Principle #4 - More melodies minimal chords

The synthesizer player and the pianists plays 10 notes each. The guitarist strums power chords over all the 6 strings. The acoustic guitarist also strums 6-notes. The bassist plays two notes in octave. The total notes these 5 musicians played is 10 + 10 + 6 + 6 + 2 = a staggering 34 notes !

It is impossible to have all these 34 notes playing in sync.

When we learned to play the piano or guitar, the pieces we play are meant for the piano/guitar to play in solo without the backing of other instruments. Thus, lots of these pieces are written complete with bass , rhythm and melody parts.

However, when we play in a band, we have to reduce the number of notes each musician plays. For example, a pianist does not need to play the bass part as the bassist has taken over that part. Nor does the pianist plays the rhythm as the rhythm guitarist is already strumming it. So all the pianist has to do is to play some fills or melodies.

Thus, musicians must try to play single or at most double note melodies rather than full chords.

It is easy to play chords but it is difficult to create melodies.