Attempting to give a left-hand part to my melodies... unsure.

[ian williams]

Hello there!

Recently I've been full of very beautiful melodies, or so they seem. My problem seems to be in the fact that I can't come up with a good left hand part. Either it's a bunch of block chords, or a few alternating notes a la Alberti Bass, or some mix of the two. It's rather boring, after a while, and intimidating to have to think of ways to harmonize my melody with a bassline. Is there anyway to mix different modes of accompanying the melody without being too boring?

I don't even know where to start :O

[term]

think in patterns. If you have a harmony, you have a number of notes available and you can put them in whatever order you like. You can use a combination of intervals and single notes; you can do that and add rhythm; you can add (chromatic) passing notes between two harmonys or in a harmony if you go up and down like c *d* e g c g e *d* c for example (in c major).
But the most simple way is to think of a pattern as i said above, which you can also change.
If it fits the music, use counterpoint. Everybody can do some simple counterpoint. In fact, sometimes there is little difference between a pattern and simple (or not so simple) counter melody that seems to emerge from it.

[ian williams]

Thank you for the advice, term!

Lately I have been enthralled by the nocturnes of Chopin, the guitar-like accompaniment of the single-note ostinato. I can switch those around in inversions and make a simple nocturne. Also, Schubert's sonatas, however advanced they are, seem to use a quasi-Alberti bass technique. It's very pleasing!

Perhaps I shall take a little from each composer, and add it to my own idiom. Thanks!

[mknueven]

The use of arpeggios are very helpful to me.  I'm talking about free-flowing melodies.
I wouldn't overdo it - but they sound very nice.
If you're in D Major and you're in 3/4 time
once you've gone to a new chord in your right hand - play the nearest inversion of the next chord.
I mean if you're melody's first part is in D Major - try D Major chord , not necessarily starting at the root, and then say your next chord is b minor - go into b minor

Use the 3rds and 7ths for outer voices part of the time.
Remember if you're in 3/4 time and you don't have time to finish your arp - just find a nice way to play upon it before you go to next measure.


It can't hurt to try - even if you don't like my idea - you'll find others as you do it.

[rodrix]

Hello there!

Recently I've been full of very beautiful melodies, or so they seem. My problem seems to be in the fact that I can't come up with a good left hand part.

Hi Ian!
I had the same problem you had for years!... However this is what discovered these last few years with an excellent teacher I am having. My long answer is on the   Improvising with both Hands thread on this forum.

Apart from playing arpeggios, ostinatos, and different from of basses and accompaniments, I recommend you also to start discovering harmony and voicings.

Harmony can be much easier than you think, and in minutes you'll be harmonizing scales. Once you know how to harmonize a scale, you'll know what chords to play for every note. Once you know the chords, you can then improvise one of your wonderful melodies just using the notes on that scale. With this simple systemic approach you'll be harmonizing all major scales for example, being able to compose and improvise in any major tonality. And then.. you can expand to minor  harmonic, minor melodic scales, etc, expanding your horizons.

Another point you should take into account is voicing.
Voicing can transform your playing into high-quality professional sound.

Try the "Drop-2 Voicing". This voicing is primarily used in Jazz, but can give a much more powerful sound in all styles, including classical.
Play any chord in your right hand. The voices of the chord are numbered 1 through N (N being number of notes) starting from your right. So if you play C E G B, then B is voice 1, G is voice 2...

In Drop 2-voicing, you just need to "drop" voice 2, and throw it an octave lower. So you would play G C E     B. Now you need to add a bass if you are playing piano solo. Since you are playing a C chord, the bass will also be C. So you play in your right hand  C E    B, and in your left hand C G. Try it with different types of chords. You'll get richer sounding results when using 9ths, 11ths, and 13ths chords.

After mastering this too, you should also look into different ways of creating chord progressions and chord substitutions to make your piano playing richer!

I suggest you begin by looking at the major scale harmonization example I put on the other thread...  I hope it's useful, and I hope you hear your progress soon 
For me learning harmonization, and understanding chord progressions, has been an eye-opener that has changed my piano playing completely, so I hope you enjoy this new area too!

Good luck!
Cheers!
Rod


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