# Favorite Chord Progressions



## Alohabob (May 25, 2017)

Someone posted a thread about favorite instrument combos to elicit different sounds. I was thinking it'd be neat to do something similar but with chords. 

A few days ago I was watching a piano playing tutorial that had the guy saying you could play lots of different styles of music by just using two chords and gave several samples. You can see this at  at 5:27

Sci-Fi/Space sample, CMajor to F#Major (question: how would this be written in the traditional 1-4-5-1 way since these aren't in the same key sig? He shows them as M6M which I'm not sure is something he made up or is something people would know.)

Anyone else have some good progressions that make the listener automatically feel something?


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## Flaneurette (May 26, 2017)

That's quite funny.

I think it is not useful to think in chord progressions when dealing with film scenes. Chord progressions or formulas are rarely heard because scenes change too often and too quickly for that. There are exceptions of course. But song writing is an entirely different beast to deal with.

With film we try to support scenes. Broken chords are useful, so is toying around with fifths, arpeggios, octaves, Major 7ths, 7ths, 9ths, 11ths, and flip them around create suspension, tensions, etc.

For example a nice tense run I just made up:

Left hand: Dm
Right hand: A, G, F, G

Left hand: EMaj.
Right hand: B,A,Ab,A

Etc.

Could be used under many scenes. It's not a song structure, but rather musical "scene" that supports the scene you see, but could change any moment to let's say... AMajor.


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## gsilbers (May 26, 2017)

there was a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuge thread about that video. In summary; its a good starting point but not the standard. 

as for chord progression i am intrigued by mixed mode mentioned in thise thread

http://vi-control.net/community/threads/two-scales-to-learn.62182/

"Mixed mode is a harmonic system (not a scale) that makes use of all the major chords generated by the major scale _*and* _the natural minor scale. So C Mix contains C major, F major and G major from the C major scale, and also Ab major, Eb major and Bb major from the C minor scale."

I ve been trying chord progression but mainly the issue is that with mixed modes (in this context) is to use two different chord at the same time.. or part of one and another to get a mixed "vibe" i guess. 
I dont know if there is a dicernible chord progression that would make sense or if the options are too open for me. 

I also like flauneretty info above. ill try that as well.


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## ZenCore (Jul 16, 2017)

Guys,

Yes, I have watched the same video recently and it was amazing! So I started to mess with those progressions.
First thing I realised was that they are not in the same key. really?  I chose M6M in my case I chose F-B (F major to B major). I created a CHORD track in cubase and wrote B-F and voila..cubase showed me that both chords belong to C DIMINISHED scale


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## PeterN (Jul 16, 2017)

Not meaning to go down here on anyone, and apologize for going slightly out of topic, but I think the 'chord progression' approach, is a bit overly appreciated. You can see guys on youtube and think, hey that guy may actually become a composer if he is able to get out of the 'chord progression' prison. Thats what the Beatles did. And they didnt have to do it, they could still have made millions if they had stayed within the chord progression field: she loves you, yea, yea, yea. But The God of Music snapped the fingers and out came Strawberry fields. Theres no chord progression there, thats creativity.


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## ed buller (Jul 16, 2017)

scott Murphy who made that video is an interesting guy. There are loads of resources out there about , what have become , cliched chord progressions . The sci fi chord progression ( tritone ) is used everywhere . There really is a language and syntax that can be expressed harmonically and it's very useful to learn it as it will get you out of trouble but it's also a good idea to come up with your own solutions.

Perhaps the most important part of this for me was NOT to think in keys. Neo Reimannian theory can really help here :




watch this !


the internet has loads of great papers and discussion on this topic, A particular favourite

http://www.mtosmt.org/issues/mto.13.19.4/mto.13.19.4.lehman.html

Frank Lehman here ,very deftly explains how Maestros like JW use the harmonic syntax of cliches to great effect in musical storytelling.


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## BachN4th (Jul 16, 2017)

There's an IOS and Android app called TouchTonnetz that I've found useful just to play around within the Neo-Reimannian system and hear the various chord movements.


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## ctsai89 (Jul 16, 2017)

One of my favorite chord progressions. Have a listen.

in F# minor

D major, A Major, F# minor, E Major, D Major, E Major, B minor-F#minor, E Major 1 cycle.


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