Chord progs for songwriting.

Ok, I want to start writing songs. I want to write songs that basically use 4 chords for the verses. I have two questions...

1. How do I change from a 4 chord progression for the verse to another 2/3/4 chord progression for the chorus. I need to know how to pick two progression that will fit together, or will all progressions fit?

2. Is there a site/page that lists ten or twenty or even all possible chord progressions. Well at least simple 3 or 4 chord progressions. And if it lists chord progressions that it "fits" with as well.

The first song I want to write is a really sad song, so I want to fit it to a 4-chord progression in a minor key, that switches to a 2-3 chord progression riff for the chorus. I need to understand the theory behind it, but a list of heaps of progressions for songwriting or something similar would be great!

There's not much of a theory to get the idea of chord progression down. First you need to understand the structure of the major and minor keys, and what chords are made in those keys. I'll take the minor key first, since your interested in a sad song.

Well the minor key is made up of 7 notes, and each of those notes is a chord based on the key. I'm going to use the key of A minor and show you the chord structure within it.

Here's the A minor key chord structure:

Aminor - A C E
Bdiminished - B D F
Cmajor - C E G
Dminor - D F A
Eminor - E G B
Fmajor - F A C
Gmajor - G B D

Some common 4 chord progressions would be:
Cmaj - Eminor - Bdiminished - Aminor
Aminor - Eminor - Fmajor - Dminor
Eminor - Bdiminished - Cmajor - Aminor
Aminor- Fmajor - Gmajor - Cmajor
...and so on.

2 nice 3 chord progressions would be:
Dminor - Eminor - Aminor
Eminor - Bdiminished - Aminor

It really depends on how you want the music to flow. Here's some good points to follow, when you start a song always start on either the root (in this case A minor) or the 5th chord which is Eminor. Then flow through the chords to make your song. But always end on the root chord, which is A minor in this case. There are other exceptions, but I see your a beginner so work with this for now. As you begin to understand more about it, try different things.

For your questions:

The first question, I would say go with the flow of the music. You will know what chords to go to next, by thinking that chord sounds cool or that doesn't. Now changing from verse to chorus is just like making the chords in the verse. Say you use the Aminor - Eminor - Fmajor - Dminor chord progression for your verse. Play it however many times then you can go into the 3 note chord progression of Eminor - Bdiminished - Aminor. Now you have a chorus. An idea if you want to get back to the verse, you notice both end of A minor. If your playing the chord progression for the chorus say 4 times, the 4th time just play this Eminor - Bdiminished. Then go back into the verse starting with A minor.

Good bridge chords to start with in the case of A minor would be Fmaj, C major, or Eminor. That's just my opinion, try whatever you feel sounds good.

You can go to any chord within the scale your playing in, you will know where to go next. This structure will get help you understand how it all works.

For the second question, I don't know any sites where they illustrate chord progressions. I gave you some before, those are the most common I think, but mostly for Rock. I don't know what your into, if it's Funk I have no clue. But I'm sure if you go through what I said, you should see how to make your own chord progressions rather easily.

Also, if your looking for a sadder song based on chord progression. Try using alot of minor chords.

Playing this rather slow, Eminor- Bdiminished - A minor. I think you'll like this one, it's pretty sad.

Nice keys to write sad songs are D minor, G minor, and B minor. Or any other minor key. So try those.

Well I hope that helps you out man. Latr

Thanks heaps. I've posted this at a couple of boards and you the first to actually understand what I mean and give a useable reply. You rock!

What I think of as a sad song, for example, is Joy Division's - Love Will Tear Us Apart. How do I get that sort of effect?

Thanx man. :) Glad to help. About "love will tear us apart", hears what I can tell you. The song is pretty much based on that one single melody, which is in E minor. A good thing is that it's a very simple melody. Here it is broken down:

(copy and paste this to notebook so you can see it)
Em7 A5 Bm A
D:------------------------------------------------------------|
A:--7--7-7--7--7-9--10-9--7-5--2--2-2-2-2-2-5-0--0-0-0-0-0-5--|
E:------------------------------------------------------------|

Ok, now I'll break it down and explain how it is understood.
The first chord, the Em7 which is the root chord of the E minor key. The "7" that is added is an extension to E minor chord "E G and B". The "7" just added "D" to the chord. This is very common, and you will always find it somewhere. The "D" in this case is only there becasue the bass and strings are both playing D. The melody just plays along with the root of the chord.

The next chord in the progression would be A5, which is there because of the string part and bass holding the "D". The melody just continues in the key of E minor. The A5 chord is just harmonizing the melody, so there's no need to change the key of the melody.

The Bm chord is there because of the bass still ringing out D and the strings playing a D along with the B in the melody. The 5th of B is left out, but for the obvious reason of making it sad. Just the minor 3rd of B accomplishes this.

The last chord which is the A is there because the only note that is played is the A. Bass and strings are both playing A, and the only exception is the D just before beginning the melody again. The D is actually a suspension of the A, which wants to go back to the E again. Its there to make the jump from A to E again more smooth, especially in the melody. This can be a very useful tool when you write little melodies. The idea is playing the note before to get to the next note, like this case playing the D to get to the E.

The Big Points that make this melody particular sad sounding is one, the fact that is moves down in pitch. It only moves up to strenghten the E(with the little melodic passage), then is goes down and down again. Another thing with that, is that the progression of the notes in that melodic passage are small, only 1 or 2 notes up or down. Also, the fact that it is kinda slow makes a big impact on the feeling of the melody. Slower tempos make more emotional music, especially sad stuff. Last, and something that I addressed in the previous post, it's in the Minor Key and the chord progression is made up of ALL MINOR CHORDS. Em7 - A5(which is minor) - Bm - A(which is minor too).

Also, in the build-up in the beginning. Here is the chord that is being played. It is also the chord played throughout the song.

E:-----
B:-----
G:--0--
D:--2--
A:--2--
E:-----

If you are planning on writting a song like this one, the best advice I can give you is learn how to play such songs. This will help you alot in understanding how such songs are played and written. Plus the more you learn, the more ideas you will have. I think I covered everything on how to play it. Also, learn the minor scales, even harmonic and melodic, to increase your range of writting these emotion type of tunes. Good Luck!

Wow! That's really detailed and helpful. I just have two more questions...

1) If I also want to write solos, intros, melodies, lyrical lines, etc. to go with the chords I'm using, how do I work out what notes/scales to use?
For example: Say I'm using the Aminor - Eminor - Fmajor - Dminor chord progression for the verse, then go into the Eminor - Bdiminished - Aminor progression for the chorus. I want to add a basic melody for the 2nd guitar to play over the chords. So how do I write a melody that can be play continously during the verses that will fit with the chords?
Also, say for the bridge I want to do a solo? I do I do this? Is there a particular scale.
I understand this is very involved, but is there a way to explain it simply? I know a couple of scales (major and blues), but don't know how to integrate this with rhythym guitar...

2) I've noticed that some rythym and/or lead guitar uses "chords" that have only two notes in them. For example, here is the tabs I have for the main riff of the Joy Division song "Love Will Tear Us Apart"...

MAIN RIFF
e]-------------------------------------
B]-------------------------------------
G]-9------11---12---11---9---7-4---4-2--
D]--7-------9----9----9----7---5-2---2-0--
A]-------------------------------------
E]-------------------------------------

What type of "chords" (if they are chords) are these? What chords progs/scales/theory do I need to know to get these. I like the sound of this because it's not as heavy and busy as chords, but lusher sounding then just single notes.
Here is another example, the intro to "Iron Man" by Black Sabbath:

INTRO
-------------------------------------------------------- (e)
-------------------------------------------------------- (b)
-------------------------------------------------------- (g)
-4----7---7/9----12/11---12/11---12/7----7/9------ (d)
-2----5---5/7----10/9----10/9----10/5----5/7------- (a)
-------------------------------------------------------- (e)

The Main Riff's use the same sort of two note melody. It seems that these are just power chords without the octave note? How do I work out progressions for power chords and the type of "chords" like those in the Joy Division and Black Sabbath song?



Thanks very much in advance! This is really helpful.

[Edited by Funkman on 02-04-2003 at 06:24 PM]

First question:

There are actually quite a few ways to look at it. And if your going to be a songwritter, you should experiment with different things and find what works for you. Music theory is only theory (not fact), so it doesn't give you a definitive answer to writting the perfect song. Always remember this when you learn different music principles, they are a guidance not an answer. Used strictly and incorrectly, they can hinder you and you don't want that. What I'm saying is keep an open mind and try different things using your ear as a guidance, then use music theory to understand what you want and how to accomplish it.

Ok, when harmonizing over a chord progression. There are 2 ways to look at it, you can use one scale over the entire chord progression. The other is you can use a different scale over each individual chord.

I'll explain the first one, which is more common and easier to use. When you use this method, the first thing to do is find out what key the chord progression is in. The one you wrote is in the key of A minor. I explained in the first post how to identify, if you need more info, let me know. Anyways, since the chord progression is in the key of A minor, you can harmonize the entire chord progression with the A minor scale. This is a good idea when your writting just a simple catchy melody, that you want to base the whole song on. An example is the Joy Division song you liked. Also, the singing part uses this method alot.

The second method, which is using different scales over different chords, is used more with solos and non-melodic leads. Especially soloists and big players like Vai, Malmsteen and guys along that line. It's also more advanced when it comes to understanding them and how to use them. Here's the idea on how it works. Taking the chord progression Eminor - Bdiminished - Aminor, and playing the following scales over them.

A minor scale: A, B, C, D, E, F, G

Watch how it changes:

Using a E harmonic minor scale over the E minor chord, the notes would be: E, F#, G, A, B, C, D.

You notice how the E harmonic minor has the F sharpened (F#), when the A minor scale has it just as F. This is done to harmonize just that particular chord and not the over-all chord progression. So as you go though the chord progression and change the scales used, you will get different effects over different chords. Each effect will be different, depending on which scale you choose to use.

Choosing the right scale, goes back to understanding what notes make up a certain chord. Take the E minor again, the notes are E, G, and B. So any scale with the root "E" and those notes (E G B) in them, will work over that chord. Believe me there are ALOT, here are some for example. E minor, E melodic minor, E Hungarian minor, E minor pentatonic, just to name a few. So when it comes to choosing which to use, you must first understand how these scales sound, and what kind of effect your going to get when you use them. Here's an idea, the E melodic minor is going to give you a melodic effect, and the E Hungarian minor is going to give you more of an exotic effect. If you are interesting in this path, start learning these scales and practicing them with chords. I'll tell you this, the more scales you know, the more riffs, melodies you can come up with. Definitely a benefit. :)

The second question:

When only 2 notes are involved harmonically (chord-fashion), they are called intervals. Three or more notes is called a chord. Identifying and naming them is quite easy, it's just like counting with letters. The first chord in your example starts with a A and the second note is E. So A would be 1, B would be 2, C would be 3, D would be 4, and E would be 5. So that particular interval would be A5. A "5" interval is a major or minor chord with the 3rd left out; the octave is optional. It's the most common of the intervals, especially on distorted guitar. The exception is with the 3rd chord "9/12", which is by chordal theory an Augmented chord which is written as "A#5". The "#5" is actually the "b6" in the A minor scale, so it's not usually written as a "#5". "Iron Man" consists of all "5" chords.

The theory behind intervals is pretty much the same as chords. This whole music understand of chordal structure and key signature is a solid fact in music theory. The change which is slight in the case of interval chords is when you might play a chord progression like Eminor - Bdiminished - Aminor. It would just become E5 - B5 - A5. If you know how a diminished chord is constructed, you would know that the 5th interval is actually flat, but a "B5" is not a chord. So most of the time, that science is altered. Here's a tab to show you:

progression using the chordal system
E:-----------
B:-----------
G:-----------
D:--9--3--2--
A:--7--2--0--
E:-----------

same when using "5" or "power chords"
E:-----------
B:-----------
G:-----------
D:--9--4--2--
A:--7--2--0--
E:-----------

So when using power chords as your chord progression instead of major and minor chords. The chords are all "5" chords and the roots are based on the key your using. Here's an example of every "5" chord in the key of A minor.

D:--2-4-5-7-9-10-12--
A:--0-2-3-5-7-8--10--

Hope this helps. Latr.

Again, thanks heaps for the information. You are really good at explaining this stuff. I'll let you know how I go with this song.

Oh yeah, one other thing...

When writing bass lines, how do I fit these in with particular chords progressions? Or can I just play any rythym and it will fit? Like drums...



And I understand the principle of leaving your mind open, the songs I've written so far are pretty much just what sounds good. I just think that understanding some theory can only help.

[Edited by Funkman on 02-05-2003 at 12:11 AM]

I'm glad you understand that cause there are some who get into that trap once they learn some theory. Especially those who know alot cause sooner or later some ideas contradict previous ones. Plus and more serious, they become more dependant on the theory rather than the ear.

Ok when it comes to bass lines, there are a few things they use when playing over a chord progression. Most bass lines follow the root, so if the chord progression is E minor- B diminished- A minor. The bass will play E - B - A. This is what is found in most modern music.

There is another way, which is used to achieve a more smoother bass line or a way to play other than the root note. This would be the use of inversions. An inversion is which note in a chord is in the bass, so take the E minor chord. Which has the notes E, G, and B. Now if you don't want the bass to play E, it can play either G or B. When this is used, it's called inversion. Playing G over the guitar E minor is a second inversion, and B is the third inversion. So on if you have more complex chords. This is noticed when you hear the bass sort of break away from the guitar. Say this is the chord progression E minor- B diminished- A minor. The bass may play this instead E - D - C. The root is played over the first chord and the second inversion is played over both B diminished and A minor.

Also, when it comes to fifth chords, the 3rd interval can be put back in for the bass if needed. You must first understand what note that would be depending on whether that chord is major, minor, or diminished in the key. Lets take that chord progression again and make it all fifth chords, E5 - B5 - A5. Now say you wanted to play the 2nd inversion on the B5 in the key of A minor. You know by the chord structure the role the B plays is B diminished. Here are the notes B, D, and F. So the bass would play D.

Now when the bass is the moving part in the music, in for instance Jazz. The bass will follow the idea of playing a different scale over each chord. Here's how this is done, say the guitar is playing a E minor chord. The bass may play his bass line in the E minor pentatonic scale. As you can see this is just a role reversal. Instead of the guitar soloing over the E minor chord, the bass is.

That's pretty much how bass lines are constructed. Pretty simple, the difference is with a good bass player is he/she will use all three throughout a song. A good example would be playing along with the root, then slowly moving away using inversion, then finish with a melodical fill. So it's good to understand all three and incorporate them into the music.

Most solo musicians strictly use the first method, with just the root. This is ok, but it leaves the bass with no individuality to it. This is also better if your in a band, and you want the bassist to come up with his own part. Anyways, thats about it and hope it helps you out. I wish you the best of luck with your song, and I'm glad to help you out. :) Latr

[Edited by noticingthemistake on 02-05-2003 at 09:16 AM]