Its fun playing popular songs on the piano. You know the tune and can easily hear the melody as you begin to play. It makes sense because you’ve heard the music so many times before.

But once you are comfortable playing other people’s music on the piano, you may decide that the next step is to create music of your own. Where do you begin? How do the most popular entertainers in the industry do it?

Start With A Melody

Some of the greatest, most popular music of our time was created by the putting the melody into play first. The melody is the catchy music; the focal point of your piece. It’s the part you may play multiple times throughout the song, giving it its hook. When you have that idea in place, it becomes your centerpiece for the rest of your composition. It determines the speed, the sound, the stamina and the feeling you are trying to convey.

What Is Your Song’s Story?

Every song ever created tells a story. It may be about love, faith, determination, hope or recovery. Whatever your message, keep it in mind as you develop your composition. See it in you mind as you put phrases and direction together. It may also help to name your composition early to help you identify its overall goal.

Link Your Melody

When you listen to a song, the intro helps move you forward to the melody. If its too long, you’ll likely wind up losing listeners interest because of lack of connection. People hum melodies, not intros. So be careful to continually connect to your melody over and over again throughout your piece.

Repeat With Style

Once you have firmly established your melody in your listeners minds, embellish it and change it slightly to add interest. Add another lyric or change the way the notes are played. Make it recognizable as the melody, yet add to it to give it depth.

Build Something

What is the ultimate purpose of your song? Remember every song tells a story and you can hear that throughout the piece. Every story has a beginning, middle and end; likewise your music should accomplish the same things. Build throughout. Don’t let people get bored. Yes, it may only be 3 minutes, but in order to want to listen to it again, there has to be a point.

Structure Is Necessary

Every song has structure; sit down and write down how your favorites are written. You may see things like:

• Melody
• Chorus
• Melody
• Chorus
• Change Up
• Chorus
• Melody to end

Simple structures can help you develop your composition and make it easier to fill in missing pieces to your half developed songs.

Keep It Simple

Yes, in some cases you will find eight, even ten minute songs. But do they become popular? People like music that fulfills a need and moves on. Something catchy they can relate to quickly before moving in another direction. Especially if you are first starting to compose piano music, keep things simple. The more you learn, the more you’ll grow.