1
Actually, the dominant 7 comes in the harmonic series
before the major key's 7, 6 is minor until
you get to the 27th interval, and the 4 is more than half
way to a tritone. Neither the major (Ionian), nor any other of the
western modes correspond. Our western scales evolved to allow
inversions. The 4 inverts the 5, and the
major 6 of the scale is the major 3 of the
4 (see the Wikipedia
article for more information than you really care about). But is not
like some medieval theory guy sat around and dreamed this up—it
just happened that way. Other cultures, notably East Asian and Middle
Eastern, evolved differently, although there are commonalities, and the
major sixth (oddly) is one of them.
2
Because I will be using 'leading tone' in two different (although
related) ways, I will distinguish by using capitalization for the Leading
Tone (as described in the text for this note), and lower case for
leading tones in the generic sense.
3
Marketa Irglova & Glen Hansard's "Falling slowly" goes
back and forth through the verse section; "Shout," by the Isley
Brothers stays there through the whole song.
4
If you slip the 4 up a half step to an augmented
4 (making the chord a major
2) you turn the chord into what is called a
'secondary dominant,' but more on that later.
On this page we will start looking at how you decide what chord comes
next. Most of the time, when you are composing, you don't really think
about this, but sometimes you get stuck. How do you get yourself
unstuck? There are some basic principles to chord movement, and we are
now going to look at them, but the most important principle, is to go
with what sounds right to you.
Standard chord movement
The first 'rule' is stay in key. This partly rooted in the overtone
series. The standard major scale is generally based on the
overtones,1 so chords based on notes in the scale sound less
surprising. This is also supported by the fact that your tune is
probably in scale, so if your chords stay there, you have less chance of
running into a conflict.
But the caveat to the 'first rule' is that for hundreds of years,
composers have been making use of going outside the key, in various
ways, to keep the music interesting. You see somewhat less of this in
popular music, largely because the 'three minute song' rule doesn't
leave much time, or need, for interest-keeping development. But you
still get it, and we will be looking at how to do that effectively later
on.
The second thing you want look for is a leading tone. Officially, the
Leading Tone2 is the major seventh in the scale and is
strongest in the 5 or 7°
chords in a major key (it is also present in the
3). Secondary leading tones are present in any
chord, though. It's just that they don't all lead back to the tonic. The
best ones are on the third of the chord, so major
1 likes to go to major 4
because its third is the 3, a half step from
4. 1→4 is a common
mid-song progression, partly because of this relationship.3 But
you can make others work, and they don't have to be half steps.
2m, for example, likes to go to
5 because its third is the
4, even though it is a full step.4
When I was first studying music theory, we were told to prefer "upwards
in seconds, downward in thirds, and up or down in fourth or fifths." You
may have noticed that if you use the third as leading tone, it will
always take you up a fourth. If the 1 of the
chord is leading tone, it takes you up a second, and if the
5, it takes you down a third. This 'rule'
certainly works, but on the other hand, it has become a commonplace. In
fact, pop music is quite fond of downward seconds, especially
1 to ♭7 and
5 to 4. Up in thirds is
not uncommon either.
Common progressions
I will again refer you to Wikipedia for more
information on chord progressions than you really want.
The most common chord progressions, particularly in pop music, have
traditionally been, at least mostly, major. But pop has tended to go
minor in recent decades, as I mentioned earlier, although this
ultimately does not change the rule. This recent shift could simply come
from boredom with the old standard sounds, but it could also be that
minor keys fit better with the increasingly popular teen angst.
There are, however, a few progressions that get (re)used frequently
enough to deserve note. The first is famous backbone of the blues: 12
bar. In its base form it looks like this:
Basic 12-bar form [From Alan Humm & Shawn Foerst, "65 miles a gallon"]
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
Twelve bars in all, subdivided into 4 bar chunks. Jonny B. Goode by
Chuck Berry (1958) is a perfect example. Early on the pattern acquired a
couple of variations in the fourth 4-bar chunk: 1 bar each of
5→4→1→5. The addition of the
4 gives some interest, and the
5 at the end after the one is, of course, an
authentic cadence (see below). In popular parlance, largely because it
takes us back to do it a gain, this is called a "turn-around."
Basic 12-bar form, with alternate ending [From Alan Humm & Shawn Foerst, "65 miles a gallon"]
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
Another popular variation is to add a 4 to the
first 4-bar group like this: 1 (1 bar)
4 (1 bar) 1 (2 bars).
Beyond these standard variations, each writer may doctor up the basic
progression in countless ways, and still leave it recognizable. Mark
Turner has put together a collection of basic 12-bar songs on YouTube, if you want to check
it out.
1-6m-4-5 progression
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
There were a couple of progressions that were popular to the point of
nausea in the late 1950s & early 1960s. The first is most recognizable
and best remembered is (Jerry Lieber, Mike Stoller, &) Ben E. King's "Stand by me."
The same progression is famously recognizable in the verse section of
"Unchained
Melody" by Alex North and Hy Zaret (1955). It looks like this:
1→6m→4→5.
1-4-5-4 progression
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
Another popular progression simply went 1→4→5→4.
It is unambiguously used in Chip Taylor's (1965) "Wild Thing"
popularized by the Troggs. But by far the most famous version (with an
only slight variation—5m), is the
Kingsmen's of Richard Berry's (1955) "Louie Louie."
1-5-4-5 progression (from a stock Pro-Tools loop)
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
Or you may recognize its inversion: 1→5→4→5
Whole songs based on any of these progressions are rare now-a-days, but
in case you were thinking that they are all worn out, and nobody uses
them any more, give a listen to "Complicated" by Avril
Lavigne ("Stand by me" in the verse, and "Wild thing" in the refrain).
Pachelbel's Canon (exerpt)
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
More recently, to the amusement of many a YouTuber, is the frequent
reappearance of the first four chords from Johann Pachelbel's (1653-1706)
"Canon [and Gigue] for 3 violins and basso continuo." One of the most
popular send-ups of this progression is by Rob Paravonian. The
progression runs 1→5→6m→3m→4→1→4→
5. It's humorous value not withstanding
this is probably one of ny least favorite classical pieces. However, it
is almost redeemed by
this rendition.
1-5-6m-4
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
A slight variation on the first four chords give us 1→5→6m→4,
which Axis of
Awesome, finds great pleasure in mocking for its apparent ubiquity.
1m-7-6
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
In the '70s especially, it seemed that 90% of the heavy rock songs had
the natural minor-key progression 1m→7→6
in the song (in "Stairway to heaven" it
comes in about 5.53 in this recording).
I think, at least partly, because it was easy to play cool-sounding lead
parts over.
Thinking in Music lists the ten most popular
progressions—ones to avoid if you want to be original, or that you
will need to use if you want to write a hit song (from the
point of view of Axis of Awesome). The truth is, though, that with only
seven chords to choose from within a key, you are not likely to discover
an entirely new progression, and the choices will be even more limited
if you want it to be 'catchy.' Good writers often go outside of this
seven chord constraint (I promised we would talk about how), but even
then you are under some limitation by virtue of the fact that you are
using the notes within the 12-tone equal tempered scale, and still more
if you also want it to sound good.
Nuts & Bolts
Cadence
7
Don't believe me? Give it a try, but remember I am talking about the
7°, not either of the diminished sevenths. If
you try it with the 7, you
will have an uncomfortable dissonance; if you use the
7, you will get a 9 chord,
which, oddly, is not as strong a 'leading chord' as the dominant
7.
8
Technically, there are more variations. For example, in order to have a
'perfect' authentic cadence, you have to go from
5 to 1, both chords have
to be in root position, and the highest note of the
1 has to be the tonic. On the other hand, if you
move from 7° to 1, it is
an 'imperfect' authentic cadence, and if you end with the third of the
root in the bass, it is an 'evaded' cadence. Unlike what I said about the
scales, these names were made up by theorists with too much time on
their hands, not composers.
In musical terms, a cadence is how you end a phrase. It can refer only
to the last two chords in a phrase, or include one or two more that set
them up. The strongest cadences involve our old friend the
Leading Tone. Since most pieces want to finally resolve on the tonic,
the chord right before it (the penultimate, for you ambulatory
lexicons) sets it up most effectively if it contains the Leading Tone in
chord positions 1 or 3. This means either the 5
chord or the 7°. Better yet, the
57 (which coincidentally is what you
get if you combine the 5 and the
7° !7). This is called an authentic
cadence.8 You can hear both the 7°
and the 5 versions of this cadence in The Chiffons' "One fine
day." In each of the following examples, the first four chords are
simply establishing the key, and the cadence is represented by the last
two.
Simple 5-1 cadence
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
57-1 cadence
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
Ninty-five percent of popular songs used to end this way, and 4 of the
remaining 5% faded out. The same is true for traditional and classical
pieces (except for the fade-out part). While that is still mostly true
in Country music, non-traditional endings are becoming so common as to
be the new 'normal.' Still, there are a couple of other options in
traditional music popular enough to deserve names. Further, not all
cadences, after all, occur at the end of a piece—many simply tie
up a phrase within the piece.
The most popular secondary cadence is the half cadence. This is
where you end on the 5 rather than the
1. This is almost always a mid-piece phrase
ending. The first phrase in "Ode to Joy" that we saw in the section on
melody uses this sort of cadence.
Beethoven's 9th: Ode to Joy, first phrase
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
For what it's worth, the next phrase is authentic
(G(5)→C(1)).
I am not going to bore you with the theory-makers' multiple
sub-varieties of half cadences.
Plagal Cadence
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
The third type of cadence you will sometimes hear at the end of a piece.
It is officially known as a plagal cadence, although folks
often call it the "amen cadence," because that is where you most
commonly hear it: at the end of a church hymn. It consists of the
4 chord resolving to the
1. Of course, if it is simply a phrase ending,
rather than a conclusion, it doesn't sound at all strange, as the third
phrase in "Oh My Darling, Clementine" illustrates.
"Oh my darling, Clementine" [3rd phrase] by Percy Montrose or Barker Bradford (1884)
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
Plagal half cadence
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
Not surprisingly, you can also have a plagal half cadence,
which you will hear quite frequently in popular tunes. As with the
relation of the half to the authentic cadences, the plagal half simply
reverses the order: 1→4. This would be
unusual for a conclusion, but is quite common with phrases within a
piece.
Deceptive cadence
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
The deceptive cadence, sometimes called an 'interrupted'
cadence, resolves to the 6 rather than the
1. Assuming this is in a major key, that
6 would be 6m,
although as we will see, these cadences work in minor keys as well, with
some caveats. This gets its name from the fact that a normal authentic
cadence is set up, leading the listener to expect a return to the tonic,
but then the composer slides to the 6
unexpectedly. It not a particularly satisfying way to end a song, so the
composer almost always follows it with a new cadence that takes us to
the expected resolution. It is used surprisingly infrequently in pop.
The best example I could find in the closing lines of The Beatles' "Octopus's
Garden."
9
Actually, it goes to the deceptive cadence twice before resolving on the
tonic.
10
Not everyone agrees on the limits of what is and is not a
deceptive/interrupted cadence. The 5→1
replaced by 5→6, both in root position (no
inversions), is recognized by all, but other possible alternative
resolutions (e.g. 5→♭6(), or inversions) are considered deceptive by some and
not others. Some claim that 5→4
qualifies (in which the Leading Tone resolves to the 5 of the
4 chord), although others call that a
'retroversion.' Whether it is 'deceptive' or not may depend on the
context. It certainly has to be a phrase terminator, but if the chords
leading up to it do not lead the hearer to expect a authentic cadence,
then no one is being 'deceived,' and nothing is being 'interrupted.'
11
Confused yet? This paragraph reminds me of a Piet Hein poem ("If you
know what I mean") that ends, "I'll gladly explain what it means 'till
you don't understand it." If you want to study these chord and note
leadings (perhaps at the piano) to figure it out, fine, but the main
point is that cadences are about unstable notes in chords resolving to
stable ones.
Beatles' "Octapus' Garden," deceptive and authentic cadences
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
The song is in the key of E, and as we come up on the end we
expect to resolve there. But instead the song goes to a
C♯m (the 6m), then
it does it again this time ending on the more gratifying E.9
More recently you can hear this sort of cadence in the refrain in Jump's
"Mexico."10
The strongest cadences are driven by Leading Tone resolution. The
authentic, obviously resolves the L.T. to the 1 in
the tonic; if you are working with a dominant seven chord, this
resolution is strengthened when 4 (7 of the
5 chord) resolves downward to the 3
of the tonic. The deceptive also resolves the L.T. to the
1, but that 1 is located in the 3 of
the 6 chord. For the same reason, you will
sometimes hear a phrase cadence of 5 to
4 ('retroversion,' mentioned in the last note)
in which the L.T. resolves to the 1 located in the
5 of the 4 chord. This cadence does
not have an official name that I know of, although it could be called a
retroverted cadence without ambiguity, I suppose. 11
Retroverted cadence
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
Cadences are organized by their last two chords, but the total cadence
can include others designed to set it up. The 2
chord is often used to set up the a 5, for
example. There are lots of variations.
Minor keys
As alluded to above, minor keys work basically the same way; you just
have to be aware of the chords that naturally occur in the scale. Of
course, there are three different minor scales. If the composer goes
with the natural minor, she will loose the strong leading tone, but that
may be what she wants. Melodic and harmonic minor work fine. The
6 is major on the deceptive cadence, but
functions much the same way as it does with major keys. The only issue
is with cadences that use the 4, if the composer
is using the melodic minor. This gives her two options—major
4 and minor 4. More
frequently, folks go with the minor, but you will recall that George
Harrison uses a major 4 throughout "My Sweet Lord."
Harmonic Minor authentic cadence
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
Harmonic Minor deceptive cadence
If the audio button is screwed up, try the MIDI
Going out of key
Secondary dominants
The most basic way to step out of key temporarily is to use what are
called secondary dominants. You remember that the dominant is
the 5 chord of the key (and the dominant seventh
is the 57). You can strengthen the
movement to any chord by playing what would be the dominant if you were
in the target chord's key. So, for example, if you are setting up a
perfect cadence (meaning you need to move to the
5 chord), you already know that the
2 chord is a good stepping-stone, but if you
play it as a major chord, the movement toward the dominant becomes even
stronger. It sounds a little brighter, but more importantly, it now
functions as the dominant chord of this key's dominant chord. Let's give
it a try. Listen as I play two phrases. The first is all in key (using
the minor 2), the second inserts a secondary
dominant as the third chord (changing the 2 to
major). Notice the difference.
13
Some theorists consider the presence of the dominant seven essential for
it to be considered a secondary dominant. I disagree, but I wouldn't
make a federal case out of it.
The two phrases differ by only one note (f♮ to
f♯), but the movement is so much stronger. You can can
make it even more striking by playing a D7 instead of just a
D.13
It is the presence of the leading tone in the dominant that makes the
resolution to its tonic work. This is just as true of secondary dominant
as of primary ones. You remember that the diminished chords have the
same leading tone in their 1 (rather than their 3), so it should not be too surprising that you can make secondaries out
of diminished chords as well. In fact in the next section (Modulation) we will see that
they can be most flexible in this regard. In this example, only the
27 has been changed into a ♯47 (i.e. 7° of 5 rather than a 5 of 5).
Another commonly used secondary dominant is 1→4. If you are in a major key, the 1 is
already major, so this is just an in-key chord change. In order to make
it a secondary dominant, you have to force that 1 out of key by adding the dominant seventh (the in-key seventh is a
major seventh). This is what that sounds like:
Of course, if you are in a minor key, you don't have this problem,
although the dominant 7 always gives more
"oomph" to the secondary dominant (if that is what you want).
These are the most frequently used secondary dominants, but it can be
used to get to any in-key chord. This progression (also in C)
moves to a B7 (adding two accidentals: d♯ &
f♯) which is the dominant of E and
Em. The latter is in-key for C.
You can do this moving to any of the in-key chords, and likewise for
minor keys, but as with the C7→F example, when the
first chord is already major, an out-of-key dominant seventh would have
to be added to qualify as a secondary dominant. The only chord that has
an in-key dominant seventh is the 5 (hence the
name), which, obviously enough, cannot be secondary.
Always another way
14
Although parallel minor is the most common, other modes are possible,
obviously. We will discuss modes more at length on the next page (modulation).
15
In any given scale (other than Locrian), there are five possible
secondary dominants. The 5 cannot be one,
because it is not secondary. The ♯4 (in
major keys=♯6 in minor) cannot be because
the 7° (=3°) is not
stable enough for a 5→1 resolution. In the
Locrian mode, technically you have six because the excluded diminished
is the tonic, so there is no actual dominant. As for modals, for any
given diatonic scale (in any of the modes), six of the 24 possible
major/minor chords are not available within the seven parallel modes
(which includes the current one), and five of the 12 possible
diminisheds are similarly not available. It is worth noting that I did
not include the altered minors (harmonic and melodic), which you could
make a case for including. It would give you a two new standard
chords—a major and a minor, and add four enharmonically equivalent
(so maybe only one) augmented chord(s).
16
I am calling secondaries and modals 'foreign.' 'Alien,' in this context,
is simply my own term to distinguish certain chords that cannot be
analyzed as locals, secondary dominants or.modals. This is sort of like
insurance-speak where 'foreign' refers to another state and 'alien' to
another country.
17
"My Sharona" is in G (1 sharp). The B♭ is
a major chord built on the minor third. We could interpret it as a mode
shift into the parallel Aolean (minor) or Dorian, but we are seriously
stretching credulity here.
18
The part of a song or other music piece, that sticks most effectively in
the mind of the listener. In songs, this is usually in the refrain,
although not always.
19
By '1-4-5' I mean a song that only uses those
chords, not necessarily one where they occur in that order.
By the way, you don't have to be going somewhere for one of these chords
to be considered a secondary dominant. An unresolved secondary is called
"non-functional," but it is still a secondary dominant, and it may still
be the chord you want.
Secondaries in general are merely tools to get where you want with a
little added pizzazz. But sometimes you just want to go somewhere
because it sounds nice, or because you want to wake up your complacent
listener. We saw earlier in Creep how you can use modal shift to do just that.14 The
ever popular ♭7 in rock is best understood as a modal
shift most of the time. In fact, many of these foreign chords can be
analyzed as either secondary dominants of some variety15 or as
short-term (often one chord) modal shifts (see next page on modulation). Other
foreign chords (F♯, for example if you are coming from
the key of C), are simply alien.16 But if you like
the way a foreign (or alien) chord sounds in your piece, you don't need
to come up with some theoretical explanation (let the web theorists do
that for you)—just do it. I'm pretty sure The Knack didn't work
out the theoretical basis of the out-of-key B♭ in "My Sharona" before
recording it.17
Many rock bands (Metallica comes to mind) made whole careers out of
avoiding in-key chords.
Most of the time, if you are just going to jump to something, you will
want to match the chord with the melody. If you are playing in
C major, for example, and your melody goes to an
a, your out-of-key chord still wants to have that
a in it somewhere. The in-key chords with a in
them are going to be Am, F, and Dm. The
out-of-key chords will be A (major), F♯m,
and D (major). If none of these are quite what you are
looking for, you may be hearing your note as one of the extended chord
notes. Maybe you wanted a B7 where the a falls on
the seven. You can still sing the a and just play an ordinary
B—the listener will hear the B7 with the
seven coming from your voice. Possibilities abound. Don't limit
yourself.
First thoughts on song-writing
If you are writing music, there are two primary approaches. One is to
come up with a melody first, usually just out of your head, and then
work out the chords at an instrument, on paper, or for more advanced composers,
again out of your head. You may play with different chord combinations,
as mentioned in the previous page, to control the ultimate 'feel' of the
tune. The other approach is to start with a chord progression, and then
add a melody. As before, this might be out of your head. Many writers,
particularly in pop music, just play the chords and sing an improvised
melody to go with it. Of course, you can also construct a melody once
you understand how chords work with melodies, and know some of the
melodic tricks that we discussed in the section on melody.
You might be thinking, "OK, so which is best?" The first answer is
whichever works for you. As a generality, I find that when melodies are
composed first they are slightly more interesting than when constructed
or improvised around a chord progression. Of course, it seems an obvious
point that the reverse is true—creating a progression first will often,
almost always, result in more interesting chords, but this not a
rule or anything.
Personally, I have taken both approaches, but I find that the pieces I
feel best about were constructed by using both methods in parallel. For
a pop song, for example, the "hook,"18 assuming that it is
sung, is a good place to have started with a melody. The verse part (or
any non-hook portion), on the other hand, often works well when it is
derived from a chords-first approach. Sometimes, in the process of
adding chords to a melody, you will 'discover' a chord movement that you
really like. It is usually possible, but not always necessary, to modify
the melody slightly at that point to accommodate. Obviously, it can work
the same way if you are going in the other direction.
Also, don't be tied to your first idea. You may get a nice tune with
1-4-5,19 but could well find it is an
ever better tune with mixed chords. You don't need to change the tune to
get there, as we saw with "Don't
worry, be happy" earlier. The same principle holds if you like the
chord progression. I had one song that I sang a harmony part for and
figured out that I liked the harmony better, so that became the new
tune.
Movin' on up (to the next page)
Next we will look at longer journeys into foreign keys/chords: Modulation.