6 Ways to Harmonize a Melody on the Piano

Have you ever gotten bored with playing the most simple melodies on your piano or keyboard?  A single note melody may be the easiest way to play a song, but if you wish to harmonize a melody and sound like a pro, here are 6 ways to do it.

Harmonizing a melody on the piano consists of adding tones underneath the melody notes that enrich a song or piece of music.  Individually these notes can also be defined as “voices”.  Several of these voices are combined to create harmony. 

The simplest way to harmonize a melody is to play the melody notes in your right hand while playing chords in your left hand.  But this simple way to harmonize a melody sounds quite thin.  It’s also limiting in your left hand because the voices can’t be spread out to create a rich arrangement of harmony.  The solution to this limitation is to harmonize the melody in the right hand while freeing up your left hand to play chord tones and or rhythms.

We’re going to take a look at 6 ways to harmonize a melody that will give your music a rich and professional sound.  I’ll discuss using intervals in the right hand to create the harmonies.  As you may know an interval is the distance between two notes.

3rds

The first way to harmonize a melody is with 3rds.  A 3rd is two tones that are a distance of three scale tones apart inclusively.  They can be Major or minor 3rds.  They’re played harmonically which means they’re played at the same time instead of melodically which means playing them separately.   

On the piano, a Major 3rd is two tones with three keys in between them.  A minor 3rd is two tones with two keys in between them. 

The easiest way to recognize and understand 3rds is to think of them in the context of Major and minor triads.  This is without the 5th of the triad of course. Let’s say you want to harmonize a melody with every note of the key of C Major. Each note in the key will have a 3rd underneath it.  They’ll be a combination of Major and minor 3rds.3rds have a slightly open parallel sound that complement the melody.  Since 3rds aren’t spread very far apart,  the left hand chord tones can be closer to the right hand than larger intervals.

6ths

A 6th is two tones that are separated by six scale tones inclusively.  They can be Major or minor 6ths. 

On the piano, a Major 6th is two tones with eight keys in between them.  A minor 6th is two tones with seven keys in between them.The easiest way to recognize and understand 6ths is to think of them in the context of a Major 6th chord with only the root and 6th for the Major 6th.  For the minor 6th, you would of course lower the Major 6th tone a half step.Using our example of harmonizing the notes of C Major,  Each note in the key will have a 6th underneath it.  They’ll be a combination of Major and minor 6ths.6ths have a more open parallel sound that complement the melody.  They’re spread farther apart than 3rds so they can encroach on your left hand if it’s too close to your right.

3rds and 6ths are the go to intervals for musicians to harmonize melodies at the piano.  But they’re not the only tones that are available to you.  There are other options to harmonize a melody.  So let’s move on.

4ths

A 4th is two tones separated by four scale tones inclusively.  Most of the time they will be perfect fourths.  They can also be augmented 4ths.

On the piano, a perfect 4th is two tones with 4 four keys in between them.  An augmented 4th is two tones with five keys in between them. The easiest way to recognize and understand 4ths is to think of them in the context of a Sus4 triad with only the root and 4th tones. This is without the 5th of the triad of course. Using our example of harmonizing the notes of C Major,  Each note in the key will have a 4th underneath it.  They’ll be mostly perfect 4ths with an augmented 4th included. (augmented meaning the 4th is raised up a half step)4ths have an oriental sound to them.  They don’t have a wide span of distance and are only slightly wider than 3rd intervals.

5ths

A 5th is two tones separated by five scale tones inclusively.  Most of the time they will be perfect fifths.  They can also be diminished 5ths.

On the piano, a perfect 5th is two tones with six keys in between them.  A diminished 5th is two tones with 5 keys in between them.The easiest way to recognize and understand 5ths is to think of them in the context of a Major triad with only the root and 5th tones. This is without the 3rd of the triad of course.  The diminished 5th is found by lowering the 5th a half step.Using our example of harmonizing the notes of C Major,  Each note in the key will have a 5th underneath it.  They’ll be mostly perfect 5ths with an diminished 5th included.5ths have a very open sound to them.  Perfect 5ths are also known as power chords.  This is an interval that’s become  popular with guitar players.  They’re slightly wider than 4ths.

Triads

A triad is a three note chord.  They can be Major or minor.  The key to using triads to harmonize a melody is to place the melody note on top of the other tones beneath them.  This is accomplished by utilizing chord inversions.  Inversions are simply rearranging the tones of the triad in a different order to accommodate the melody note.  

Every triad has three possibilities to harmonize the melody.  Root position, 1st inversion and 2nd inversion.  (remember the melody note is always on top)Every note in a key of music can be harmonized with only three different triads that are referred to as the primary chords in a key of music.Using triads to harmonize a melody gives it a very full sound.