Pop is a little bit theatrical. That's the whole vibe. That's the point - is that it's great music, great melodies, great hooks. But, on top of it, it's a presentation. There's a showmanship about it. And that's why I wanted to be a pop star.
Adam Lambert
Jazz should be recognized as music of the people, based in a lot of accents and melodies. What is jazz but music that people danced to? Jazz has the dynamic thing. I don't think you have to be playing only Charlie Parker licks on your horn or whatever the new version of that is.
Al Jarreau
I chose 'Time' by Hans Zimmer because it's very melodic, and the way it progresses throughout the track is very unique. I am personally a very big fan of piano melodies, and to me, 'Time' is just perfect.
Alan Walker
Springsteen's 'Thunder Road' and Carole King's 'It's Too Late' are examples of why I am a singer/songwriter. I practice these songs every day. The melodies are timeless in the rock world, the lyrics are words that I need to say, and they need to be heard again.
Alice Ripley
When I hear 'fusion,' I think of Tricky-Dick stuff - really hairy melodies played in unison. It's like, 'Why?'
Allan Holdsworth
When I'm outside gardening, it can be so inspiring. I think of words and melodies. It's peaceful. Every singer-songwriter should find something outside of music that makes them as happy as gardening makes me.
Amanda Shires
John Williams is, without question, talented. He writes very good scores and very good melodies and all that.
Andre Previn
I know that my passion is for opera, but sometimes I like also to sing songs, because there are many beautiful melodies.
Andrea Bocelli
Melodies are just honest. They can only be what they are. Words have the capacity for deception. They're all full of subtext, and some of them are cliche and overused and vernacular. They're tricky. All I can say is, words are tricky.
Andrew Bird
Every time I get up in the morning, melodies occur to me and I start trying to shape lyrics to melodies.
I often think of random melodies. And I pretty much hear in my head what I want to do with the orchestra as I'm writing on the piano.
Andrew Lloyd Webber
One would be lying if one didn't say that one had melodies that I keep in my back pocket.
On its fifth full-length album, 'Cervantine,' A Hawk and a Hacksaw's love of the Balkans continues unabated, but with new songs and collaborators. In 'Uskudar,' the music finds an equal balance of sweet, sour and earthy sounds with nimble string melodies and a grunting tuba.
Anthony Fantano
I listen to what people say in the songs, not just the melodies. With rappers you gotta listen to what they say.
Anuel AA
I compose melodies in my head and then interpret them musically with my guitar and keep them recorded. The guitar helps me to build unique chord structures on simple melodies.
Anupam Roy
I'm always going to take an experience and a fire beat and marry it all together with adult melodies. I try to paint, just like Frank Ocean paints with his lyrics. I try in similar ways to paint my life into these songs.
Ari Lennox
I love country music so much. I love all kinds of music. But when it comes down to it, I'm from East Tennessee, and country melodies and country songs have always just sliced me in the heart.
Ashley Monroe
I use my phone to record notes or hum melodies. That's how I remember them.
Astrid S
I could probably have an idea one day and then go into the studio and really wanna write about just that idea that I have in mind. Or it can vary with just a simple beat and I just do a bunch of melodies on the track that inspire me.
Ava Max
Lyrics are important, but it's hard, because English isn't my first language - although it feels like it is these days! I grew up with amazing melodies, so getting that right on a song has always been the key thing for me, but there's no reason why a great melody doesn't deserve great lyrics.
Avicii
It's hard - some people get inspired by a feeling, but I'm mostly inspired by melodies.
The blessing of being able to write music and let music speak for itself is you let the melodies and let the lyrics and the groove talk to people instead of me talking to people.
I did psychology at university, but I wouldn't say that my music is too influenced by it. The way I make music is a little more to do with an emotional connection. When I compose the melodies for my tracks, it always comes from the heart.
I hear these melodies. I hear horn lines and string lines. That's what's fun about recording with an orchestra.
No one wants the picture-perfect song anymore. I'm trying to keep the beautiful qualities of pop - nostalgia, melodies, and the feeling that a beautiful pop song can give you - but make it real. It's not polished.
The albums 'Heaven On Earth' and 'Runaway Horses' and 'Live Your Life Be Free' were harking back to when I was a young girl and listening to Californian radio - lush productions, complicated melodies, harmonies like the Beach Boys and the Mamas and Papas. That's what those albums remind me of.
As soon as I started writing the first batch, I had a vision. I saw me on stage playing a certain type of music. I want to take these blues melodies over aggressive guitars. I heard the sound I wanted to make. I knew what I wanted to do. It wasn't ever there before.
I usually sing a lot on my mixtapes. I sing a lot on songs that just really aren't singles. Even my first single, 'My Last,' which I feel like is more pop than anything - I was originally singing the chorus on there. I'm used to that. I've always had fresh melodies.
I think more influential than Emily Dickinson or Coleridge or Wordsworth on my imagination were Warner Brothers, Merrie Melodies, and Loony Tunes cartoons.
Living in a capital in Europe but still surrounded by mountains and ocean, my relationship to music was strongest walking to school and back. I would sing to myself and very quickly started mapping out my melodies to landscapes - at the time I just thought it was very matter of fact, a common thing to do.
I have written most of my melodies walking and I feel it is definitely one of the most helpful ways of sewing all of the different things in your life together and seeing the whole picture.
Plantation gospel music was the stuff I fell in love with when I was a kid - these beautiful melodies and these hard, hard stories.
I like big, soaring melodies and fun, splashy lyrics. Maybe like what Blondie would do in 2013.
I used to - my earliest memory of waking up with a melody in my head was, you know, 8, 9, 10. I've always heard kind of melodies in my head.
It's a privilege to serve the poor, to be servants of noble Africans, but I better belong in the rehearsal room or in the studio with my band. That's where I want to be and I still wake up in the morning with melodies in my head.
I just love catchy melodies.
Most of those melodies are me trying to find out what notes fit, and then hitting ones that don't fit in a very interesting way.
I just write songs that I strongly believe in and that are coming from inside. There's no tricks. It's honesty with big melodies.
Ever since I was a child I've always been very attracted to melodies. Whether I hear Jeff Beck, a choir, an ocean or the wind, there's always a melody in there.
I started classical and operatic lessons when I was 8 and become an operatic singer and went to competition. I write my own music. A lot of the songs, growing up, I was into writing dark stories and poems, and one day I started putting melodies to them.
I kind of always thought that I had a good ear for melodies. I think in terms of melody. I can just be walking and I'll hear a melody.
I think with me and the type of music that I'm trying to make, it's always going be soulful because I grew up listening to different types and variations of soulful melodies and jazz, but experimenting with different types of stylistic souls.
What's the essence of the Go-Go's? Great melodies, guitar hooks, driving drums. All of that.
I always enjoy rhythms and melodies, but I always use my voice as more of an instrument and less of a soapbox for me to say or to preach.
'Course, 'Santini' bombed in England, y'know. It came out at the height of the New Wave, which couldn't have been a worse time for a solo singer trying to sell rock melodies.
I remember writing '5 Dollars' out of intense listening sessions of Bruce Springsteen. I don't know if it's obvious, but I was obsessed with how limpid Bruce Springsteen's melodies are: It's such a great way to do storytelling and to still be melodic and catchy.
Brazilian music has many of the ingredients that I strive for in my own music: Strong melodies and a disciplined but intense rhythmic concept, and interesting harmonies.
I get to play around with different ideas and beautiful melodies. I don't have to yell in a rock voice. I think you can get an emotional depth in the types of rooms we're playing that you can't find in larger rooms.
I've always been a writer who does simplistic, simple melodies. But I think it works.
Often, with our music, there's quite a lot going on, so people hear melodies that sound up and catchy, and production, and maybe don't really listen to what the songs are about, so it's nice to sing a song like 'The Currents' and really mean it.
