How Melody and Harmony Work
Unlock the mechanics of great music by turning raw notes into memorable hooks and emotional chord progressions. Learn how to write melodies that stick, choose chords that fit, and bring both together seamlessly.
Like Duolingo, but for How Melody and Harmony Work. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.
21 levels across 4 sections, about 42 minutes end to end, roughly 8 days at five minutes a day. It moves through Crafting Catchy Melodies, Building Chords That Fit, Marrying Melody with Chords, and Adding Color and Texture. It starts from scratch.
Free forever · No credit card · iPhone & Android
Key ideas in How Melody and Harmony Work
- Steps move to neighbor notes and keep a tune easy to follow
- Leaps jump across pitches to create an emotional surge or surprise
- A melody relying only on leaps feels erratic, while only steps can feel flat
- An ascending line builds tension and energy as pitch rises
- The peak of an arch contour serves as the natural climax
- Descending lines release energy and bring closure
- The tonic acts as a musical home base where melodies feel fully resolved
- Notes further from the tonic carry tension that demands to settle back home
- Stopping on a non-tonic note creates suspense or an open question
- Keeping the exact rhythm locks the pattern into memory
- Shifting the pitches up or down provides variety while keeping the recognizable groove
- Changing both rhythm and pitch simultaneously makes a line feel like an entirely new idea
- Rests act like punctuation marks, grouping notes into digestible phrases
- A continuous stream of notes without silence exhausts the listener's ear
- Silence gives the brain a moment to absorb the phrase that just ended
- A scale selects 7 out of 12 available pitches that blend harmoniously together
You've tried the other tabs
Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.
You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.
One answer, then back to scrolling.
Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.
Tomo gives How Melody and Harmony Work the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.
Here's what playing it feels like
A real question from this course. Take your best guess.
What happens when a melody suddenly uses a leap instead of a step?
Get it right to open this lesson and 20 more in the app.
Where How Melody and Harmony Work takes you
- 1
Crafting Catchy Melodies
- Shape and Motion in Melody
- The Major and Minor Scale Palettes
- 2
Building Chords That Fit
- Constructing Triads and Chord Qualities
- Progressions and Harmonic Motion
- 3
Marrying Melody with Chords
- Harmonizing a Melodic Line
- Smooth Voice Leading and Inversions
- 4
Adding Color and Texture
- Extended Chords and Harmonic Flourishes
4 sections · 7 units · 21 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.
You pick the voice
How Melody and Harmony Work is taught in the The Professor style: clear, structured, thorough. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.
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Start How Melody and Harmony Work today.
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