Piano vs. Guitar

It seems to me that piano players utilize more interesting chord progressions than guitarists, but guitar players are better than piano players at making simple chord progressions sound cool. Why is that?

I play both piano and guitar, and knowing one instrument helps the other immensely, and vice versa. I find myself a much more versatile player since I picked up piano a couple years ago - anything I can play on one instrument, I try to apply that idea to the other instrument.

It seems also that all guitar players seem to be worried about it speed and scales and soloing. Cmon everyone, take up your axe and work with chords! How many of you could pick up a chart from the RealBook, play through the progression, and make it sound good? There is more to progressions than 1-4-5.

And so that I'm not just ranting, let me post a couple cool chordal ideas.

When playing any major progression, you can borrow a couple chords out of the minor key to spice up your sound. Say you're playing C, Am, F, G, on and on and on. For a quick little bridge, or an ending, you can use the Ab and Bb from C Minor to lead up to the C Major chord. So...
C, Am, F, G, C, Am, F, G, Ab, Ab, Bb, Bb could be a 12 bar form.

Utilize "5 of's" (which I believe are called secondary dominants. For example, when playing I, vi, IV, V progression (C, Am, F, G from the last example), you can use any chords dominant as a leading chord. So, instead of this C, Am, F, G, you can have C, E, Am, F, G (the C and E chords are a half measure, all others a measure). Or use another to lead to the F chord, and C chord. C, E, Am, C7, F, G (every chord a half measure except the F and G). Notice the tension you're getting (G# from the E, Bb from the C7). You can use a 2-5-1 for the ending. C, E, Am, C7, F, Dm, G, C. Now that you have that Dm, you can use it's 5 for even more tension. C, E, Am, C7, F, A, Dm, G, C. Extend those chords! Cmaj7, E7, Am7, C7, Fadd9, A7, Dm7, G7. Now THAT'S a nice sounding progression, that evolved from a simple 1-6-4-5. Then, on the second time through the progression you stick the F and G in the same measure and put Ab and Bb in the last measure.

So (this list without extensions), you went from
I, vi, IV, V, I, vi, IV, V
to
I, III, vi, I, IV, VI, ii, V, I, II, vi, I, IV, V, bVI, bVII

See how much more harmonically interesting that is? That's what a piano player would do. A guitarist would wank over the 1-6-4-5... Let's be musicians instead of guitarists. Feel free to comment, add your ideas, correct me somewhere that I'm wrong (I know I f*cked something up during this long post) or b!tch at me for saying something good about pianists.

P.S. - Note the first paragraph - I think guitarists can make progressions sound better - I can play a simple F#m7, Dmaj7, Bmadd9 on guitar and make some kickass porno music that piano players can't touch!

Cool. There are some guitarists that use more complex chords. Alot of Jazz and Blues players will utilize 11th, dominant b9, and 13th chords. I think it has alot to do with the sound you have, a piano is purely acoustical so complex chord structures sound good. Play a dominant 13th chord on a heavy distorted guitar and (frankly) it sounds like crap. If you play the same chord on a acoustic or a clean guitar, it doesn't sound as discordant. You can get a nice sound with some chords on a lightly driven guitar (bluesy and maybe alittle heavier). A cool trick though to get some more complex chords to sound decent on a heavy distorted guitar is to ommit a note from the chord. Like the power-chord, you ommit the 3rd. Apply the same rule and ommit the 5th from more complex chords like dominant 7th's, and such. So a A dominant 7th would be 5x56xx. Makes a much better sound, because the 5th is just there to enhance the root basically.

Try taking out the 5th in major and minor chords like 7th, 6th, and 9th's. And take out the 3rd in diminished and augmented chords, if needed. It will make a less acceptable chord more acceptable.

i always like van halen for his backing riffs or progressions(i think) rather than his solo...he was one of the few who was good a rythm guitar..not saying there arnt other..i just dont know of many

Yeah eddie was a decent rhythm player. Two others who are good rhythm players are Izzy Stradlin (my fav) and James Hetfield. I don't particularly like where metallica has been going in the last 10 years but I still think he's a good rhythm player.

To add to Dirt's post on adding the bVI and bVII. Another chord that is good to add to your mix is the bIII. It's considered more bluesy but works great in Hard rock progressions. One in particular is "Hey Joe", which I believe is I-bIII-IV-bVI-bVII.

I like the topic dirt, despite the lack of posts, there is much room for discussion of this topic. Well, from a classical sense, the piano is far superior in chord structures. For a long span of time certain aspects of music were unthinkable, and in ancient Greece, almost unethical. During the time of Bach and other composers, parallel octaves and parallel 5ths (a movement from one chord to another chord in which the octave or the 5th were in the same voice that they were in the previous chord) would sound to them like a series of half steps would sound to us. Many things that are acceptable in modern music were cacophonous to them. And it goes without saying that music is much different now than it was then. And chord knowledge is pivotal to any versatile guitarist. But noticingthemistake makes an excellent point on omitting certain voices from the chord structure. Understanding the way that the chord blends with each tone, then choosing to add or omit notes that give the desired sound is a great tool to have.

To digress from my rant. I aree with you mistake, Metallica's direction has been disappointing. But Hetfield is a great rythm player in terms of strumming 16ths and triplets for a 7 minute metal song. That's more rhythmic endurance than I have. Metallica isn't much for unique chords, but the music is great. Jon Frusciante of the Red Hot Chili Peppers is probably my idol of rhythm guitar. He plays amazing parts, and I have never been more impressed with any rock guitarist ever in terms of chord utilization. You could find some jazz players who would probably swallow him whole, but to play rock with his style is simply astounding.

Oh by the way...Noticingthemistake: I love that quote from Reservoir Dogs, Quentin Tarrantino is the man :)

Originally posted by noticingthemistake
Yeah eddie was a decent rhythm player. Two others who are good rhythm players are Izzy Stradlin (my fav)

My fave too :)

I love his solo stuff, have all the albums. Have you heard any of his solo albums?

Eddie is a great Rythm player, so Was Hendrix and Rhandy Rhoads....the one thing all these guys had in comin with there rythm playing is the use of triad shapes vrs. bar chords and their ability to add notes on to the chord shapes, particularly 11th's and 9th's, creating melodic interest w/the progessions instead of concentrating on root movement (leave that to the bass player).
The one thing piano players have over guitar players (most) is that they use voice leading in their progressions, most guitar players don't take voice leading into question and instead just move block chord voicings around the neck of the guitar in patterns, can become very uninteresting to the ear after awhile.
BTW, Hey Joe is 1, 5, 5/5, 5/5/5, 5/5/5/5....or it is easier to think of as a cycle of 5th's progression (C,G,D,A,E).

Yeah that movie rocked, Mr. Pinky had a awesome character too. I would have put one of his quotes but they were a little vulgar, especially when he explains “like a virgin”. That’s great.

Naw, I didn’t realize he released anything solo after GnR. I’ll have to check that out. I have all the GnR stuff too plus some rare bootlegs. After the 70’s guitar rock days I think he was one of the best at that style of playing rhythm.

I find if the bass plays the root movement too much, the song lacks contrast. To a guitarist this is good idea and since this is a guitar site, I’m only going to say one thing. As a guitar player you shouldn’t rely on the bass playing just the root too much, and then write chord progressions that need the bass to play the root so that the progression sounds natural. The progression should sound good just on the guitar, and if that’s true the bass can be openly more expressive. Inversions on the bass can add contrast to continuing progression. C, G, D, A, E can sound good for awhile on the bass, but adding this a little contrast C, B, A, C, B on bass while the guitar continues the progression as before will provoke new interest in the movement.

On Hey Joe your right. That’s the main movement but I am pretty sure it mixes up to become E, G, A, C, D in one part. The book I took it from says so (I think I'm gonna stop quoting things from another people or books), I wrote this example to explain and illustrate the use of the bIII chord. The progression above is I, bIII, IV, bVI, bVII. And C, G, D, A, E is bVI, bIII, bVII, IV, I. Again yeah it’s easier to look at it as a cycle fifth, but it also shows the use of bIII, bVI, bVII chords which is what TheDirt was going into.

Hey Joe is one continuios progression that never changes..C G D A E.
I agree, bass players should not be root huggers, I would never hire or work with a bass that played like that (unfortunately many do) and vice versa, guitar players should utulize voice leading and not limit themselves to open str. voicings and bar chords. Triad shapes are actually much easier to play and sound so much better, but unfortunately it requires knowing the notes to all of the strings up and down the fretboard, a task that seems to seperate the mice from the men.

That's it. I'm not quoting anymore, I feel like I can only trust myself now. haha Sometimes it aint even safe to do that. Yeah you definitly don't want less creativeness with knowledge on either. Chord knowledge is a powerful tool for any musician. I've been experimenting with bV chords and minor v chords lately, quite an eye opener and a bit challenging.

Dominant7b5 chords are hard to make sound good, even in minor progressions (at least to my ears). Given a choice I will usually alter the 5th by sharping it instead, a much hipper sound (my opinion).
They do work nice in chromatic progressions though with proper voice leading, here's the bridge to Superstition by Stevie Wonder;
|B7.C7.|B7.Bb7b5.|A7...|E7#9...||

Yeah, my ears tell me the same thing. The V chord always wants to be major (dominant), even in a minor key. I hardly ever use the minor v chord in a minor song. I found that V as minor works well if it's going to the IV chord next, and it's ok coming from IV too. i.e. C - Gm - F - C, or G - C - Dm - C - G. A little misleading because the sense of modulating but it's easy to come back to the original key. Of course those are major key progressions. As for minor key songs, V as a minor is still rare for me. Probably just my rock influences saying a minor V is too weak. hah.

Dominant7b5 chords are definitely not hip, more bluesy as it says in writing (b5). Even found in some Be-bop and jazz. Actually a V7b5 to Imin is a nice cadence, a major is fine too but carries less drama. I personally like the fall back to a minor tonic, especially for blues. If you were writting from a major or minor standpoint, this chord is still rough on the ears. It is more modal in context of use. If you were writting from the dominant chord or Mixolydian mode or even better the Lydian Dominant (4th mode of melodic minor, where it occurs naturally [in some sense, enharmonically]). This chord is a nice resolve to end or return turn the minor or major key. But yeah like you said, it's a tricky chord. Even to explain..hehe

Yeah, the example using the bV is very common, another way is to come from the IV to V. i.e. IV-bV-V7. In this case I would probably alter the 5th by sharpening it rather than flattening it. Just for the sense of ascension. A newer innovative way is to come from I instead of IV so the progression would be I-bV-V7. Misleading? yes. Troubling? yes, but a quick resolve by only playing the bV for a beat is a smooth move. Quite different from a lot of music produced already.

[Edited by noticingthemistake on 08-25-2003 at 03:30 PM]

I usually hear v minor as being in a modal context, and usually when I come across it it's a progression like 1 4 5 w/ each chord being 2 measures, for instance like Santana's "Black Magic Woman"
|D-...|....|A-...|....|D-...|....|G-...|....|D-...|A-...|
D-...|.///||

Hmm.. Yeah I guess if you look at it that way, v happens to fall minor a lot. I look at modal roman numeral progression as still being in the context of a major or minor key. So if I write something in a Dorian mode, the modal center is still IImin instead of Imin. I guess it’s cause I was taught that modal songs are not diatonic, and “I” makes me think tonic. I’m sure you understand. It may seem confusing to many, but it’s actually very simple to work with especially in a major/minor dominated world.

As for the progression, yeah that is a very common one (extremely common). Even though, I would still be compelled to make the A a dominant chord. A string of minor chords contained in the 1, 4, 5 block to me is almost “lifeless” or “monotony”. A7 just seems to liven it up, but not take away from the minor tonality. Since the dominant chord is a bluesy sounding chord anyways. Of course there are times when you want to leave it be as Santana did, but it seems this one takes more consideration. A good point though.

I figured out one that is not too bad in the key of A minor. Am - Em - G7 - D Changing the Em to an E7 actually doesn’t need to be if I’m going to G dominant afterwards. It definitely sounds better to leave it an E minor chord instead. Also the D major chord at the end is a nice twist on things.

145 minor sounds modal to me because there is nothing within the progression that gravitates towards the tonic.

Here's an interesting one, the Beatles used this progression in the song She's Leaving Home, which is in major, but at first utilizes a minor 5 chord

3/4 E..|B-..|F#-..|A..|C#-..|...|F#7..|B7..etc

Originally posted by chris mood
145 minor sounds modal to me because there is nothing within the progression that gravitates towards the tonic.

I think it can go either way. No other scale has the pull towards a tonic like the major scale, not even the minor scale. All other scales are sort of ambiguous when it comes to relating to the tonic, the major scale has the most natural sound when relating to the tonic and when it goes there it sounds perfect. When you ask a question if this progression is minor sounding or modal? I think it all depends on the melody that is played over these chords. If the melody is focused around the root's minor pentatonic notes, it will definitely sound minor. Not one note in the min pent with this chord progression is near much tension. But another way to look at it is Phyrgian (minor BTW), 1 and 4 as minor chords occur naturally in a phyrgian scale, and naturally 5 is phrygain anyways or you can think of it cycling up a 5th, either way is correct. If your thinking in terms of Santana song, it's definitely gonna be phyrgain just because it's the mode mostly used in spanish music. Change the 5 to a dominant and use the spanish phyrgian scale.

Here's an interesting one, the Beatles used this progression in the song She's Leaving Home, which is in major, but at first utilizes a minor 5 chord

3/4 E..|B-..|F#-..|A..|C#-..|...|F#7..|B7..etc

Good one. Very cool cause I've tried moving from Vm to IIm without convincing myself, but then again I haven't yet came to the thought of trying a substitute of the IV chord before reaching that chord. F#- being the sub for A major, or relative minor. Sweet! :)

I think you misinterpretted the progression, the key is E major (although the chords are not posted for the entire song, if they were there would be no mistake, the chords I did post are quite ambiguios to either E or A major). so therefor the progression is Maj1 (E) to minor v (B-) to minor 2 (F#-)to maj.4 (A) to minor 6 (C#-) to dominant 2 (F7, or 5 of the 5) to dom. 5 (B7)...then the song goes back in forth between the minor 2 and dom.5, the chorus is almost entirely based off the Emaj chord.

I'm not sure if your familiar with jazz notation, but chords that have a - after them indicate minor, therefore B- is Bminor, B is major.

Naw I got it dewd. I knew it was E major for one the Bmin (since were talking about V as minor), and because you would be starting on the root (Emaj) and ending it with the V (B7). I wouldn’t say A major cause the first chord E major would have to be E7 instead, at least to hint at it. It was getting late last night when I posted that so I didn’t really explain what I was saying. The chord progression goes from Emaj - Bmin - F#min - Amaj, so it’s I - Vmin - IImin - IV. Since I’ve looked into minor V‘s in a major key, I’ve seen it work most effectively when the minor V chord goes to IV next. Which would make this chord progression Emaj - Bmin - Amaj - Amaj. I know it's not but follow and I will explain what I am getting at. Now when I talked about substituting, I was talking about inserting a substitute for the A major chord (IV). In the key of A major, the relative minor is F# so it’s an easy substitute. Take a look at the chord progression again, Emaj - Bmin - Amaj - Amaj but this time substitute the first A major chord with it’s relative minor chord F#min. Which gives you Emaj - Bmin - F#min - Amaj. Granted it’s not the best explanation for this chord progression, but it makes sense of what I’ve seen and how a Vmin - IImin can work in contrast to the popular Vmin- IV.