This is the first post where I will be talking about the composition process behind the music I make. I won’t go into detail about every little something that happens in the song and instead try to highlight some of… Read More »Contrasts and Motive Expansion – “Stay”
To be able to harmonize a melody you first need to have a melody and/or know how to make one. The next piece of knowledge you must have is about chord formation; and finally, the experience of how each… Read More »How to Harmonize a Melody
Most likely, you don’t have any problems with coming up with a basic idea for a beat, melody or some chords. What may happen is that you might not know how to go from there and consequently turn those ideas… Read More »How to Develop Your Musical Ideas
There are lots of ways to approach this process, probably as many as there are musicians. It is up to you to find out what suits better to you, considering your working process, the way you think and how you… Read More »8 Practical Tips to Make a Melody
In this post, as strange as it may seem, I will focus on ways of gathering materials from a single chord. And why would we do that, you may ask? – First, because it’s fun! – Second, because this is… Read More »Creating Musical Materials From Just One Chord
Simple doesn’t have to be boring! In fact, it can be fresh and uplifting. Even the most complex things usually sound better when presented in such a way that all seems logical and make complete sense – complex and yet,… Read More »How to Make Simple Chord Harmonies Sound More Interesting
We can do music just for the pleasure of making it without even thinking that we want to convey a message. But having a sense of where we want to go by trying to convey a message, an idea or… Read More »The Importance of Planning Your Musical Compositions
Explore how modulation can add some freshness to your music with the different types of modulations and contrasts, modal modulation, polytonality, among other techniques:
Compose a chord progressions using harmonic cadences, cycle chord progressions, negative harmony, chord substitutions, back cycling or spice up and thicken your melodies with block chords, among many other harmony techniques:
Harmonize a melody using different chord extensions and chord formations like triads, seventh chords, chords by fourths, seconds or clusters:
