Hack Music Theory

How to Write
Peaceful Piano Music.

Free PDF Tutorial
includes multitrack MIDI file

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Intro.

I’m just old enough that I got in my Grade 1 to 12 school years before computers and the internet took over. If you’re a Gen X like me, and there wasn’t a computer in your school building either, then our schooling experience was pretty much the same as our grandfathers’ schooling experiences in their youth. How crazy is that?!

And the deeper you go back into the past, the longer those stretches of time are where nothing changed. Fast forward to today, and robots are making music and cars are driving themselves! It’s not surprising that there’s a tidal wave of nostalgia sweeping industrialised countries. People are desperate to find anything that can lessen the unpredictable nature of this relentlessly-changing modern world.

For most people, an unpredictable world causes anxiety. And the opposite is true too: A predictable world causes calm. It’s totally understandable that this desperate desire to find some predictability in our world has resulted in “Peaceful Piano” being one of the most popular playlists on Spotify. Every track on this playlist creates a predictable musical environment, which counterbalances all the change.

If you’ve been in the Hack Music Theory family for a while, you’ll probably be amused right now, as I’ve spent decades teaching people how to make music that’s not predictable haha! Well, my views on music have evolved over the decades, and I now see (and hear) the benefit of well-written predictable music. For the record though, I don’t mean the manufactured “content” that makes up most of the new releases every week, I’m talking about artistic music that’s predictable, like Mozart.

One of the most popular composers in the Peaceful Piano “genre”, who’s been paving the minimal path since the mid-90s, is the Italian pianist and composer Ludovico Einaudi. So, inspired by “Experience”, one of Einaudi’s most popular songs, here’s our 5-step method for writing peaceful piano music. But first… Tea!

Step 1. Arpeggio

Set up four bars of 4|4 on your piano track, with the grid on 1/8 notes and the tempo at 80 BPM. If 80 isn’t peaceful enough for you though, go slower. Creating a peaceful atmosphere is all about slowing down from the fast-pace of modern life.

Bob Marley famously said: “One good thing about music, when it hits you, you feel no pain.” That’s a great quote, and we love Bob, but we don’t want anything in our peaceful piano music to “hit” our listeners. And chords do exactly that, as the listeners hear all three (or more) notes together. Under regular listening circumstances, that’s a good thing, but not here. Our mission is to create a peaceful environment for listeners, and hitting them with three notes all at the same time is a lot of information and emotion to process, which is stimulating, not relaxing.

So, we’re going to be using arpeggios, which is just the fancy word for chords that are played one note at a time. Arpeggios allow us to convey the exact same emotion from the chord, but in slow motion. It’s like slowing down a fast-paced video on YouTube, you get the same thing, it’s just easier to digest and process.

There are numerous ways to play arpeggios. For example, you could simply play the 1, 3, 5 (e.g. C E G) in that order. That would work, but the notes are close together (i.e. close position), so that sounds more intense. Allowing space into the arpeggio by moving a note up an octave (i.e. open position) sounds more relaxed.

And that’s exactly what Einaudi does in the left-hand part of “Experience”: he plays the 1, then the 5, and then the 3 an octave higher. It’s a lovely voicing* for a triad, as the 3rd (the note that gives the chord its emotion) is the highest note, so it sings out above the others. That voicing would be a bit intense (for our purpose) if the notes were played together, but playing it as an arpeggio beautifully softens it.

*Voicing is the position of the notes in a chord. E.g. The voicing of a close position chord is 1, 3, 5. And to turn that into an open voicing, you could move the 3 an octave higher: 1, 5, 3 (8va). That 8va symbol is just the way of showing that the 3rd note is an octave higher.

Einaudi’s arpeggio voicing: 1, 5, ♭3 (8va)

We used the same open voicing for our arpeggio, except we play the ♭3 before the 5, so our arpeggio is 1, ♭3 (8va), 5. Playing the ♭3 right after the 1 brings the emotion into the chord sooner. There’s no right or wrong way, though, it’s up to you. You could even play the ♭3 or the 5 before the 1. That won’t have the same stability as playing the 1 first, but you could try it and see if you prefer that option.

Our arpeggio voicing: 1, ♭3 (8va), 5

By the way, our example is in the key of A minor, so that’s all the white from A to A. And like Einaudi, we’re also starting our progression on the root triad (in our example that’s A C E). Also, as this is the left-hand part, keep all the notes below C5, as you want to reserve the higher register for the right-hand melody (Step 4).

Step 2. Rhythm

Right, now that you’ve got your arpeggio voicing, it’s time to infuse it with rhythm, which will bring it to life. Remember, the intention with this peaceful piano music is to create predictable order for our listeners, so they can let go of their anxiety.

With that in mind, we want to use a soothingly hypnotic 1/8 note rhythm, which is going to rock back and forth between the notes in our arpeggio.

To do this, go through your MIDI notes and cut them, so you end up with a pulsing 1/8 note rhythm. Be sure to only play one note on each 1/8 note beat (never two together, as that will be too intense), and don’t skip any 1/8 note beats.

Arpeggio with pulsing 1/8 note rhythm

Now that you’ve breathed life into this chord, you probably noticed one glaringly obvious problem: it sounds like a robot trying to lull a baby to sleep! Yep, there’s no dynamics*, which makes a peaceful piano arpeggio actually sound pretty awful.

So, to infuse it with a human touch, change the velocity of each MIDI note. We recommend starting by turning all the velocities down, as you don’t want any of your notes played at full volume. Then, keep the root note a little louder than the others. The fifth should be the softest note, and the 3rd is somewhere in between.

Also, if you want to move some of the notes slightly off the grid to give it a more human feel, that’s great, but do that at the very end, after you’ve finished writing.

Einaudi is a pianist, so he plays his own compositions. As a result, there are beautiful changes in dynamics (and tempo, too) in his recordings and performances. So, if you can play, or if you have a friend who can play, you could also give them the MIDI notation afterwards and record a real human playing it :)

Arpeggio with dynamics

*Dynamics are changes in volume between notes (and sections) that performers use for expression.

Step 3. Progression

Alright, now we’re getting to the juicy bit: the chord progression. So, start by copying and pasting your root triad (Am) arpeggio into the remaining bars.

Am arpeggio copied and pasted (highlighted) into remaining bars

You’re going to choose three other triads from the key of A minor, though not the dissonant diminished triad. So here are your options: Cmaj, Dm, Em, Fmaj, Gmaj.

You can use whichever chords you like from that menu, and play them in whatever order you like. Simply move each arpeggio up or down to the root note you want. One small caveat, though. You copied and pasted a minor triad, so wherever you decide to play a major triad, you’ll need to move the ♭3 up one semitone to the 3.

Our progression is: Am, Fmaj, Gmaj, Em.

Chord progression: Am, Fmaj, Gmaj, Em

Step 4. Melody

Right, now it’s time to write your right-hand part :)

This is where we’re veering off a little from Einaudi, as his melody mainly consists of two notes. There’s a fine line between a melody that relaxes, and a melody that bores. Each producer is different, and each listener is different. For us personally, we need more than two notes in a melody to keep us listening, but there are 363 million listeners to Einaudi’s song (on Spotify alone) who disagree with us.

Regardless of that mind-blowingly BIG number, we still invite you to use more than two notes in your melody, otherwise there’s a real risk of your peaceful music becoming background music. But (and it’s a big but!), we have to be extremely sparing with the amount of notes we use, otherwise we’ll end up stimulating our listeners’ brains, and that’s the exact opposite of what we’re trying to achieve.

Now, you’re going to write a one-bar melody over the Am in your first bar. The rhythm of your melody is going to be four 1/4 notes, which means you only have a couple of options for how many melodic notes to use. You can either use four notes, like we’ve done. Or you can use three notes, and repeat one of those notes.

Einaudi’s melody mainly consists of the 5 and ♭6, which is beautiful, as those notes are one semitone apart, so they create a lovely tension and release. We started our melody on the ♭6 (F), then we resolve that tension down to the 5 (E). We then mirrored than tension and release with the ♭7 (G) resolving up to the 1 (A).*

Right-hand melody (highlighted) over root triad in first bar

Once you’re happy with your one-bar melody, and you feel that you’ve found the sweet spot by relaxing and not boring your listeners, then copy and paste that melody into your second and third bars. Einaudi repeats the exact same one-bar melody while the chords change below it. This technique is deeply soothing, as the melodic repetition lessons anxiety, while the freshness of new chords engages us.

*Need more melody help? Use the Melody Checklist in our Songwriting & Producing PDF.

Melody in first bar copied and pasted into second and third bars (highlighted)

Step 5. Variation

Lastly, it’s time to sprinkle in a few variations. Despite the freshness of new chords below our repeating one-bar melody, the listeners will still get bored if the melody doesn’t change somewhere. So, Einaudi creates a small variation in the fourth bar.

Once again, be extremely careful not to vary the melody too much. In our example, we’re right on that edge, as we changed the first two notes and also moved the third note (G) an octave higher, to create a climax for the overall four-bar melody. So, we only left the fourth note (A) in our main melody where it was previously. This is the maximum amount you’d want to vary your melody here.

We pulled off this amount of variation because the first two notes (C to B) mirror that beautiful one-semitone movement from F to E in our main melody.

Variation of melody in fourth bar (highlighted)

When you’re done with your fourth bar variation, copy and paste the whole four-bar loop. Then, somewhere in the second cycle (bars five to eight), cut a 1/4 note into an 1/8 note and two 1/16 notes. Then, move the 1/16 notes to create a little run. This will keep the listeners engaged through your second cycle. Also, for a more complete ending, change the last note (or two) of your melody in bar eight.

Variations in fifth and eighth bars (highlighted) of the second cycle

Make Music You LOVE.

I know you want to be a confident producer who finishes songs, and loves the results. In order to become a confident producer, though, you need decades of knowledge and experience. To gain that knowledge, you need a good teacher. To gain that experience, you need decades of practice. That’s overwhelming!

I understand that searching for a good teacher is frustrating. Most courses are taught by YouTubers who are not qualified in music, and are not qualified teachers either. The few who are qualified in both, have no industry experience. I feel your pain. Truly. Most of my music teachers were bad. That’s why I studied music and education in order to become a lecturer, and why I created Hack Music Theory.

Also, over my 30+ years of composing, I developed a unique method called Song-Whispering, which I’ve used to make music with multiplatinum Grammy winners. In my one-of-a-kind online apprenticeship, you’ll learn my method and turbocharge your music with my decades of knowledge and experience.

Enroll Now and stop wasting years of your life learning from bad teachers and trying to get better through trial-and-error. Transform into the confident producer you would be in 10+ years now, and start loving your music!

Ray Harmony
Multi award-winning college lecturer, teaching since 1995

“Song-Whispering may be the single greatest concept ever!”
–Glynne Owen (Japan)

“I followed their YouTube for a while before taking their course. I wish I'd taken it sooner!”
–Sagar Saluja (India)

“I wrote the first song in my life that I actually like!”
–Anastasia Lucas (USA)

Free PDF Tutorial

Lastly, are you new to music theory? Or are you experienced, but you want a refresher? Then download our FREE BOOK (link opens in new tab). It only takes 30 minutes to read, then you’ll have a solid theory foundation that you can instantly apply to your songwriting and producing. Enjoy!

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