Composing Good Chord Progressions

NFH

Once I stumble across a good chord progression I'm fairly good at coming up with melodies etc. My problem is I am not very good at coming up with different chord progerssions, they always tend to be fairly similar. I dont play the piano or guitar very well but I know they are the best intsruments for songwriting, is there some kind of method to contructing chord progressions, mainly on the piano, cheers.

frobisher

You could start experimenting with Jazz progressions, not neccesarily to use them but to get your ear used to something other than the regular vanilla. That said, I personally make th chords fit the melody and usually like to keep them staright forward. I used to use minor 9ths and major 7ths alot but grew out of them. You could also try key changes to see what that brings you?

Flynn

Ok i don't know how good you are at theory? I'm no whizz kid myself but you should google the cycle of fifths and try to get an understanding of that.. adding sharps and flats etc...
But i've put a list below of the chords in the major keys.. you can see the pattern

Major, minor, minor, major, major, minor, diminished.
And make sure to try 7th out.. and also going from a minor to a 7th while keeping the root.. ie. Am - Am7

You really dont need to understand any of that to write good chord progs. tho.. just pick a key below and belt away.. make sure to add 7th's for colour..
I have a song and it goes... C, E7, Am, Am7, G, G, F, Fm
Sounds a bit too much like bright eyes tho.. give it a go..



I II III IV V VI VII

C Dm Em F G Am Bdim

G, Am, Bm, C, D, Em F#dim

D, Em, F#m, G, A Bm, C#dim

A Bm C#m D E F#m G#dim

E F#m G#m A B C#m D(dim)

B, C#m, D#m, E, F# G#m, A#dim

F#, G#m, A#m, B, C#, D#m, E#dim

Gb, Abm, Bbm, Cb, Db, Ebm, Fdim

Db, Ebm, Fm, Gb, Ab, Bbm, Cdim

Ab, Bbm, Cm, Db, Eb, Fm, Gdim

Eb, Fm, Gm, Ab , Bb, Cm, Ddim

Bb, Cm, Dm, Eb, F, Gm, Adim

F, Gm, Am, Bb, C, Dm, Edim

Oh and certain chords go well together.. just follow the numbers.. like I IV V in G that would be G C D.. which i'm sure you've done many times.. so just pick a new key...like F Bb D etc. etc..

Anyway hope that helps ur songwriting.. Happy Xmas..

NFH

Thank you very much, thats very helpful and Merry Xmas to you too!

white_falcon

or you could cheat, and download this program. it makes up random chord progression for ya :P

http://digital.hollmen.dk/products/kozong/index.htm

henessjon

try this as an experiment..

play your song in the key you wrote it in..... now play the song in all the keys

transpose them...
bet you will learn a lot that way..

smurfrockstar

I was reading some guitar magazine ages ago and stumbled across an article by Slash. The gist of it was that most of the time when he was coming up with new riffs or chord progressions he was trying to copy something he already knew. He could never get it exactly right but instead he ended up with something new. A lot of the time when I'm writing something I'll think of a song that has a similar vibe to it and try to get it sounding something like that. I never do I usually end up with something completely different. I'm crap at theory and god help me but I've never used something along the lines of a half diminished chord (Brian Wilson seems to have been a massive fan of these).

Another point is that sometimes you don't need a strong chord progression to write a good song. Look at Tomorrow Never Knows, John Lennon walked into the studio one day and said I've got this song in E, McCartney turns around and asks for the chords and Lennon says, E!!! People don't listen for cool chord progressions or strange time signatures they want hooks and melody. There's a massive difference between writing good songs and writing good music. If you can come up with strong melodies you're doing an awful lot better than most!!!:D

ogy

I've never used something along the lines of a half diminished chord

just a little point on this. im not saying its a bad idea to learn theory, i think its a great idea to know what augmented/diminshed chords are and how to use them, BUT don't discount just messing about. remember that notes and rhythms and stuff in reality aren't that complicated, systems to describe them are:) like for example african drumming uses a lot of polymetric rhythms which are fairly complicated to explain, but the tribes etc who originally played this music didn't know that! they just played them, they learned them by copying others, and came up with new ones by experimentation, they didn't know they were playing 7 against 4 or whatever:)

Anyway my point about augmented/diminshed chords is: generally the difference between major/minor chords and augmented/diminshed chords, is only one chromatic change i.e. if you play an A Major chord, A C# E, and then you just shift the E up one step to F, ta daa, you got A augmented. if your playing a C minor, C Eb G, and you flatten the G by one step, you got C diminished. Changes like this are effective because they use interesting harmony without challenging the ear two much because your only changing one note. You don't need Grade 8 theory to come up with a chord sequence that has these notes G B D, G# B D, A C# E, your just shifting the bass note up by one to join the chords together, but in reality your going G, G#dim, A which sounds quite clever:)

and half dimished 7ths ain't nothin:) a normal diminished 7th is C Eb Gb A (Bbb technically). A half diminished seventh is just a diminished 7th except the 7th is like a normal 7th from a Major 7th chord rather than the A above, so itd be C Eb Gb Bb.

Diminished sevenths are really useful becuase if you move Any of the notes 1 step down you get a normal 7th chord, which is a really nice way of getting to a new key/harmonic area. examples:
(i) Cdim 7 (change the C to a B and you get->) B7 (which is the V in the key of ->) E
(ii) Cdim 7 (change the Eb to a D and you get->) D7 (which is the V in the key ->) G
(iii) Cdim 7 (change the Gb to an F and you get->) F7 (which is the V in the key of ->) C
(iv) Cdim 7 (change the A to an Ab and you get->) Ab7 (which is the V in the key of ->) Db

So you can see from any diminished 7th chord you can easily get to 4 different keys. you can get to even more keys from a half dimished chord doing similar things, but its a little more complicated (you have to move more than one note).

hope that makes some sense!

Dave Clemo

Loads of good advice and good sense here. Metaphysically speaking, music works on a spiritual level. Music can soothe the soul. It can also get your heart a thumpin' and your feet a dancin'
I don't know why it is, but classical composers use the key of c#minor for dirges and sad pieces and Am for uplifting pieces. Why is one key an "upper" while the other is a "downer"? Someone cleverer than me might explain it better. What it means for you is that you need to match the mood of the song to the key that it's played in. Experiment and you'll discover this for yourself.
Dave