Jp Melody Writing

Japanese-Style Melody Writing (Melodic Method)

Source: the complete system of Hiroshi Takayama, Popyurā Ongaku Sakkyoku no Tame no Senritsu-hō, Expanded Edition (ポピュラー音楽作曲のための旋律法 増補版, Rittor Music). This file reorganizes the book into a practical reference by compositional task. The large lookup tables (seven types of non-chord tones, motive-construction table, eight degrees of cadential openness, form formula collection, situation-based reverse-lookup skeleton, etc.) are in reference.md in this directory.

0. Core Concept: A Melody = One Tone Moving Through Time

• A melody is not "multiple tones arranged in space" but one tone moving through time (imagine a floating ball moving up and down).
• Listeners connect earlier and later tones by memory and retroactively update each tone's role (starting point → passing point → arrival point) — only upon hearing the 3rd tone is the 1st tone reinterpreted as "the start of an ascent."
• Every tone sits in a force field (場, ba) made of four forces:
  1. Gravity of register: high notes are tense — moving upward requires effort; low notes are settled — moving downward feels like releasing tension;
  2. Force of the mode: in-scale tones are stable, out-of-scale tones are pulled back;
  3. Force of harmony: consonance with the chord is stable, conflict makes the tone want to move — this is precisely the source of forward momentum;
  4. Force of beat and rhythm pattern: on-grid positions are stable, positions off the rhythmic grid are unstable.
• Two additional sources of expressive motion:
  • Everyday-experience associations: speech intonation (イントネーション), the physical load of bodily movement — stepwise motion = small gestures, hence smooth; large leaps = big gestures, hence effortful; repeated low notes = the strong vibration of a large instrument, hence a sense of heat.
  • In-song experience (designable by the composer): an unusual use of a tone can be accepted empathetically if it is prepared in advance within the song (letting listeners accumulate the relevant experience first); an ordinary use of a tone can become fresh through contextual relationships. This is the key to resolving the "banal vs. self-indulgent" dilemma.
• Segmentation (分節, bunsetsu): the same string of tones, segmented differently, = a different melodic experience. When writing a melody you must constantly anticipate "where and how the listener will segment." The units cut out by segmentation are phrases (フレーズ).
• Hierarchization of motion: tone → motion → phrase → motion-of-⟨tonal motions⟩ → large-scale structure.
  • Stacking and enlarging tension (tension↑ → more tension↑ → expansion↑) creates sustained expression and large forms;
  • The final release acts on everything that came before, producing an intense sense of relief (安堵感).
• Terminology convention (strictly distinguished in the book): pitch = the height of a tone itself; interval = the distance between two tones.

1. Expressive Rules of Pitch Motion

Direction (向き)

• For phrases of three or more tones, overall direction is judged by the relative height of the first and last tones; if the local motion arriving at the final tone opposes the overall direction, the sense of overall direction is weakened.
• Segment long phrases first, judge direction section by section, then assess the composite effect.
• The harmonic background can rewrite the meaning of direction: if an ascent lands on a stable tone by harmonic mechanics (e.g., G7→C landing on the tonic), the "questioning feel" is replaced by a "sense of resolution." To emphasize question/tossing-out, remove the elements that block it (don't land on a stable tone).
• A slow ascent with restrained volume and tension can express "longing gazing into the distance, pure yearning" rather than tension.
• Bodily analogy: ascent = stretching up to look far away (伸び上がり), descent = bending down to look closely (かがみ込む).

Width (幅)

• Stepwise motion (順次進行, junji shinkō):
  • Smooth and flowing, without obstruction; ascending/descending along the scale = a smooth increase/decrease of tension, extremely common;
  • Adding auxiliary tones a 2nd above/below the existing tones as ornamentation = increasing motion while keeping the contour, more florid.
• Semitones:
  • The narrowest interval, expressing subtle nuance and delicate tenderness (デリケート); a melody containing semitones = voluptuous beauty (艶やかさ) and depth;
  • Overuse (especially chromatic semitones with accidentals) → neurotic, morbid, grotesque (グロテスク) — must be restrained;
  • "How to use semitones well" is a major requirement of melodic sensibility (one of the two great sources of melodicity, alongside pentatonic density).
• Leaps (跳躍進行, chōyaku shinkō):
  • Dramatic, large emotional swings; the position of the leap is emphasized (whichever word the leap lands on, that word stands out);
  • A single leap should stay within a 6th; a perfect octave, however, is actually easy to sing and easy to hear, and is usable;
  • Too many leaps still make a melody hard to sing and unnatural — use with restraint.
• Repeated notes (same pitch):
  • Low register = calm confiding, understated narration (or forcible suppression); high register = tension continuously sustained, ceaseless shouting;
  • When pitch stays still, the listener's attention shifts to rhythm → combine syncopation and varied durations = percussive / speech-like (語り, katari — narration) expression.
• Width × speed:
  • The narrower the interval, the easier to sing and the more it suits any tempo; the wider, the more it needs slow tempo and preparation;
  • A large leap needs sufficient duration at its start or end (or both) to sound natural and singable; rapid continuous alternation between high and low notes stiffens most easily.

2. Preparing and Landing Leaps

• Upward leaps are easy, downward leaps are hard (moving while adding force is controllable; motions that release force are hard to stabilize).
• Two remedies for a wide downward leap:
  1. The landing point naturally carries an accent (アクセント) — anticipate it and use it deliberately;
  2. Lengthen the starting tone fully + diminuendo (ディミヌエンド) — build up emotion and tension at the start before leaping.
• Among narrow leaps, downward is actually easier (force release) — a "short high note leaping down" at the start of a phrase to create a phrase-head accent is a common device (the 「いつでも」「どこでも」 type, matching word intonation).
• Tame (タメ, windup/holding back): before a leap, place 1 to several tones moving in the opposite direction (usually stepwise), like winding up before a big gesture; it can also be placed mid-leap.
• Josō (助走, run-up): before a leap, place 1 to several stepwise tones in the same direction; the run-up tones may lie inside or outside the leap interval.
• Landing cushion: after arriving at the leap, follow with 1 to several stepwise tones in the same direction, softening the landing impact — especially effective for downward leaps.
• Rebound (reaction): after a large leap, stepwise motion in the opposite direction = a landing rebound; that rebound step can double as the tame for the next leap, forming a chain of "leap → rebound(windup) → leap → rebound(windup) → leap."
• Splitting a 7th: a 7th leap is most commonly split with an intermediary tone into 3rd+5th or 4th+4th (stepping-stone style, 飛び石, in two steps).
• Hard limit on same-direction consecutive leaps: leaps of a 4th or larger may continue in the same direction at most 2 times, and the total interval between the two ends must stay within 1 octave.
  • Compliant examples: 3rd+5th = 7th, 4th+4th = 7th;
  • Violations: 5th+5th = 9th, 4th+4th+4th = 10th — unnatural and hard to sing.
• A melody with many large leaps tends to sound instrumental and mechanical; but a large leap at slow tempo with unhurried preparation can draw an expansive, open (伸び伸び) melodic line.
• Leaps larger than an octave strongly sever the melody (they cannot be segmented as one phrase); reverse use: separate registers widely at segmentation boundaries → a pseudo-two-voice melody (a low-register motive and a high-register motive in dialogue).
• The value of "unnatural" motion (all require restraint — overuse kills the effect):
  • An unprepared large leap = a sudden emotional outburst (filling in intermediary tones makes it smooth but destroys the explosive force);
  • Not resolving a leap in the opposite direction but continuing the same way = a special sense of setsunai (切ない, aching bittersweet heartache);
  • Consecutive leaps with thin internal connection = disembodied lightness, an inorganic pop feel;
  • Displaced semitones with no perceptible scale affiliation = artificiality, detached irony;
  • Augmented intervals (増音程, zō-ontei) = a non-Western feel.
  • Master formula: embed local unnaturalness as a "hook" (引っかかり), then finally resolve it in a natural way.

3. Range Setting and the Human Voice

Basic Rules of Range

• First set the melody's central range at roughly 1 octave, and place the center of each phrase within it — otherwise the melody becomes diffuse, or even sounds like a mix of multiple voices.
• The whole song's actual range is about 1.5 octaves, at most 2 octaves (which happens to be the usable range of most voices and instruments).
  • Contained within 1 octave = a narrow-interval melody, intimate and easy to sing;
  • Spanning 2 octaves = strongly dynamic but hard to sing.
• Effects of a phrase's position within the range:
  • Center shifted high = bright, full of tension; a tone breaking above the range ceiling spikes in tension; extreme highs = an anguished (苦しげ) expression;
  • Center shifted low = calm and relaxed; falling below the floor = heavy (重々しい); extreme lows = powerless slackness.
• The same motion has different effects at different positions in the range:
  • An ascent in the middle of the range = moderate tension; an ascent toward the top, breaking out of the range = tension conspicuously amplified;
  • An ascent climbing from a low position back to the middle = the tension increase is offset by "low notes turning soft," and may even act as relaxation;
  • The same phrase-final ascent: low register = a light-hearted question; high register = an earnest plea, even an interrogation (詰問).
• Pitch character is relative: the same middle C is heard as a "high note" in a low-register melody and a "low note" in a high-register melody.

The Human Voice (声の音域)

• Male voices are about 1 octave lower than female voices; by convention male voice parts are notated 1 octave higher than sounding. In pop practice: male voices rarely use the low register and often use the high register; female voices rarely use the extreme high register and commonly use the low register.
• Chest voice (チェストボイス, ≈ jigoe/natural voice):
  • The root of pop-music reality (リアリティ) and intimacy; the character of pitch motion is expressed most intensely here;
  • The strained quality of the high register can express earnestness (the urgency of wanting to convey something).
• Middle voice (ミドルボイス):
  • Half-closed vocal folds, extending the range upward; the timbre is bright and open = a positive, projecting strong expression;
  • The same high phrase: sung in chest voice = strained and imploring (苦しげ); sung in middle voice = expansive, gazing into the distance — register choice changes the melody's character;
  • Whether a male singer has a middle voice, and where his passaggio (換声点, kanseiten — register break) lies, is a major precondition determining range and key (キー) — confirm it first.
• Falsetto (ファルセット/裏声):
  • Treat it as a different instrument from chest voice: pure and delicate, suited to refined, tender (デリケート) expression;
  • Limitations: few overtones → diction slightly blurred; dynamics hard to vary → unsuited to intimate confiding and large emotional swings;
  • Flipping into falsetto from chest voice = the desperation (懸命さ) of reaching a high note even at the cost of the voice breaking → intense longing, ultimate setsunasa.
• For singers with an awkward passaggio: design registers phrase by phrase (this phrase in chest voice, that one in falsetto/middle voice), so no single phrase crosses the break.
• Set the melody's basic octave in the middle of the usable extreme range — leaving headroom while keeping the option of deliberately touching the limits for expression (a strained high note conveying depth of feeling).
• The shōwa (唱和, inner sing-along) effect:
  • Listeners hum along with the melody in their heads — after being induced into entrainment by accessible repetition, a subsequent high note still feels "high and tense" to the listener even if the singer produces it effortlessly;
  • A sudden high note at the song's opening or a phrase's start gives no time to entrain → it is externalized and appreciated as display (a sense of virtuosity);
  • When writing, be explicit about whether a passage will be "sung along with in entrainment" or "appreciated from outside," and actively induce the intended mode.

4. Duration and Cadence

Usable Range of Note Values

• Common note values: 16th note to whole note; tuplets are normally only 1-beat or 2-beat triplets (32nd notes, quintuplets, etc. appear only occasionally to cram in lyrics).
• Principle: pop music must let listeners stay entrained — note-value combinations must not make the listener lose the beat.
• For a whole song in triplet feel, don't write triplets everywhere; renotate in compound meters 6/8, 9/8, 12/8.
• First examine character at a moderate tempo around BPM ≈ 100, where "note value ≈ note length," then consider the shifts at extreme tempos.

Long Notes and Short Notes

• Long notes = sustained force = tension; expression can be shaped inside the note (vibrato ビブラート, crescendo/decrescendo) → climaxes commonly place a long note in the high register (the maximum-intensity expression of tension).
• Consecutive long notes + little pitch motion = sustained tension; but sustaining too long turns slack and boring — insert leaps, or weave short notes between the long ones to revive it.
• Long notes + large leaps combined = smooths out large pitch motion while amplifying the sense of scale (スケールの大きさ).
• Each long note carries strong expression: sung forte = power and conviction; sung piano = gradually fading, hanging by a breath.
• Short notes = light, agile, lively; sung forcefully = sharp, brusquely flinging away (突き放す). Short notes in the low register are offset by heaviness (重い).
• Short notes + wide leaps are hard to sing and come with built-in dynamic swells — usable intentionally as accent/load; a large leap still needs "motion-preparation time" before it.
• Narrow intervals × short notes = melody approaching speech (語り/セリフ) (news-anchor speech rate ≈ 8th notes at BPM 120, which does not sound fast).
• Continuous short notes across a wide range = light rolling motion; kept up too long = neurotic, obsessive.
• Mixing long and short: long notes = principal (center of gravity / natural accent), short notes = subordinate — regardless of beat position.
  • Common cycle: short notes approach (アプローチ) a high long note → tension → a low short note releases → approach again…;
  • Extreme compression = alternating long-short-long-short skip feel (スキップ) (common in 6/8, 12/8) — handy but prone to yotei-chōwa (予定調和, predictable resolution / cliché predictability); beware banality.

Duration Treatment at Cadences

• Lengthening the cadence tone = motion stops; two follow-ups: add one short note to release the tension, or use a rest for de-tensioning (脱力).
• Duration alone is not enough to close a cadence: if harmony and mode (scale degree) do not cadence at the same time, the sense of ending remains half-finished — usable in reverse: let the chorus settle while the whole song stays unresolved, leaving a "words left unsaid" feeling.
• Large cadences (section-final / song-final):
  • Ritardando + decrescendo bleed off energy; a "notated ritardando" = writing each note before the cadence progressively longer, or inserting one bar of 2/4;
  • Variant: stretch the note before the cadence fully (tame) then end on a short note — tension held to the last instant, then released in a flash;
  • Further: the melody omits the cadence tone, handing it to the accompaniment — a dreamlike afterglow like breath cut short;
  • Reverse: no slowing, no lengthening, close with an accented short note = a decisive, clean, strong will (can be reinforced with an additional accented short note).
• Rests are part of the melody:
  • A powerful segmentation tool — at the end of a long phrase, don't fill the full value with a long note; place a rest to make the segmentation explicit yourself (or use a breath mark ブレス or a slur スラー to frame the phrase);
  • A short rest inside a phrase = de-tensioning, functioning like a low short note;
  • Wherever the lyric contains a sokuon (っ, geminate stop), a short rest necessarily results.

5. Beat Position and Syncopation

Beat Position of Phrase Openings and Closings

• A song opening with no accompaniment + flat note values easily falls into a meterless state (beats cannot be grouped) — beware; it can also be used deliberately as an unstable, mysterious introduction.
• Mid-song meter changes: a section-level change = dramatic but risks splitting into two songs (keep unity with the same melodic figure); locally inserting one bar of 2/4 = a tame before the chorus that launches a pickup — a stock device; at any meter change, anticipate what the drums and bass will do.

Syncopation (シンコペーション) and Anticipation (アンティシペーション)

• Syncopation = a weak-beat (or offbeat) note tied into the following strong beat → that note becomes "strong-beat-ized" → the next step is dragged later = a tame feel, unhurried lag.
• Anticipation = a strong-beat note played early on the preceding weak beat → the progression arrives early = urgency, restlessness, a driving rush.
• Precondition for both: the listener already clearly perceives the beat — used a cappella or at the song's opening where the beat is not yet established, they are not only ineffective but disrupt the sense of meter.
• A melody glued to the beat throughout = plain, earnest and forceful, but stiffly foursquare (四角四面), and since the accompaniment strikes on the beat, the melody doesn't stand out; moderately detaching from the beat (offset the opening + timely syncopation) → the melody floats up off the beat, free and expansive (伸び伸び).

Coordinating with the Rhythm Pattern (リズムパターン)

• Write the melody with a rhythm pattern already implied inside it: while composing, play back an 8-beat/16-beat groove in your head and let the melodic motion move within that groove (ノリ) — avoid "forcing a melody into a ready-made rhythm pattern."
• Three relationships with the backbeat (the snare on beats 2 and 4 in an 8-beat):
  1. Have the melody rest at the backbeat positions → a call-and-response (掛け合い) with the backbeat;
  2. It need not be strictly vacated; consciously yielding to it is already effective;
  3. Reverse: melodic strong accents in unison (ユニゾン) with the backbeat — you can partially overlap and let the backbeat show through where the melody rests.
• 8-beat melodies often move on the offbeats (ウラ) of quarter notes; 16-beat melodies on the offbeats of 8th notes → syncopation/anticipation arises naturally.
• Ura-nori / omote-nori (ウラノリ／オモテノリ): a groove consciousness taking the offbeat/onbeat as the starting point of each gesture (start → resolution); neither is superior, but the feel differs:
  • Omote-nori = grounded steadiness, striking power; ura-nori = bouncing, flowing lightness;
  • The groove determines which words get focus (in ura-nori, words starting on offbeats become focal) — to emphasize a word, adjust note placement according to the groove.
• Bounce (バウンス): offbeat notes shift later, closer to the next onbeat (≒ onbeat notes lengthen); the slower the tempo, the bigger the bounce; fixed at triplet values = shuffle (シャッフル); in a bounced song the melody can use triplets without incongruity.
• The rhythm pattern belongs to the accompaniment: leave gaps in the melody so the pattern shows through the gaps (a three-dimensional sound); don't trace/duplicate the rhythm pattern with the melody — redundant, cluttered, mutually canceling.

The Motion of Rhythm (リズム) Itself

• Rhythm = grouped note values + accent placement (different accent placement = a different rhythm); high notes naturally act as accents — you can build rhythm by placing high notes alone; swapping on/off positions (ウラオモテ) radically changes a rhythm's character.
• Plain repetition: stable but rigid; enlarging the repeated unit to 2+ bars reduces the sense of formality; the fewer note-value types, the stronger the repetition effect and the heavier the formality.
• Displaced repetition: repeating a 1.5-beat (dotted quarter) unit in 4/4; repeating a 2-beat unit in 3/4 = hemiola (ヘミオラ) — the displacement generates tension.
• Deformed repetition: overall compression = impatient, pressingly earnest; overall expansion = unhurried and settled; lengthening via anticipation = paradoxically more urgent.
• Partial repetition: leisurely echoing the phrase ending after a gap = echo (エコー) — introspection, lingering regret (心残り), murmuring to oneself; progressively shortening and beat-compressing the repeated part = tatamikakeru (たたみかける, pressing in step by step) — urgency.
• Contrast: rhythmic shapes must have vivid characters to be recognized; the most legible = short-value groups vs. long-value groups; a latent contrast with the order flipped prevents boredom without seeming arbitrary.
• Rhythm with unclear segmentation = long-winded; segmentation that is too self-evident = dull — accumulate tension with "hooked" note values and beat positions, then release at a plain-spoken position (a sense of opening, 開放感).

6. Modes and Pentatonic Scales

Major Mode / Minor Mode (長旋法／短旋法)

• A mode = selecting tones from the 12 + assigning roles (tonic, etc.); the key is determined by the tonic's position, not by the mode type; the same set of tones with a different tonic = a different mode (all white keys can be C major or A minor).
• Major-mode mechanics: the leading tone (導音, dō-on, degree vii) resolving up a semitone to the tonic is strongest > dominant (v) > subdominant (iv);
  • Mechanics ≠ compulsion — the leading tone moving by arpeggio into another chord tone is also very common; the major mode overall has few constraints and free motion;
  • An overly strong functional feel (leading tone → tonic, tracing dominant-to-tonic harmony) = prim and stiff (school-anthem feel / punk's blunt shouting);
  • Major key ≠ cheerful: graduation songs and other works of sorrow and nostalgia are mostly in major.
• The three forms of the minor mode:
  • Natural minor scale: no leading tone; motion is free but melodies easily go flat and featureless;
  • Harmonic minor scale: vii raised a semitone as leading tone (extremely strong pull to the tonic); an augmented 2nd arises between vi–vii — avoid connecting them directly;
  • Melodic minor scale: ascending, both vi and vii are raised (eliminating the augmented 2nd; the raised vi strongly tends toward the leading tone); when vii is not acting as leading tone it is not raised and moves toward vi (descending form).
  • Standard practice: proceed freely in natural minor, and locally mix in harmonic (or melodic) minor at section boundaries to "punctuate" — strong effect but easily predicted and contrived-sounding (わざとらしい); use sparingly.
• Beyond the leading tone, minor has several other semitone locations → well suited to emotional (情緒的) melodies; minor key ≠ dark (much hard rock and many jazz standards are in minor).
• Church modes = grab the characteristic tone (each differs from the major/minor mode by exactly 1 tone; full table in reference.md):
  • Dorian (ドリア) = major 6th; Phrygian (フリギア) = minor 2nd; Lydian (リディア) = augmented 4th; Mixolydian (ミクソリディア) = minor 7th;
  • Place the characteristic tone at the right moments in the melody + support it with chords containing the characteristic tone; never using the characteristic tone = the mode is imperceptible, wasted;
  • Discrimination: a melody with lowered vii is usually "major mode + blues pentatonic," not Mixolydian.

Pentatonic Scales (ペンタトニック) — a Major Source of J-Pop Melodicity

• Pentatonic scales have no leading tone and cannot form a dominant chord → cannot establish a key by themselves; the mechanical core = "neighbor-tone tendency":
  • Tones tend to move to adjacent scale tones (adjacency comes in 2nds and 3rds; 2nds are easier); leaping to a farther tone requires force, and after the leap the tendency is to reverse direction.
• Four typical figures ("pentatonic-sounding"):
  1. Move to a neighbor and fold back;
  2. Move to a neighbor and continue in the same direction;
  3. First "hook" (引っかける) to the neighbor in the opposite direction, then leap back two scale positions (= the pentatonic version of tame; the variant whose first step is a 2nd is the most common);
  4. Overshoot past the target neighbor to the far side, then fold back.
• Three figures that destroy the pentatonic feel:
  1. Frequently leaping to tones 3+ scale positions away (one such leap followed by a return to normal is fine);
  2. Leaping 2+ positions and then continuing in the same direction;
  3. Consecutive leaps or repeated same-direction leaps.
  • Of these, arpeggio-like (broken-chord) motion is the most destructive — but arpeggio leaps across phrase boundaries are fine.
• Same-direction stepwise motion ≤ 3 steps: 4 steps sweeps the entire scale = a characterless scale-run that merely announces "I am pentatonic."
• Mode shifting (転旋法, ten-senpō):
  • Two pentatonics a fifth apart differ by only 1 tone → easy to switch, commonly used, enriching the pentatonic's small tone supply;
  • Switching between major/minor mode ⇄ pentatonic (usually without a key-signature change): a pentatonic opening (intimate, singable) → splice into stepwise scale motion (semitone momentum) as complements; locally mixing the leading tone into a pentatonic to fit the harmony — freely adjusting distance between "pentatonicism" and "functional harmony."
• The pentatonic tonic may differ from the key tonic (e.g., C major with an E-minor pentatonic = floating, modern color) — a standard way to avoid pentatonic flatness; any major/minor pentatonic built on a scale degree of the key is usable (if it contains an out-of-key tone, drop that tone).
• Pentatonics are highly independent of harmony: tones that look like appoggiaturas/passing tones need no resolution and may leap away freely; the same harmony fits many pentatonic phrases and the same pentatonic phrase fits many progressions — "coexisting well with the harmony while acting independently and freely" is the essence of pentatonic melody.
• Weakness: only 5 tones invite cliché, and no semitones means emotional scarcity — you can write in fixed kobushi (こぶし, melismatic pitch inflection)-style semitone turns (overuse becomes garrulous).
• Diluting the pentatonic feel: insert large leaps or arpeggio-like motion. In practice, regulate "pentatonic density" phrase by phrase (labeling each phrase as ~pentatonic (strong)/(weak)/intermediate); even when not using a pentatonic, always ask how pentatonic the current melody feels.
• Pentatonic cadences: the tonic = the strongest cadence tone, dominant next; arriving via a pentatonic neighbor or an ascending 4th is stronger; the precondition for a strong cadence = the pentatonic tonic coincides with the key tonic; otherwise only soft cadences are available.

Blue Notes (ブルーノート)

• Definition: temporary semitone lowerings of degrees iii, v, vii in major (the "melancholy tones") — not a fixed change to minor-scale tones, but:
  • Lowered temporarily, or deliberately sung flat with the "true tone" as premise;
  • The typical usage is a before/after contrast of "original tone → blue note," or ornamental oscillation between the two.
• The effect is strongest when the harmony does not contain the blue note (the semitone collides with the chord's diatonic 3rd): blue iii against the 3rd of I, blue vii against the 3rd of V — a head-on collision, the fiercest blues color.
• Often packaged as the blue-note pentatonic (ブルーノートペンタトニック) (a minor-pentatonic shape containing ♭iii and ♭vii) used over major; blue v does not join the pentatonic and almost always resolves by semitone step up/down (used as a passing/ornamental tone).
• To "dye" the whole song blue: add chords such as ♭III, ♭VI, ♭VII, Vm, I7, IV7 (usable even when the melody has no blue notes; this is a non-functional usage carrying no harmonic function).

7. The Relationship Between Harmony and Melody

Chord Tones and Non-Chord Tones

• Chord tones (和音内音): stable, straightforward, plain; but easily buried in the chord, and inevitably leap-heavy, lacking smoothness. Stability ranking: root > 5th > 3rd.
  • A purely chord-tone melody easily runs parallel to the harmony and gets swallowed by it; but when the harmony moves frequently or contains local modulations, it can actually highlight the harmonic interest.
• Non-chord tones (和音外音): unstable, tense, hard to bury; their urge to resolve (basic form = moving by 2nd up or down to a chord tone) is the greatest engine of melodic momentum.
  • Tension control: non-chord tones a semitone from a chord tone are strongest (hard and fierce, to be used with care); the longer the value and the stronger the beat, the greater the tension.
  • In pentatonic/blues contexts, modal force takes priority and non-chord tones need not resolve.
  • Non-chord tones may be used consecutively; other chord tones may be interposed mid-resolution; unresolved / irregularly resolved non-chord tones = subtle feelings, an ineffable afterglow, inorganic expression (also a resource, but too long or too strong harms the sense of harmony).
• Definitions and resolutions of the seven types of non-chord tones (passing tone / neighbor tone / appoggiatura / anticipation / escape tone / suspension / suspension-appoggiatura) → reference.md Table 1.
• The more chord tones a chord has (triad → 7th → 9th → 11th → 13th) → the fewer non-chord tones remain → the freer the usable tones, but the blander each tone's relationship to the chord, losing the delicious mechanics of non-chord tones.
  • The chord-tone/non-chord-tone status of the same melody changes with the chord symbol (under C / CMaj7 / CMaj7(9), the identities of B and D differ) → writing a melody requires simultaneously imagining the chord sounding with it;
  • The whole song needs a plan for "how many chord tones, and where and why the count changes" — a 9th chord suddenly appearing in a triad-dominated song = the forces at that spot lurch, unbalancing the structure.

Melody within Functional Harmony (機能和声)

• Function groups and progression rules (T→anything; D must return to T, D→S forbidden; S = buffer between T and D) → reference.md Table 2.
• Stock progressions at the instant of the chord change: leading tone → tonic (semitone up), degrees iv/vi → down a 2nd, dominant degree → hold or up a 4th — following them = a strong sectional/cadential feel; within the dominant chord itself, arpeggios and steps are free.
• The melody should avoid implying "forbidden progressions" (e.g., a melody strongly implying V→IV) — done deliberately, it yields a non-tonal, modal effect.
• Yotei-chōwa alert: a melody traveling with functional harmony (especially tones over the dominant chord) is extremely easy to predict — break textbook resolutions with suspensions, appoggiaturas, and anticipations.
• A section may cadence directly on the dominant chord, and the next section need not start from the tonic chord (a strong sectional break permits harmonic discontinuity, e.g., after a G7 section, restarting straight from F).

Melody within Non-Functional Harmony

• Modes without a leading tone (natural minor, pentatonic) often pair with non-functional harmony: chords planted directly against melody tones, parallel motion, harmony that doesn't progress and serves only as rhythmic accent, chains of 4ths (lacking the dominant→tonic thrust).
• Weak momentum → songs easily go flat; countermeasures: a combined tactic of rhythmic-density changes, register leaps, pentatonic ⇄ scale switching, appoggiatura resolutions, and locally borrowing V7→I to punctuate sections.

Mutual Independence of Melody and Harmony

• Melodic motion and harmonic motion need not coincide: melody stalls while harmony moves, they move in opposite directions, the same melody over different harmonies — all are sources of three-dimensional depth (exploit them actively; they are not errors).
• A melody that traces (なぞる) the harmony = flat and monotonous (occasionally useful for a unified sense of power).
• At least one of the bass (lowest voice) and the melody should leave the root: melody constantly coinciding with the root = stable but sonically impoverished; change the chord's bass note (inversion) or have the melody avoid the root.

Chords First or Melody First

• The trap of fixing a complex progression first: the melody degenerates into "walking along the harmony"; harmonic rhythm becomes formulaic (one chord per bar, dominant at the end of 8 bars); transplanting a genre's typical progression ≠ obtaining that genre (characteristic progressions exist bound to rhythm, melody, and position in the form).
• Practice path: freely invent melodies over 1–2 chords → over a 3–4-chord loop progression (play the loop until your body memorizes it, then "hold the harmony in mind while inventing melody") → once fluent, invent even complex progressions in relation to the melody.
• Conclusion: melody and harmony are parallel temporal structures that should be conceived simultaneously and interlocked tightly — neither takes precedence.

8. Fitting Lyrics and Melody (歌詞と旋律)

Intonation (イントネーション)

• Principle: the melody's rises, falls, and stresses match the word's pitch accent — otherwise meaning becomes hard to catch or is heard as a different word (「雨が晴れて」 "the rain clears" → 「飴が腫れて」 "the candy swells").
• Pitch accent follows standard Japanese (標準語) (standard ≠ Tokyo dialect; when unsure, consult an accent dictionary アクセント辞典).
• Deliberately defying the accent = a linguistic hook, expression of large emotion — but adjacent words must have correct accent to preserve the sentence's meaning; setting particles on high notes can build emotion in rising steps.
• Phrase endings: rising ending (語尾上行) = question, appeal, hope; falling ending (語尾下行) = answer, assertion, resignation.

The Rhythm of Words

• Chōon (長音, ー, long vowel): give it a long note value (or re-articulate for emphasis); stretching the wrong place changes meaning (「彼が好き」 "I like him" → 「カレーが好き」 "I like curry") — align the stretched note with the bunsetsu (word-phrase) boundary.
• Sokuon (促音, っ, geminate stop): express with a rest; or lengthen the preceding vowel, then cut it off short and strong (「はしーぃって」).
• Hatsuon (撥音, ん, moraic nasal): merge into the previous syllable, or give it a short, weak independent note; a long strong-beat 「ん」 is hard to sing and easily buried (unless you make it float by taking it off the chord tones).
• Devoiced vowels (無声音) (devoicing of u/i after t/k/f/s/p, e.g., the く of 「たかく」): no perceptible pitch — must get a short note, otherwise the phrase's musical meaning changes (the effect of figure repetition is lost).
• Consecutive identical vowels (「こと＋おもってる」): insert a rest between the two notes, or change pitch, to prevent them merging into one long tone that swallows the second vowel.

Segmentation and Emphasis

• When lyric bunsetsu and melodic segmentation coincide, comprehension is easy; misalignment changes meaning (「君が来るまで待ってる」 "I'll wait until you come" → 「君が車で待ってる」 "you're waiting in the car").
• Uses of deliberate misalignment: breaking before a particle to suspend interest; cutting mid-word to create tension (「わ・た・し」 syllable-by-syllable insistence); stretching the phrase head as tame to induce expectation — use only where word meaning survives.
• Letting the musical phrase override linguistic segmentation = a comprehension burden on the listener → reverse-used as the obsession and earnestness of "singing it out even so"; all-equal 8th notes + preserving word boundaries by pitch motion alone = a single-minded (一途) devotion.

Lyrics-First and Music-First (詞先・曲先)

• Shisen (詞先, lyrics-first): writing only the catchphrase at the head of the sabi (サビ, chorus/hook) lyrics-first is already effective; even merely reserving positions for sokuon words (「ずっと」「もっと」「きっと」) is effective. Give the words to be highlighted long values, high notes, and kime positions.
• Four repairs for kyokusen (曲先, music-first):
  1. More syllables than notes → split note values or add notes before/after;
  2. Fewer syllables than notes → merge note values;
  3. Counts match but rhythm doesn't fit → change values/rhythm;
  4. Contour conflicts with pitch accent → adjust pitches while minding segmentation.
• Don't finish the melody to the last detail in advance — keep room for revision, and iterate back and forth with the lyrics; take care not to destroy repetition/contrast structures to accommodate words — when necessary, go back and change the lyrics.

Ji-amari / Ji-tarazu (deliberate mismatches)

• Ji-amari (字余り, too many syllables): words crammed into short values, patter-like → a breathless desperation; compressing the notes at the phrase head = a forward-toppling surge; repeating that rhythm = step-by-step advancing earnestness. Overdone, it becomes strings of equal values, a speech-like melody; if the emphasized word earns no sympathy it slides into comedy.
• Ji-tarazu (字足らず, too few syllables): words stretched, articulated over multiple pitches → arrests attention, pouring in deep feeling; stretched too far = word meaning dissolves into scat (スキャット, meaningless vocalise).

Rhyme and Rhetoric

• **Rh

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