Songs to help you recognise chords in a progression

this video is sponsored by hook theory today i'm going to show you some songs to help you remember and recognize the sound of chord functions of a chord functioning within the context of a key so if you're not sure what a chord function is rather than thinking about chord progressions in terms of note names like c g a minor f we instead think of them as numbers often written down as roman numerals relating back to the key that that chord progression is in so rather than c we'd call that one because we're in the key of c so it's the first chord of the key the one chord the g would be the fifth chord of the key the five chord a minor is the sixth port of the key and f is the fourth chord of the key so this chord progression is one five six four and the advantage of that is we can recognize that sound regardless of what key it's in because a 1 5 6 4 will sound very similar regardless of where we start if i play d a b minor g you can hear that that's the same chord progression even though we're using totally different chords so that's the advantage of being able to hear the chords function within the key rather than hearing the actual note that we're playing rather than having any sort of perfect pitch we have relative pitch so that's one five six four but what i want to show today is an example for each function in the key each common function that you might have and we'll start with the most common functions and work our way down to some of the rare recorded questions that you'll hear so let's start with perhaps one of the most common chord progressions you can hear moving to the fifth chord of the key and for all of these examples to make it easier to recognize the actual function that we're looking for i'm going to find a song that starts on the tonic chord on the root chord of the key and then moves to the chord function that we want so the example we've got for chord number five of the key is summer of 69 by brian adams which starts on the tonic chord of d and then moves to the fifth chord of a and that happens in the verse section it also happens in the rift section that we get after the chorus one five [Music] [Applause] another example we can use for the fifth chord of the key is actually any song that uses the one five six four chord progression that we're talking about at the beginning the axis of awesome chord progression the most famous example probably being let it be by the beatles the first two chords of that progression c moving to g is one moving to five when i find myself in times of trouble mother mary comes to me so that was the fifth chord of the key chord five but another chord which is going to come up time and time again is called number four fourth chord of the key and a song that we can use as an example of the fourth chord of the key is born in the usa by bruce springsteen here's the fourth chord [Music] so this song basically goes back and forth all the way through from chord one of the key b and chord chord four e so if you just listen to that song by the end of it you'll have a fairly good idea of how the four chord sounds [Applause] [Music] the next most common chord function that you'll probably come across is the sixth chord of the key and the example we have for this chord function is stand by me by benny king which starts on the chord a which is our one chord and then goes down to the chord f sharp f sharp minor which is the sixth chord so that's one and that's the sixth chord there [Music] and for an example of a song that purely uses the first and sixth chords of the key goes from one to six throughout you could use send my love by adele which goes from d which is our root chord to b minor for its entire duration [Music] perhaps the next most common chord function that you'll come across is the second chord of the key so our example for this one is actually a song that goes back and forth from the first chord of the key our root chord a to the second chord of the key b minor and it does that all the way through its entire duration and the song is i'd rather go blind by ether james something told me [Music] if you're interested in music theory which i'm fairly sure you are then you'll be interested in hook theory hook theory offers various brilliant resources for learning music theory for example their website offers a music theory analysis of over 20 000 different songs they also offer two interactive music theory textbooks where much like my own videos they use pop and rock songs to exemplify and explain music theory concepts on top of this hook theory's hook pad is an excellent tool that helps you apply music theory concepts in your own songwriting and for a limited time you can get lifetime access to both hook pad and both hook theory books for 20 off follow the link in the description to start using hook theory today so we're now starting to get into these slightly less common chord choices but these are by no means rare you will still find these chord functions in a whole range of songs and this next one is the third chord of the key so the example we're going to be looking at is help by the beatles and in the verse section of help by the beatles we start on the chord a and then go up to the third hood of the key c sharp minor [Music] so far we've only looked at diatonic chord functions chord functions that are based on the notes of the major key but of course most songs use notes from outside of the key as well chromatic notes so let's look at some of the chord functions that you can get when you go outside of the major key perhaps the most common chromatic chord function is the flat seven so i think everyone will agree that the best example of a flat seven chord is the epic outro from hey jude in in that outro section we get chord f which is the tonic chord and then we move to the flat seven chord then it moves four chord and it moves back to one so those first two chords in the progression [Music] are one and seven one and flat seven [Music] so the next example we're going to look at is the major version of the two chord so we've already looked at the minor version of the two chords that was rather go blind by ether james but this time that two chord has been turned into a major chord and sticking with the b tools as i always like to do um the best example i can think of of the major two chord is in eight days a week which starts like this [Music] the first two chords in that chord progression that's called number one that's called number two of the key and it's the major version so we've got d major and e major in the key of d [Music] the next chord function we're going to look at is the major version of the three chord so much like with the previous example we've already looked at the minor version of the three chord but this is the major version of the three chord and i think the most classic example of this is the first two chords of creep [Music] so that's our root called our tonic chord of g and then it goes up to b major which is the third chord of the key the next chord function we're looking at is the major version of the sixth fold of the key so just like with the previous examples we've already looked at the minor version of the sixth chord the minor chord built on the sixth degree of the scale this time it's the major chord built on the sixth degree of the scale and surprise surprise we're back with a beatles example this time it's maxwell's silver hammer which starts on the chord of d which is it's one chord because we're in the key of d major and then it goes to b major which is the major version of the sixth chord [Music] so i'm going to give you three more examples of chord functions the next example is the minor version of the fifth chord of the key so the fifth chord of the key is usually a major chord that was actually the first example we looked at today so if you're in the key of b the fifth chord of the key would usually be f sharp major but of course you could do a minor chord in that place so if we went from b f sharp minor you'd get a minor version of the five chord and the example i've got for you today for that is the only exception by paramore which starts from the chord of b and then goes up to f sharp minor the fifth chord of the key [Music] [Applause] so that's the minor version of the v chord but next we're going to look at the minor version of the iv chord and this chord is actually quite well known for having a particularly melancholic sound to it so i'm an f here so if i go from f to b flat minor rather than the regular b flat major it has a very longing sound to it and a good example of this is no surprises by radiohead the opening riff this is all chord one f and then the climb is climbing up the minor version of the four chord b flat minor one minor four [Music] so we've now looked at 11 different chord functions and we haven't really reached all of the possible chord functions but we have certainly ticked off perhaps the most common types the types that you're going to encounter the most often but i'll give you one more example or 12 example which is the chord function of the flat second chord the major chord built on the flattened second degree of the scale so for example if we're in the key of f sharp you'd normally have a g sharp as your second chord of the key but if we flatten that i have a normal g then we've got the flat two chord that's our root chord f sharp and that's our flat two chord g major quite an exotic sound to it and this exotic sound 100 comes through in the example i want to show you which is white rabbit by jefferson airplane which basically pivots back and forth for most of its duration between f sharp and g one and flat [Music] pill two you larger and one pill makes you small so as i mentioned before that isn't every chord function there are more chord functions than these 12 but i do think that these 12 are probably the most common types of chord function that you'll run into so they're a really good place to start they're also all just major key chord functions all 12 of the functions we've looked at today are working around the idea that we're in a major key but of course we might be in a minor key so i'm actually going to do a video next week about how to recognize chord functions in the minor key instead so if you're not subscribed already do hit the subscribe button so you don't miss that video and thank you as always to all of the patrons who make my videos possible including the names you see on screen right now and andrei science diarrhea andy deacon andrew andrew assassin austin barrett austin russell bob mckinstry boomer dale britney parker cameron villa colin aiken charles finn briscoe bow david bennett's heart david rivers donald howard dr darren wicks elena scorchenko eugene leroy fd hodor greg kobowski guillermo latona james brocklebank hernick kutcher hugo miller ivan pang jake fisher j.a hokensparker john dye jessica dongchen josh sanderlin justin vegan mark seitara mark zekenhagen max o'keefe melody composer squared michael vivian nathan lawrence nathaniel park nick cheng paul middleton paul miller paul hazel peter dunphy roger clay sean kennedy steve daley tim beaker tim payne victor levy vedad flowers vladimir kotakov volte the washington shakespearean festival island fairbanks and zayfod [Music] you

Channel: David Bennett Piano

Views: 375,175

Keywords: chord function, ear training, examples, roman numerals, tonic, 1 5 6 4, I V vi IV, chord progression, how to recogise, how to hear

Id: fxNRcKnMF-c

Length: 15min 12sec (912 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 08 2022