Hey guys... One of the things that will help ya'll understand the idea of playing in keys is to understand major scales and the chords that come naturally from them.
In past lessons, I had really tried hard to get you to understand the value of understanding and memorizing the Chromatic Scale. If you do understand this scale, you will:
1. Understand the formula for creating a major scale
2. Understand intervals such as the 3rd and the 5th
3. Understand the quality of intervals such as the major 3rd and the minor 3rd -- which is what chords are made of
4. Understand other stuff down the road such as how to transpose music
5. Be able to identify the notes on your guitar
6. Understand the idea of movable chord forms
All of this theory type stuff COMES FROM an understanding of the Chromatic Scale.
So do yourself a favor and... well... you know -- GET CRACKIN' ON IT!
Alright.. enough with the preachin'.
What I wanted to do today is to show you some VERY common chord progressions (A chord progression is the collection of chords that make up a song.)
Let's use the key of C as an example. See the picture of the key of C below.
C D E F G A B C
We have learned that the:
I (one) chord in any major key is ALWAYS major.
ii (two) chord in any major key is ALWAYS minor.
iii (three) chord in any major key is ALWAYS minor.
IV (four) chord in any major key is ALWAYS major.
V (five) chord in any major key is ALWAYS major.
vi (six) chord in any major key is ALWAYS minor.
That gives us for the key of C these here chords:
C Dm Em F G Am
Great! But how do we use 'em?
There are common, that is, VERY often used chord progressions using only these 6 chords. Here's some of them:
C F G F C -- The most common chord progression there is. Have you ever heard of songs like "Louie Louie", or "Wild Thing"? Well, there ya go...
C F C G C -- "Cherry Cherry", "What I Like About You"
Alright... So I'm dating myself here with my choice of songs. But I just wanted you to know that I wasn't joking about this. Here's more stuff:
C Am F G C
C Am Dm G C
C F C
C F C G C
C Am Em C
Think about ANY combination of these 6 chords that are possible -- It's been used. It's been done before. Many times.
Because of what I said above about the chords in any key, I could show you the progressions in this way:
I IV V IV I
I IV I V I
I vi IV V I
I vi ii V I
I IV I
I IV I V I
I vi ii I
These will work in any key.
Play these progressions. Get the sound of them in your head -- in a bunch of keys and styles.
Now... If you work on this, and spend the time learning your major scales, and understand which chords are major and which are minor, you will begin to learn the ability of "pulling" chords off of a recording.
That is a verrrrry cool skill to have.
Please understand that there may often be more chords in a song than those that are "natural" to a key. But ya gotta start somewhere, right?
Right. So get 'er done.
Professor Bruno Noteworthy
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Contributor's Note
Professor Bruno Noteworthy is a toon music professor who loves teaching the guitar to kids.
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