Tag Archives: progression

The Minor Fourth Chord

Posted on March 30, 2016 by songtive

Today we’re gonna learn about a curious chord progression that you all can identify in a wide number of popular songs. We are talking about the use of a minor fourth degree (IVm) that adds a melancholic feeling to the phrases’ endings – which we already discussed with the name of cadences.

There are many examples in the music literature using this little cadential chord progression, let’s take a look:

The Beatles – Blackbird
Green Day – Wake Me Up When September Ends
Queen – Bohemian Rhapsody
Doris Day – Dream a Little Dream of Me
Santo & Johnny – Sleepwalk

As you can see there are plenty of songs and different musical genres on the list using this small but effective chord progression!

Building a IVm Progression

This progression is made out of 2 chords: a IV chord from a major key that will be turned into a minor chord flattening its third (one fret lower/one key lower) and the I chord from the same major key. This process of altering the original IV chord is also called “borrowing”, because they do not belong to that major key’s original triads – which we discussed in a previous article. However, it can be expanded in multiple ways as we will see. Let’s check it out in detail:

Identify the IV chord of a major key: You get one major key to practice and identify the IV chord (a major one) and break it into chord tones.
Flat the Third: Once you got the chord tones forming the IV chord, it’s time to turn it into a minor chord by lowering the third down one half-step. If you have a C major chord (C – E – G) and you low its third down one half step it will become C – Eb –G, therefore turning it into a minor chord.
Close the Progression: The next step is to bring the chord progression to an end by placing the I chord – but not limited to – right after the IVm chord; this will give us a conclusion feeling – which is what makes it work.

Three easy steps to make it sound and put into use right now! Let’s take it for a test drive:

“Sleepwalk” by Santo & Johnny

We are going to explore the possibilities of our just-learned chord progression by break it popular hit ‘Sleepwalk’ into its chord progression and analyze how the IVm chord is working in there!
Let’s take a listen:

Even when it is a mostly solo performance on a lap steel guitar, we can hear an underlying chord progression played by rhythm guitar on the background:

At 0:19 we can hear that melancholic and sweet feeling the Fm chord gives to the whole progression. Let’s get into details according to the process we learned:

Identify the IV chord of a major key: Since the song starts and finish with a C major chord, we can positively assume it is written in the C major key. We identify the IV chord – that being F major – and break it into its chord tones: F – A – C.
Flat the Third: Since we already know how the IV chord in C major key is formed, we flat its third to turn it into a minor chord: F – Ab – C.
Close the Progression: Even when we discussed that the I chord is next in line, that principle can be expanded with the purpose of enlarging the chord progression. After the IVm chord (F minor) follows a V7 chord (G7) that will act as a leading chord to C major, since it contains the leading tone of the C major key – a B note.

Going Beyond

When it comes to learning chord progressions and harmonic principles, which is what we’re doing, the most convenient way to understand them is to explore diverse keys. This will give you a different view and a mastery of all keys, which will make you a resourceful composer!

Use our Songtive app to explore all the possibilities! Let’s transpose the ‘Sleepwalk’ progression and try it around another major keys. Remember to use the Songtive Transpose feature for easy transposition:

In D major key:

In F major key:

You can check out our most popular app Piano Companion which helps you to better understand chords and scales.

A Melody that Fits into a Chord Progression

Posted on March 20, 2016 by songtive

This time we are reviewing one of the most interesting topics regarding music theory that you can use right now: how to make a melody that fits into the chord progression. One of the things that puzzled me when I was new to composing is how can I deliberately know – not by ear only – which notes are “right” or “wrong” when it comes to guitar solos, piano solos, melodies for my voice and such stuff. I just went to play any scale formula I knew over the chord progression and hoped it to run alright…which not always did, obviously!

A Trip Down to Memory Lane

Remember when we talked about the chord tones for every scale? For each scale, you can build a chord over each note via overlapping thirds in it. Let’s take a look at it in C major:

G       A       B       C     D     E        F        G
E       F       G       A     B     C        D        E
C       D       E       F     G     A        B        C 
I      IIm     IIIm     IV    V    VIm     VIIdim     I

Also each note (and chord) will be called tonal degree in order to know their position among the given scale.

Once you know what notes belong to what chords, it will be easier to determine which notes are appropriate to put in, see where I am going here?

The Chord-Melody Theory

The Chord-Melody Theory is a musical resource that relies on the chord tones to make a choice when it comes to what notes are “right”! The process is quite simple, and I’m sure you will find it helpful:

Make sure you got the chord progression right and break it down into chord tones
“Right” notes for a melody will be those that are also a chord tone
“Wrong” notes for a melody will be those that are not a chord tone, creating an effect called dissonance
Passing tones are “wrong” notes placed beside a chord tone, thus bypassing the dissonance they create!

This way, we can realize how fairly easy is to create a melody or guitar solo if you master your chords and chord tones, so make it a no-brainer for yourself taking a time to practice and learn the chords of every major and minor key and the chord tones they are made of!

Let’s Practice!

Have a good listen to Kansas’ famous classic Dust in the Wind, which is also in C major, for our lesson:

Now let’s take the chord progression for the first line of the verse – 0:20 to 0:30 – and analyze it through the Chord-Melody Theory:

1.- Get the chord progression

2.- Let’s break it down into chord tones:

C major: C – E – G
G major: G – B – D
A minor: A – C – E

Songtive helps you to do that by highlighting chord notes in the Melody editor as shown below:

Moment’s gone: D and E notes for the melody. D does not belong to A minor chord tones, but E note does! And since D is placed besides, it will be considered as a passing tone…making it sounds good!

How can I use it?

Well, it is time to get to the Songtive app and use our lesson!

Enter the Songtive.com and start a new song (or for better sound quality use our iPhone/iPad/Android app)
At the Song preferences tab select a key – I’m using C major for discussion purpose – select a time signature and sidescroll the metronome for setting the beat.
In the line below just input any C major progression you like
Go the Melody icon and start to select your notes for each chord!
Keep in mind the Chord-Melody Theory when choosing your melody notes
Experiment all around it so you can come up with a new song!

chords melody music-theory progression songtive

The Cadences

Posted on March 15, 2016 by songtive

This time we will talk about cadences, one of the most useful harmonic procedures available to every composer or songwriter out there! Every musical hit you know uses it, every song you like it also makes use of it, which makes it very convenient to learn.

Classical music, rock music, R & B music…you name it: they will use cadencial procedures to make effective chord progressions. Check out these songs

(1:02 to 1:03)

… and

(0:53 to 0:54)

That conclusive effect you can listen in such timeless classics, that seems to create a “landing” feeling, is what we call cadence.

What’s a Cadence?

Long time ago, in the 1600s approximately, with the appearance of tonal music – major mode and minor mode – harmonic resources known at the time were refined into the single concept of consonance we already reviewed, and chords as we know them were conceived – major, minor, augmented and diminished triads.

Every major, augmented or diminished chord has a property, a single note that will make it tend naturally to other chords. That single note is what we call leading tone, and when you move that leading tone to a chord that has the note it leads to, you create that conclusive effect – in music theory you call this resolution, a release of the tension created from this leading tone movement. This leading tone can be found in the VII degree of each major or minor scale moving to the root of said key/chord, for example: B would be leading tone to C major/minor, F# would be leading tone to G major/minor, and so on.

How can I do it?

Let’s take Bohemian Rhapsody as our example. When you hear the line “nothing really matters to me” you hear a F7 chord playing behind, and when Freddie reassures it repeating “…to me” you hear an F chord and then a Bb major chord. Let’s take it to our chord chart, and for discussion purposes we are repeating the progression over and over:

Analyzing this simple 3 chord fragment, we get some valuable information:

From F to A#/Bb – when the conclusion effect arrives – there’s an Ascending Perfect Fourth interval
F chord contains a A note, which is leading tone to A#/Bb
When F moves to A#/Bb, the leading tone (A) moves to the root of the chord (A#/Bb)

And this is how the cadence is achieved!

Let’s practice in another key! We are taking D major/minor as an example:

Move from V or V7 to I to perform a cadence!

How can I use it?

Every time you want to end a musical or text line, a cadence will be the most ideal resource to do this. Why? Because of its conclusive effect it will create a clear distinction between phrases and moods, therefore creating symmetry and balance throughout the whole song!

The perfect way to do this

So follow these simple steps!

Enter the Songtive.com and start a new song (or for better sound quality use our iPhone/iPad/Android app)
At the Song preferences tab select a key – select a time signature and sidescroll the metronome for setting the beat
In the line below just input the Cadential Pattern like V – I or V7 – I and press the ‘+’ button at the right
That’s it! You just created a Cadential Pattern to conclude your musical thoughts!
Now combine it with common-tone chords adding a Cadential Progression at the end to create a musical phrase, for example: I – IV – V – V7 – I

cadences chords music-theory progression songtive