4.2 Writing A Melody

• Objectives

  Musical:

  • Learn what goes into a good melody: it’s in key, singable, fits with the chords, and catchy.

  • Discover how to make a memorable melody with repetition and variation.

  Technical:

  • Inputting and duplicating notes in the piano roll.

• Procedure

  As a Class:

  • Watch the top video and discuss what goes into a good melody.

  • Complete some of the connection activities to build confidence and understanding of the material.

  • Watch the longer step videos and create a memorable melody together.

  Individual:

  • Instruct students to copy and paste the assignment URL from their LMS to open the Soundtrap assignment on their own devices.

  • Have students watch the short step videos and complete their own original melody project.

  • Remind students to check their work by viewing the checklist.

  • When students are done, they can show each other their melodies and work on the enrichment activity.

• Assessment

  Informal Assessment:

  • Check for understanding by asking questions between the class viewings of the step videos.

  • Walk around the room while students are completing the individual portion of their projects and check to see if their grid is correct, if the notes are in the correct range, and if the pitches and rhythms are correct. Also, look for instances of repetition and syncopation. If you can, sing some of their melodies back to them and help them with the iteration process.

  Formal Assessment:

  • The completed projects can be graded by the instructor against the rubric. Students can also present their melodies to each other in small groups or to the entire class.

• Connection Activities

  Pop Melody Guided Listening:
  Listen to teacher and student-selected songs and have students determine if the melody is in key, singable, fits the chords, and catchy. Have them note instances of repetition and variation. It also helps to play some of these melodies on a piano and isolate them for students. Slow the examples down to make it easier to hear these elements of melody.

  Piano Roll Singing:
  Write a simple melody in the piano roll and have students try to sing it. Start with simple scalar patterns using the same note values. Next, add different rhythms to these simple melodies. Finally, add skips to the melody to challenge students. Students can use any syllable they want in this process and it helps to have them connect to the melody kinesthetically by moving their hand up and down to track its contour.

  Guess The Melody:
  Put a famous melody on the piano roll and have students try to figure out what it is. HERE IS A LINK to BitMidi, which has MIDI files of popular melodies. Download the file of one that you would like the class to work with and drag and drop it into a blank Soundtrap project. There will be a track named MELODY in the project. Move this track to the top of the track list or isolate it by deleting the other tracks. Enter the piano roll and find the most recognizable section of the melody. Put students into teams to find the melody for points. They can start out by using their ear and trying to figure it out by parsing the rhythm and contour. You can alter this by showing an incomplete statement of the melody and allowing students to enter it into the piano roll. They can then guess what the song is by using context clues. To make this easier for students, change the project key to C (or A minor).

  Melody Remix:
  Take a section of a famous melody from BitMidi (instructions to import these files are in the previous activity), isolate it and remove a portion of it. Give this incomplete melody to small groups of students and have them complete these famous melodies in new ways. They can also add in their own chords, bass, and drums to make the melody their own.

  Complete The Melody:
  Take a section of a famous melody from BitMidi, isolate it and remove a portion. Give this incomplete melody to small groups of students and have them complete it to match the original by ear.

• Differentiation

  Enrichment:
  Students who finish their melodies can access the Complete The Melody project by entering the password 88tg88tg in the side panel. There are four incomplete melodies in this project. Students have to supply their own beginning, middle, or end to finish off the melody. Students can also access the Melody Referencing Project. In this project, a completed example song is provided and students have to transcribe the different parts by ear. They can do all the tracks or isolate the melody.

  Remediation:
  If students have a hard time writing their own melody using 8th note subdivision, change their grid size to quarter note and allow them to use only that duration value. The melodies will sound simpler, but they will be easier to write. You can also make the assignment only 4-bars long by deleting the second half of the template.

• Notes

  Try to “catch” students writing melodies with intention and highlight their work for the class. They might be going back and forth from the piano roll and singing to themselves in an iteration cycle, or they might be trying to plunk out a melody on the on-screen or MIDI keyboard. Either way, writing melodies with intention is difficult and is something to celebrate in the class. I like to do as many piano roll challenges in class as possible to help gain literacy. Some have been outlined in the connection activities section, but let your imagination run wild with this concept.

• Standards & Pathways

  Core Arts Standards

  1. Creating:

     • Anchor Standard 1 (Generate and conceptualize artistic ideas and work): Write original melodies using repetition and space.

     • Anchor Standard 2 (Organize and develop artistic ideas and work): Apply written melodies to song sections.

     • Anchor Standard 3 (Refine and complete artistic work): Use copy/paste and duplication techniques to refine melodies.

  2. Performing:

     • Anchor Standard 4 (Select, analyze, and interpret artistic work for presentation): Discuss and create melodies in class.

  3. Responding:

     • Anchor Standard 7 (Perceive and analyze artistic work): Check melodies using a checklist.

     • Anchor Standard 8 (Interpret intent and meaning in artistic work): Present melodies to peers.

  4. Connecting:

     • Anchor Standard 11 (Relate artistic ideas and works with societal, cultural, and historical context to deepen understanding): Connect written melodies to real-world music applications.

  Technology Literacy Standards

  1. Empowered Learner (ISTE Standard 1):

     • Use music production tools to create and track written melodies.

  2. Creative Communicator (ISTE Standard 6):

     • Experiment with writing melodies and present them digitally.

  Career Readiness

  • Music Production: Skills in writing and arranging melodies.

  • Sound Engineering: Understanding technical aspects of writing melodies.

  • Broadcasting and DJing: Ability to create and analyze written melodies for performances.

  • Multimedia Production: Integrating written melodies into various projects.