piano+vocal composition

[kickoutofyou]

Hello everyone. I have been taking piano lessons for about four years now, I don't know what my skill level is, but I have recently played Maple leaf rag and am learning clair de lune. Anyways, I have recently started making my own compositions using my knowledge of music theory(chords, scales, inversions, etc.) to develop the harmony to my own my melody. I right know have ideas for writing a nice piano piece with vocals. However, I don't know what the piano part should be for this. I know that the piano isn't supposed to play the vocal melody line, but I don't know exactly what the piano part should be. Could someone please give me advice on what the piano accompaniment should be? And also how to determine the chords of the song because I'm having trouble doing that, too. Any advice would be greatly appreciated, Thanks.

[Bob]

It could double the voice part.  That makes it easier for the pianist to have the melody.  I'm not sure if it makes it much easier for the vocalist -- Their line is there but they have to tune with the piano.

Otherwise, without the melody, it could just be an accompaniment pattern.  Broken chords, arpeggiated. 

Or a countermelody.  Or line if it's not much of a melody.

At the ends of phrases, the piano could do a little more too.  Kind of like a little punctuation to the melody line.

[retrouvailles]

Study the lieder of Schubert and Schumann (and others) for some good ideas on how to write for piano accompaniment. I wouldn't just double the voice throughout, or just use a purely chordal accompaniment, for that can get really boring really fast. Use different techniques for variation and to keep the interest level high.