Thinking Aloud

Melody: Part 27

The First Pass

In this part of the Melody series, we’ll decode the loudness contours of the 5 melodies we heard in the preceding part.

We’ll be reusing the same plan and tools that we used to decode the children’s rhyme in Part 25, the only change being that we’ll complete every stage of the plan with all 5 melodies before moving on to the next stage.

The first stage is decoding the loudness contour. If you need a refresher on loudness, check out the Melodic Loudness Primer.

Melodic Loudness Primer

The Gear You’ll Need

To make it easier to focus on the loudness levels of each melody’s pitches, we’ll turn every pitch into the same Sa, following a slower tempo¹.

This modified version, along with the provided loudness dictionary, will be all you’ll need to name the loudness level of each pitch (Ve, Ya or Ha).

The Arrow of Loudness

Here’s the loudness dictionary with Ve, Ya and Ha in order:

Make sure to also listen to the original melodies by heading over to the previous part. This will help you in contextualising the modified versions that you’ll find below..

Let’s begin!

Loud, Soft and In Between

Decode the loudness contours of these modified versions of the 5 melodies.

• Melody 1: Netru Illaatha Maatram (approximately 0:28-0:40 of the linked video), A.R. Rahman

  Hint:

  Ha Ya _ Ha _ _, Ha _ _, _ _ _,

  Ya _ Ya _ _ _, _ _ _, _ Ya Ha.

• Melody 2: Jab Se Tumi San Laagali (approx. 1:25-1:36 of linked video), traditional Khayaal composition

  Hint:

  Ha Ya _ _ Ya Ya _ Ya, Ha _ _,

  _ _ _ Ha _ _ Ya, _ _ _ _,

  _ _ Ya, _ _ _ Ya Ya.

• Melody 3: Symphony No. 25 (approx. 1:34-1:46 of linked video), W.A. Mozart

  Hint:

  Ve Ve Ve, _ _ _, _ _ _, Ve Ve _ _,

  _ _ _, _ _ _, _ _ _, _ _ Ve Ve,

  Ve _ Ya _ Ya Ve _ _,

  _ _ Ya _ Ya _ Ve Ve,

  _ _ _ _ _ Ya _ Ya,

  Ha _ _ Ha _.

• Melody 4: Pehla Nasha (approx. 0:47-1:00 of linked video), Jatin-Lalit

  Hint:

  Ha Ya Ha, _ _ _ _ _,

  Ha _ Ha, _ _ _ _ Ya,

  _ Ya _, Ya Ya _ _ _,

  Ha _ _ _,

  _ _ _ _ _ _ _ Ha.

• Melody 5: Mamma Mia (approx. 1:03-1:20 of linked video), ABBA

  Hint:

  Ya, Ha Ha _, _ _ _ _,

  Ya, _ _ _, _ _ _ _,

  _, _ Ha, _ _ _ Ya _ _ _ Ya,

  Ha Ha _ _, _ Ve _,

  _ _ Ha Ha Ha _,

  _, _ _, Ha _ _ _, _ _ _ Ha.

Moving Forward

The solutions to the 5 challenges above will be available in the next part. Also, we’ll be decoding the rhythm for the 5 melodies.

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1. We’ll still be maintaining the relative durations of pitches to keep the rhythm recognisably intact.