Choosing a chord progression
There’s always more than one way of harmonising a melody.
Here are two sets of chords for the major pentatonic song Amazing Grace.
Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost but now am found,
Was blind, but now, I see.
Version 1
C C7 F C
C C G G
C C7 F C
C G C C
Download Amazing grace version 1
Version 2
C E F C
Am D G
C E F C
Am D
F C/E G/D C
Download Amazing grace version 2
What ideas can I steal from this?
The most interesting part from version 2 is the E chord. It isn’t in the C major key, strictly speaking, but because the melody uses an E at this point, and the C and E chords both share the E note, it sounds good.
So, the idea to steal is using interesting chords, and thinking about your chord choices.
Try looking for chords that sound good with your melody notes, but don’t just follow the tired I IV V chord progressions we’re all used to.
For example, in the key of G, you might try a Bb chord, an Eb chord, or an F chord. None of them are in G major, but they can sound good, depending on your melody.
Acknowledgements
I had this idea after follow a link on this useful list which led me to this article about the Beatles (which is mostly badly written and pretentious, but still interesting).
Now, have you got your copy of my free ebook?
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About the Author
Tom IndieSongwriter.net is a website about songwriting. It is written by Tom Slatter, a musician and teacher who can also be found at tomslatter.co.uk. IndieSongwriter, used to be called Songwright.co.uk.
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Hi Tom.
You did great for me. you took away the mystery behing harmonizing a melody by the simple explanation of several ways of creating harmony- as in use of octave, the 3rd up , the fifth up and the 3rd down. This is great for me. Thank you very much. I m just coming back from the fanbridge page where i d just registered so as to get your free ebook. i have nt got this yet. the site seems to have another objective which actually is useful for me as well but I need to get a pdf version or whatever helpful formats of your free ebooks.How do I get them? thanks alot!