[Jim]

Originally Posted by allthumbs

Nice takes both. I always find it intersting that following chords produces a melody that is strikingly close to the original, even if the player hasn't heard the original tune. Proving once again, strong melodies are built around chord tones.

Thanks Marty. That's an interesting point you bring up ... it would be an interesting study to do to see if a group of people given a unique chord progression to a well known song (that they didn't know) would mostly come up with a solo close to the original melody or not. To see if the chords drive the melody that strongly. And I suppose the reverse test (given a melody, come up with a chord progression for it) would also be valid.

The kinds of things composers spend their time doing (creating melodies to fit harmonic progressions and visa versa). How close would several composers come with the same starting material?

Possibly Masters or Ph.D. thesis material there!

Jim