Interesting Melodies

Lately I have hit a little bit of writers block and have found that it has been taking a long time for me to come up with some interesting melodies. I find myself listening back to melodies and saying to myself "Its pretty, it makes sense, but it dosent really catch my attention as some of the other things I've written."

Anyone have any advice or tips for writing more interesting melodies?

Advice? Write.

Just write until you get a good one. It doesn't matter if its not the best melody ever, but it is something. Eventually you will come up with a gem. But you have to dig through the rock to get to it.

x2.

Write and write melodies. Don't worry if does appear silly or not sufficient serius.

The thing is, melody is really only as good as it's harmony allows it to be :)

Ravel's works often feature some very banal melodies, when only taken by themselves -- not the kind of things that one could hum to oneself and think, "Wow, what a great melody!" But when you hear his melodies in the context of his harmonic work, it becomes very beautiful. (For an example of what I'm talking about, take his Bolero, for instance. Or his string quartet in F Major )

When you hear melody by itself, people tend to hear the "implied" chords that go with them in either the Major or Minor key you're starting your piece in. Instead of going along with these implied chords, try working with the harmonics that can be "hiding", if you understand what I mean.

In the words of John Corigliano, here is nothing more difficult than creating a beautiful melody.

Keep pushing, though! You'll find one!

The thing is, melody is really only as good as it's harmony allows it to be :)

Ravel's works often feature some very banal melodies, when only taken by themselves -- not the kind of things that one could hum to oneself and think, "Wow, what a great melody!" But when you hear his melodies in the context of his harmonic work, it becomes very beautiful. (For an example of what I'm talking about, take his Bolero, for instance. Or his string quartet in F Major )

When you hear melody by itself, people tend to hear the "implied" chords that go with them in either the Major or Minor key you're starting your piece in. Instead of going along with these implied chords, try working with the harmonics that can be "hiding", if you understand what I mean.

I'll have to second that, but only if you're writing in a tonal style. The best way to develop a sense of melody is simply to write, write write!

I actually don't think you want to push your creativity to your limits in order to get a nice melody, just do nothing about it and inspiration hits you like magic!

I hit the same snag a few weeks ago, but then I just stopped trying and just then I came up with a great melody (made it into a piano-violin duet).

When you have a good idea for a melody, the hard part has just begun. Perhaps to get it to sound right and to come up with an adequate 'sub-theme', is what you rather should be worrying about.