Songwriters who just have a natural gift for melody

we should all seriously be ashamed the first name we didnt mention is Burt Bacharach. his middle name is melody.

 

Sarah Mclachlan lush melodies
Harry Nilsson

 

Guess you did mention them...on this very forum....thereby making it non-myopic.
So you were wrong.

Howver, there are at least 40 pages of posts that mention Cole Porter and Oscar Hammerstein, so it really wasn’t myopic to begin with... so you were wrong there too.

Thanks for playing and trying to be condescending.

 

Mark Burgess

 

Andy Partridge

 

40 pages of how many in total? 610,000? I'm wondering how to make a good comparison (going by stats on the available page). Look, it's no secret that this forum is largely rock-centric. That's the only point I was trying to make. There are certainly many folks who dig on jazz, but they are certainly not in the majority here. Having read the thread, I didn't see a single jazz composer. Let's leave this as my point.

 

...then you obviously overlooked my tiny little microscopic post of one artist....

 

I hate to pile on but mingus and monk were mentioned on the first page as well

 

Many of the the usual suspects have already been identified. Along with a questionable choice or two (there's more to songcraft- especially melodically inventive songcraft- than isolating one simple sequence of notes and repeating it metronomically.)

My choice is Tom Petty.

As a tyro guitar player, I haven't found anyone more consistently able to spin original-sounding, fully fledged songs with memorable melodies and singable choruses out of absurdly simple transitions between the most basic chords on a guitar. Taken as a catalog, even Neil Young songs are more complicated.

Both of those guys write songs that are just silly simple. But they fit them together so well. I find songwriting achievements like those especially impressive because I can tell that it's going to take a while for me to get the hang of the changes for tunes like "Your Gold Teeth, Part II."

 

Pete Ham

 

Lennon & McCartney
Donovan
Benny and Bjorn from ABBA

 

There's many here I agree with. Paul McCartney has to be at the top of the list. When I hear some of his stuff I just have to smile at the utter beauty of it.

Also, the Bee Gees. Barry Gibb and his brothers could certainly knock out a tune.

Elton John and Bowie too.

 

Fabrizio De André
Philip Glass
Jason Isbell
Eileen Jewell
Meredith Monk
Lucinda Williams

 

Thomas Wright "Fats" Waller.
As James P Johnson said "Some people have music in them, but Fats was all music. And you know how big he was!"

 

3 pages in, and no mention of Paddy McAloon, Colin Moulding or Ben Folds!

 

McAloon definitely, not familiar enough with the works of Moulding or Folds to say.

Laura Nyro, unless I've missed a mention, is another notable absentee from these pages.

 

John Linnell

 

Ron Sexsmith (especially his latest album!)

 

Michael Dunford had this until Renaissance died - even the synthpop albums had decent melodies.

 

Robert Pollard
Dean Wells
Paul Weller
Lou Barlow

 

Damon Albarn(BLUR)
Ray Davies(The Kinks)
Smokey Robinson
Stevie Wonder
David Byrne
Joe Jackson
Robert Smith(The CURE)
Andy Partridge(XTC)-Would make the list just on the song 'Dear God' alone
Alex Kapranos(Franz Ferdinand)-Not sure if Paul Thomson also co-wrote some of those great melodies
James Dean Bradford(Manic Street Preachers-'Everything Must Go' is a great melodic album that followed the 'not so' melodic, but brilliant Rock Album, 'The Holy Bible', but future albums were more melodic driven)
Buckingham, C.McVie & Nicks(Fleetwood Mac)

I recently discovered Frankie Valli(spelling?) through his Interview with Dan Rather(AXS TV), and thought his Songs were very melodic.

 

Tom Petty
Ryan Adams

 

When thinking of Smokey Robinson, we shouldn’t forget Marv Tarplin, who composed the melodies of some memorable Smokey hits such as “TheTracks Of My Tears”. Also, Stevie Wonder composed or co-composed the melody of “Tears Of A Clown”. Smokey’s facility with lyrics was, however, all his own.

Regarding John Lennon, he composed so many of the Beatles’ earlier and memorable tracks. I sense that Paul McCartney took slightly longer to really find his composer mojo but from a melodic standpoint it was more enduring.

I was surprised that the Brothers Gibb didn’t get mentioned more quickly. Perhaps I’m impatient.

Honourable mention for Clive Westlake who wrote “I Close My Eyes And Count To Ten” by Dusty Springfield. So many melodies in a single song.

Nice to see Laura Nyro mentioned.

Lionel Bart.

Sam Smith. Some of his songs are sooo musical and melodic. “I’m Not The Only One” could have been written by Stevie Wonder at his peak.

 

Frankie Valli’s songs were mainly composed by Bob Gaudio. Frankie just sung them.

 

Freedy Johnston for sure