions so don't want to add many more, as it's a broad enough inquiry as-is. any tips on the subject at all are appreciated, really. maybe someone will come along with some good examples of themes in different contexts or something. If this goes unanswered, I'll just go back to experimenting

 

[exitonly]

37 minutes ago, luke viia said:

yes, I suppose that's part of what I'm after. I actually found a decent article on this subject after posting that wall of text, but it's also nice to have a back & forth about techniques like a forum allows.

and yeah - themes. That word seems so generic that I figured it couldn't be what I was talking about, haha. 

anyway I feel like I already asked a boatload of questions so don't want to add many more, as it's a broad enough inquiry as-is. any tips on the subject at all are appreciated, really. maybe someone will come along with some good examples of themes in different contexts or something. If this goes unanswered, I'll just go back to experimenting

 

while this book does use notation, it is really easy to get into and covers how to build up material for composing-

https://www.amazon.com/Composing-Music-Approach-William-Russo/dp/0226732169/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=william+russo+composing+music&qid=1645208147&sprefix=composing+music+will%2Caps%2C564&sr=8-3

[luke viia]

thank you! 

[brian trageskin]

@luke viia  i've been thinking about your questions and i think you might want to look into variation, motivic development and reharmonization, among other things. although the latter is probably way too advanced for you lol. i hope i'm not being presumptuous but judging from your questions, it kinda sounds like you set the bar too high for yourself. i don't know how knowledgeable you are though. 

anyway i think it's really important that you have a decent grasp of harmony/melody if you're interested in this stuff, it'll make your life much easier imo. not that i know anything about any of this btw lol, i'm a beginner really. i do know how knowledge gaps can keep you from progressing though. 

btw, i fucking hate not being able to edit my posts because i'd like to delete the video i posted. i found another one on the same topic that's vastly superior, plus the guy in it explains the exact same thing more accurately and within 45 seconds (although to be fair, he doesn't talk about transposing to a different scale). anyway this is a nice, concise video that gives examples of basic variation techniques for melody. not really what you're after and pretty basic but i thought i'd post it anyway as it's still stuff that everyone should experiment with imo, especially phasing. plus it's the fucking lick yo. 

[brian trageskin]

whoops, he does talk about transposing to a different scale at the beginning and the end of the video. i need to start paying more attention to the stuff i post ffs.

never mind me

Edited February 19, 2022 by brian trageskin

[toaoaoad]

On 2/18/2022 at 10:17 AM, nikisoko said:

while this book does use notation, it is really easy to get into and covers how to build up material for composing-

https://www.amazon.com/Composing-Music-Approach-William-Russo/dp/0226732169/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=william+russo+composing+music&qid=1645208147&sprefix=composing+music+will%2Caps%2C564&sr=8-3

+1 I'll vouch for this book too

[brian trageskin]

On 2/18/2022 at 7:17 PM, nikisoko said:

while this book does use notation, it is really easy to get into and covers how to build up material for composing-

https://www.amazon.com/Composing-Music-Approach-William-Russo/dp/0226732169/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=william+russo+composing+music&qid=1645208147&sprefix=composing+music+will%2Caps%2C564&sr=8-3

i just downloaded it in an illegal manner because that's how cheap i am   cheers!

[chim]

@luke viia

Sounds like you'd be interested in counterpoint/fugue. The classical Bach approach employs a lot of shitty rules but the core ideas on how to manipulate a melody line are great to experiment with. It basically means counterpointing (duh) your melody line with various inversions and transpositions and expanding on it as you move along the composition. You can reverse the order of a melody, transpose it down an octave and play it half as quick, or have another section repeat the main line in double-time. Duel of the Fates is a good modern example on various manipulations of a single motif. Go for weirder substitions for extra jazz credit (root major into 9th minor?). 

Edited February 20, 2022 by chim

[thefxbip]

 

[thefxbip]

 

[thefxbip]

 

[thefxbip]

cool channel if youre interested in 18th century harmony (Baroque and Bach etc)

he gives you the teaching a choir boy orphan would get back then until he becomes a pro musician

 

Edited March 15, 2022 by thefxbip

[brian trageskin]

On 2/15/2022 at 4:38 PM, brian trageskin said:

love the idea. let's do it. i can't at the moment but in a few days' time yeah. (obviously you could just do it yourself in the meantime, if you have the time and inclination - which you probably don't) 

lol, i lost all interest in doing this 

[brian trageskin]

something i've had fun experimenting with, i thought it might be worth sharing.

many of these are various inversions of the same chords. i'm using Ab3 as the axis of symmetry but you can use any note as the axis obviously. i intentionally omitted the various maj7 chords because they sound cheesy af, as well as other chords that didn't fit well within the progression - yeah this is thought as a linear chord progression but the idea with this post is to inspire others to experiment with this "technique", so the fact that it's a progression is just a bonus.

[xox]

Today’s tip: use major seconds and flatted fifths more often 

[brian trageskin]

i actually fucking hate the last chord i picked, i mean within the context of the progression. i won't be able to sleep tonight if i don't fix this. i can't edit my posts but anyway, pretend the last chord is this, which is vastly superior:

or just pretend the last 2 chords don't exist. 

thanks