WRITE A GREAT MELODY with this Formula | Sentence Form in Music Composition

I've been a violinist for over fifty years, never been a composer. With just the two videos of yours that I've heard, things make so much sense, and I realize that music doesn't have to be the mystery that it always has been for me. Even if I don't compose anything, your explanations are amazing, clear and satisfying.

Two thoughts about periods and sentences when you generalize. These forms can be nested in two ways, and if you want to look in a more general way, perhaps many already are nested. 1. Make a period out of two sentences. Your sentence does its thing and ends with half cadence, now repeat it and end with full cadence. Presto, it's a large period made out of two small sentences. There was a video a long while back by a different composer youtuber suggesting more to this relationship, suggesting something like all periods can be thought of as two sentences. Question and answer. 2. Make a sentence that starts with a period. You have your question, then your answer, but then it continue it with fragmentation. The initial question and answer are treated as the two statements of your basic idea and you move into a continuation, and round it off with a larger cadence. Now what was a period on initial hearing has turned into a sentence when looked at from a higher altitude. This may seem a stretch, but look at the Spirited away example. Just take the melody of the two basic idea statements. If you think in C major, the first one ending on D, the 2, can be thought of as a half cadence. The second one ending on C, the 1, can be thought of as an answer with a full cadence. This is not the long version I'm talking about, but already the first two statements can be thought of in this way as a "little period" nested into the beginning of the sentence.

I'm a three chord country/garage rock songwriter who doesn't know what on earth a fermata is. But you explain this in a way that illuminates the possibilities of even very basic song formats. Thanks so much. Great lesson!

I had stumbled upon your old tutorials a while ago. Nice to see you on YouTube too. :) As for future topics, it’d be nice to see your take on how to communicate various moods in music and the harmonic choices behind them. I remember reading your tutorial on movement by thirds; it’d be nice to learn about other techniques too.

I cannot believe I wrote a melody without knowing this, and yet adhering perfectly to this form you exposed in the video!

I just stumbled across your channel, and you are an incredibly gifted teacher. My sister has this same skill set (though applied in conjunction with sports and coaching) where you really understand fundamentals of a certain subject and are really good in explaining those fundamentals in a way that a wide range of people, from beginners to professional musicians, can grasp what you are describing that makes it almost seem so silly that we didn't quite understand it so simply before. Thank you so much for this! This topic specifically is something I have really been struggling with in terms of melody and sound phrasing. There is a reason that popular music is popular, and as melody really refers to the vocals in pop music, this is the piece that I really have trouble with - kind of "bringing things home", or applying a pattern especially in a chorus that makes a song "easy" to listen to, but not necessarily boring or overly repetitive. Thanks again. Subbed.

I watched both videos on period form and sentence form. For me, these are really very interesting approaches that no one has ever conveyed to me in this form in such an understandable way. Now it's up to me to try out these different approaches in practice in my compositional attempts. So it only remains for me to thank you for your effort, also in the other contributions on Youtube. It's really nice to meet people like you who get it really teach you something. So thanks again!!!

This type of content is some of the best (if not the best) I've seen in the past years, hands down. Really useful material for a self-taught "composer"! Extremely useful approach! I'll definitely be looking more into harmony stuff like more on cadences and sequences mentioned at 12:20 or stuff like that to add color to works! Really really like this content and definitely I'll be sticking around for a while!

Hi, I'm a new subscriber and I am so glad I found you. You lay out your topics in a way that even a novice (like myself) at classical composition can understand. You are an excellent teacher. Very rare. Thanks for tutorials!

instant subscribe. my music theory understanding is enough to get what you're doing but would never be able to think of on my own. can't wait to watch more and get to the next level!

I always appreciate when content creators give references of where they've researched, so that one can also do ones own research. You can do any videos on Form and I'll be interested.

Youtube kept pushing this vid at me until I watched it, and I'm so glad it did. I had composition classes in college and studied privately later. No one ever taught me the period-sentence distinction. It's more a design principle than a formula. Formulas are like cheat codes. This is more of a strategy. Super helpful.

Thank you for this video on sentence form composing. I like this form, because it does help to move the music forward and gives you ability to write a new phrase. I also like the cadence at the end. Sometimes I let the music linger (in the mixing session) at the end or let come to a soft stop. Awesome! 🎶🎵🎶💕

This is the video that finally filled the last bit of knowledge I needed to understand this. Thank you for the tutorial

Absolutely love this topic and would love more videos on this! So interesting to me.

Excellent. I'm a jazz guitar player exploring solo and the form is an important part of this for me for improv. I'd like to hear more about styles and which forms they gravitate toward (especially jazz). This makes so much sense now - thanks.

Blinding lights by The Weeknd is the first example that comes to mind with this format of melody, crazy when music theory clicks in that way. Makes you feel empowered.

I’ve learned so much about music theory from just this one video. Definitely subscribing. I wanna see more

Mr. Leach, it gave me a very inspiring impulse for my stuck composition. Trying to work on it by benefitting from both period and sentence forms. Thank you for your efforts! Greetings from Turkey!