African American Christian Wedding Songs : Songwriters - How to Reference A Song You Love to Come Up With a New Melody for Your Song

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A great way to come up with a melody is to look at one you love and modify it to be completely new. Let's reference the song "Firework" by Katy Perry as an example.

Let's look at the notes of the chorus aligned to the beat. The numbers on top represent the beats of the song:

3-------4-------1-------2-------3-------4-------1-------2-------3

Ba-by--you're-a-fiiiii-----------------yer-------work

Eb-Db-C------Bb-Bb---------------Ab--------C

Let's try keeping those same notes, but changing the rhythm to come up with a new melody. We'll start our melody on beat 1, instead of beat 3:

1-------2-------3-------4-------1-------2-------3

Ba------------------by-you're-a-fiiii----yer

Eb------------------Db-C----BbBb---Ab

Of course, we wouldn't use those same words, but I wanted you to be able to easily follow along. If you play these notes on your piano or guitar to the new beats I've assigned them to above, you'll see the melody takes on a completely different feel. You'll noticed I deleted the last C note from the original melody, which also helped change up the melody a bit.

There are endless ways in which you can keep the same notes as a current song, while modifying the rhythm, to come up with something new.

You probably noticed in that last example that aside from changing the rhythm of the notes, and omitting the last note when I was referencing "Firework," I also started my melody on a different beat. I started on the 1, whereas the chorus in "Firework" starts on the 3.

The beat you start your melody on can affect the mood of your song. A lot of times songwriters write their melodies starting on the downbeat (or beat 1) of a measure, because it tends to come more naturally to do so. If you do that all the time, it can become tedious.

It's also important to note that whatever word lands on the downbeat (the 1 beat) will tend to be the most highlighted word. Even though Katy Perry starts the chorus melody on the 3 beat, the word "Firework" hits on the downbeat. That makes sense, because it's the title of the song, so it stands out when it's placed on the 1 beat. The word "firework" also stands out because she stretches it out to over a measure long.

Changing the beat the melody starts on is seldom considered, but can make a big impact in how your melody hits your listeners' ears. It's definitely worth experimenting with.

To learn more, download my free EBook here:
http://www.SuccessForYourSongs.com/freeoffer/

Anthony Ceseri is the owner of http://www.successforyoursongs.com/, a website dedicated to the growth and development of songwriters of all skill levels. Anthony's writings appear as examples in the book "Songwriting Without Boundaries: Lyric Writing Exercises For Finding Your Voice" by Pat Pattison, an acclaimed lyric writing professor at Berklee College of Music.