Harmonies

[Nalencer]

This is the closest forum I could find to put this in, but it's not completely relevant to songwriting.

My question is about harmonies. How do you learn to sing harmonies correctly? Do you need training, or what? How do you learn the notes? But ear?

 

[sweetpeee]

Every chord you play is harmony.Vocal harmonies are just voices singing notes of a chord or notes of a scale.That's the short answer, but it's accurate.

J.P.

 

[Monkey Allen]

Here's a bit of a hack way to do it if you play guitar. Say you're playing an A bar chord and then the tune goes to a D bar chord, your melody (the main line of the vocal) might start on the fourth string (counting up from the high e string) of that bar chord. If you want to add a bit of a harmony, you can start the second voice/ the harmony voice singing the line on the 3rd string as held by that opening A bar chord.

 

[reverieman]

easy way out

The easiest way to learn harmonies is to understand theory.. Major chords have a Major third on bottom a minor Third on top.. Minor chords have a minor third on bottom major third on top... start there.. example if you are singing a C over an Am then the harmony will be a Major third up, or a minor thrid down.... same goes for any chord. You dont have to stop with thirds and fifths, but I would suggest you start there.

 

[Dags]

Every chord you play is harmony.Vocal harmonies are just voices singing notes of a chord or notes of a scale.That's the short answer, but it's accurate.

J.P.

Very true! If you are looking for a harmony line, play the chord and pick out the third or fifth as a start.
You'll need to noodle around a bit to find out what notes work with the main melody, and sometimes you'll find an unexpected jump to another note works best. Your ears will tell you when something sounds wrong.
Eventually you'll be able to 'hear' where the harmony line goes and just sing it effortlessly

Have fun working it out, Nalencer
Dags