Developing Motifs into Full Pieces

Intro
In this article, I’m going to provide you with a useful template that you can use to develop a
short motif or idea into a full-length piece. I’ll cover the PReVaDe method and provide a brief
introduction to “sentence structure.” When properly combined these tools help give you a
powerful weapon for fighting against writer’s block! However, as a quick disclaimer, I’d like to
point out that there are literally countless ways that you can write a piece of music, and that this
template is not an end-all-be-all strategy to great tunesmithing. It’s simply one of the many
strategies I’ve developed over time to help me with my own composing process. With that being
said, let’s dive in and take a quick look at the template!

The Template

Melodic Paragraph/Sentence Structure

Question 1 Question 2 Answer

:||
PReVaDe PReVaDe PReVaDe PReVaDe

This is what the template looks like when organized into a chart. It might not make much sense
to you now, but by the time we’re done, you’ll realize just how simple it actually is. We can even
break this entire thing down into three easy steps:

1. Come up with a musical idea/motif

2. Use PReVaDe to write two questions and an answer
3. Repeat the process

Right away you’ll probably notice that the bulk of this entire process falls on step number two.
It’s definitely the most technically demanding of the three steps, which is why we’ll spend the
bulk of our time exploring it, but first let’s come up with a musical idea!

Step One: Come up with a musical idea/motif

This step is arguably the simplest of the three. I’m sure you often come up with short musical
ideas when playing around on your instrument of choice. It’s pretty easy to absentmindedly
come up with a brief idea, but much harder to turn it into a full melody. Your idea can be

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anything, but this template typically works best for shorter ideas that last no longer than a bar or
two.

Here’s a musical snippet I came up with for the sake of this project:

Step Two: PReVaDe and Question/Answers

PReVaDe is a concept taken from improvisational studies in music. It stands for “Present,
Repeat, Vary, and Deconstruct”. This step forms the foundation for the entire template in this
document. Below I’m going to quickly go through the basics of PReVaDe as a process and show
you how it might be used to develop the motif I just shared with you. Then I’ll take a little more
time to go into more detail for each step of the PReVaDe process.

Present is exactly what it sounds like, we’re going to “present” our musical idea. This kick starts
our melody and introduces the new material we’ll be working with. After we’ve presented our
idea, we simply repeat it (sometimes with small changes) to help establish our motif as the main
material that our music will build on (at least for a while).

After repeating the motif, we’re going to add some variety by modifying it. In this step, we’re
simply repeating the motif again, but this time around we’re changing it up a little bit. You can do
this by adding new notes, taking away pre-existing notes, switching up the rhythm, changing the
harmonies, or whatever you’d like to do. In this case, I’m going to sequence the motif, which is a
fancy way of saying I’m going to move it up or down in pitch, and I’m also going to switch up the
last two notes.

The final step in PReVaDe is the Deconstruction phase, which is possibly one of the most
confusing but important parts of this entire process. Here we’re going to tie things up with a nice
little bow and end up with your very first “melodic statement”. Deconstruct basically means “end
the piece”. There are many different strategies for deconstructing a motif, but for the sake of this

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template, we’re going to try and stick to just another varied repetition of the motif because this
works nicely for the process of writing questions and answers in music (more on this in a bit).

So now we have a basic understanding of how PReVaDe works, but there are a few more points
I’d like to share with you before moving on.

The “Repetition” and “Variation” steps are very closely related. Your “repetition” does NOT need
to be an exact repetition of the original motif. You can feel free to add some new notes, change
the pitch, switch the chord underneath it, etc. You can make whatever changes you want to your
repetition but whatever you do, keep in mind that your initial repetition should be more closely
related to the original motif than your “variation”. So in other words, the more changes you make
to your “repetition” of the motif, the more changes you’ll need to make to the “variation” of it.
Another way to think of this is that the “repetition” of step can be a “mini variation” and the
“variation” step should be treated as a “bigger variation” step.

If you’re struggling with coming up with different ways to add variation to your motif, here’s a
chart I made of common strategies that have been used by composers for centuries. Feel free
to use as many or as few of these at a time as you’d like.

Technique Definition Example Original Motif

Sequence Changing the pitches used

in your motif. Either by
keeping the same exact
intervals between your
notes (called “real
sequence”) or by changing
the intervals slightly to fit
the key you’re playing in
(called “tonal sequencing”)

Augment Stretching the notes in your

motif to make them sound
slower.

Dimunation Shortening the notes in

your motif to make them
sound faster

Expand Adding additional notes to

your motif.

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 Contract Taking notes out of your
motif.

Divide Dividing your motif into

segments and repeating
them in some sort of AABB
fashion

Interval Changing the intervals and

metamorphosis pitches of your motif, but
keeping the same rhythm.

invert Turning your motif upside

down.

retrograde Playing your motif

backwards.

So now that we all have a better understanding of the PReVaDe method, we’re going to start
applying it. For this template, we’re going to focus on using PReVaDe four times to write three
different melodic sentences. The first two PReVaDe’s will be questions while the second two will
combine together for a single answer.

Now chances are that you’ve heard “questions and answers” in music many times before. It’s a
very common concept, but I find that very few people actually enjoy a clear understanding of
what it means. Most instructors certainly seem to take for granted that everyone has an intrinsic
understanding of the differences between questions and answers in music, but I know that it’s
something I struggled with quite a bit when I first started out. Because of this, I’d like to take a
bit of time to delve deeper into this idea.

At the core of the “questions vs. answers” idea is a single question: “does this sound like it could
be an ending or not?”. If a segment of music feels like it could be a satisfying ending to the
piece then it can be considered an “answer,” however if a segment of music feels like it’s
open-ended or that there should be more music coming after it then it’s considered to be a
“question.”

Now, this idea can be helpful for identifying questions and answers when you’re listening to
music, but it’s not as helpful for writing them yourself. For this, I’m going to recommend a simple
approach from Alan Belkin’s fantastic book “Musical Composition: Art and Craft.” In the book,
Prof. Belkin states that there are five parameters that determine if a phrase is a question or
answer: Melody, Harmony, Rhythm, Texture, and Dynamics. In order for a phrase to be an

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answer, a minimum of two parameters MUST agree that it is an answer. The more phrases
that agree, the stronger the sense of finality your answer phrase will have!

Below, I’ll include a simple chart for how these parameters can be used to classify a phrase as
an answer. As a general rule, questions are the opposite of answers, so if you want to designate
a phrase as a question phrase, do the opposite of what you would for an answer.

Questions and Answers in Music

Answers

Melody

End the phrase by moving down in pitch

Use smaller melodic intervals near the end of the phrase than the beginning

End in the register used for the rest of the piece

Harmony

Resolve to the tonic when using tonal harmony.

Reinforce a cluster chord with an octave or P5 in the lowest two voices (if using a-tonal
harmony)

Use only consonant intervals between the harmonic voices

End a largely stepwise baseline with a leap

Have highest and lowest voices in the harmony move towards each other

Slow down the harmonic rhythm near the end of the phrase

Rhythm

Slow down the rhythm

End on a strong beat

Pause Momentarily

Dynamics

Decrease in total volume

Texture

Reduce the number of instruments playing

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 Reduce the total number of octaves/registers being used

One last important thing to consider when writing questions and answers is that they aren’t
black and white. They exist on a spectrum! By that, I mean that a musical idea can be
considered a question in one situation OR an answer in another! It all depends on what other
musical ideas are surrounding it.

For example, let’s say that we have a PReVaDe sentence that you wrote using 3 question
traits and 2 answer traits. We’ll call this “Sentence A”.

If you follow it with a “Sentence B” that has only 1 question trait, and 4 Answer traits then in
comparison, sentence A will sound more like a question.

However, if Sentence B instead has 5 straight Question Traits, then sentence A will sound
more like an answer. For those of you, like me, who like more visual examples here’s what I
mean:

Example 1:
Sentence A Sentence B

Question Traits: 3 Answer Traits: 2 Question Traits: 1 Answer Traits: 4

In this example, since “Sentence B” sounds more like an answer, then in comparison “Sentence
A” will sound more like a Question.

Example 2:
Sentence A Sentence B

Question Traits: 3 Answer Traits: 2 Question Traits: 5 Answer Traits: 0

In this example, since “Sentence B” sounds more like a question, then in comparison “Sentence
A” will sound more like an Answer. Even though it’s the same sentence from example 1.

So in other words, if you write a sentence as mostly a question, but include a touch of traits that
you'd find in an answer, you can take that question and use it as a type of weak answer. Sort of
like phrasing your answer to a question as a question:

Teacher: “What are mitochondria?”

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 Me: “....the powerhouse of the cell?”

This doesn’t exactly invite confidence in your answer, but it’s an answer nonetheless. There are
all kinds of sentences you can make along this spectrum but that’s a topic for another time. For
now, let’s keep moving on.

Now that we have a better understanding of PReVaDe and Questions/Answers. Let’s take
another look at the template from earlier.

Melodic Paragraph/Sentence Structure

Question 1 Question 2 Answer

:||
PReVaDe PReVaDe PReVaDe PReVaDe

Does it make a little more sense now? Let’s break it down

First we start the template by using PReVaDe to turn our motif into our first Question.

Then we use it again to write a Second question (I typically like to give this one a few more
answer traits than the first).

After we’ve done that we use it two more times to make one long Answer (you can think of this
as writing a comparatively weaker answer followed by a stronger one).

Then we wrap it all up with the final step which is to repeat the entire process as many times as
you’d like while taking any liberties you’d like! (Hence the repeat sign)

Step Three: Repeating the Processes with Any Changes You Feel Like!
I want to keep this step purposefully vague because I don’t want you to end up getting boxed
into a super rigid template when writing your music. This is an issue that many composers fall
into. Templates like this one can be very useful, especially when first starting out. However, just
like everything else in music, they exist only as suggestions! Nothing in music theory is a hard
law. Music theory, by definition, is just the collection of experiences and suggestions had by
generations of musicians. You have the freedom to follow these as closely or as loosely as
you’d like. I’d personally recommend that you use this template only so far as it’s helpful. If you

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have an idea of how to develop part of your music that doesn’t fit into this framework then do it!
Don’t worry about following the steps rigidly.
However, as useful as I’d like to believe this information is, I know it’s not necessarily what many
of you were looking for so I WILL provide a few ideas you can use for the third step, but I can’t
recommend enough that you experiment and try your own way of continuing on.

Ideas for how to continue:

1. Repeat the entire template exactly as it is.
2. Switch things up a bit. The first musical paragraph was written as
“Question-Question-Long Answer” maybe try a different approach
a. Long Question- Short Answer- Short Answer?
b. Long Answer-follow up question-follow up question?
c. Series of ambiguous questions/answers with so many different traits you can’t
really tell which is which.
3. Maybe try mixing up PReVaDe into a different order
a. Presentation-Variation-Variation-Deconstruction?
b. Variation-Variation-Variation-Variation?
c. Presentation-Variation-Repetition-Deconstruction?
d. Anything you can think of?
4. Come up with a new Musical Idea and try any of the above suggestions to develop it.

The point I’m trying to make here is that this template can be as rigid or flexible as you need it to
be. If you’re looking for lots of structure, then by all means feel free to write two or three musical
paragraphs that stick rigidly to the first two steps. If you just need something to help you get
started, then use the first steps or skip right to the third. Whatever you feel is most helpful. At
the end of the day, your music is your own and can be written any way that you like. The only
caveat that I’d add is that if a particular musical idea is significant to the makeup of your piece, it
can be really helpful to end the piece on some answer-based variation of that idea. This will give
your ending a relatively strong feeling of finality.

I hope this is all helpful to you in your journey as a composer. As always, I’m open to any ideas
you have for articles or videos you’d like to see. If you haven’t already, consider checking out my
youtube channel where I post videos on the topics I cover here and more! If you have any
questions or suggestions, please feel free to shoot me an email at
tabletopcomposer@gmailcom I always enjoy hearing from you guys. Best of luck, and keep on
writing!