Gusta Music Open the studio
Learning path, lesson 5 of 8

A melody hook

A hook is short, it stays in the key, and it comes home at the end. Four notes are enough to start one.

Try it in the studio Opens a new song with lessons 1 to 4 already done, so you start right here. Free, no account.

The lesson, step by step

In the studio each step is one sentence in a strip over the real controls. Its check lights when your song does what the step says; Show me opens the tool and points at the control.

  1. Add a track for the melody: + Add track, then Pluck.
  2. Play or write a short melody on it: four notes or more, one at a time.
  3. Keep every note in A minor: the shaded rows in the editor are outside it.
  4. End the phrase on A, the home note of A minor.

In key, then home

A minor uses A B C D E F G, no sharps or flats. The note editor shades the rows outside the key, so any unshaded row is safe. In Jam the strings are laid out in the key already, so nothing you play there can be wrong, and Rec keeps it as notes.

Ending on A, the tonic, makes the phrase sound finished. End on E and it hangs, asking for more, which is useful later; for a first hook, come home.

What the studio checks

The melody is the track that is not the chords part and not the bass, playing one note at a time (notes struck together read as a chord). It needs at least four notes, all of them in the key's scale, and its last note has to be the key's home note.

F# in bar 1 is outside A minor. Move it to a row that is not shaded.

It ends on E now, which leaves the phrase hanging. Move the last note to A.

Questions

I cannot play an instrument. Can I still write a melody?

Yes: open Jam, where every column is in key, and play with a mouse or a finger. Or double-click notes into the editor one at a time.

Does a sung melody count?

The check reads notes, so play or write the melody as notes. A sung take can go on its own track next to it.

Do I need the AI to finish the lesson?

No. Every lesson is done by hand, with a check that reads your song. Gusta, the studio's AI, can make an example you can study, keep or undo, but that is optional and it uses tokens; the lessons themselves are free.

The whole path

Eight lessons of about ten minutes, each building part of the same song, ending with a finished file.

Next lesson: A verse and a chorus.

  1. A beat
  2. Hats and groove
  3. Chords from the key
  4. A bass that follows the chords
  5. A melody hook
  6. A verse and a chorus
  7. A clear mix
  8. Out the door

Learn it in the real studio

Gusta Music is a free browser studio: a timeline, a note editor, a mixer and an AI copilot that edits your song with you instead of generating one for you. The lessons run on top of it, and the song you make is yours.

Start lesson 5