Sweet home alabama

Danny1969

MatthewShreddery said:

Those of you who say G; are you saying this just because on paper all the notes fit G major? (which is correct - they certainly do)

Or, are you actually hearing some kind of aural resolution when the chords land on G every time?

Yeah I hear it land on G like G is the home chord

Same as I hear "Hey Joe"   play the C - G  - D - A progression and then land on it's E "home chord" 

That for me defines the key to a song

Funny enough I had a Lynyrd  Skynyrd tribute in last night and I asked them what key SHA was in  ...... they said it was in D .... then looked confused

stickyfiddle

HAL9000 said:

stickyfiddle said:

Maybe it's actually in E minor??

Actually I think you'll find the relative minor of D is Bm

I see what you did there... You're still wrong

BigMonka

Am I missing something here, are people really saying its in D because it starts on a D chord?

viz

No, nobody's saying that. The D-ers hear D as the home chord. They hear I-bVII-IV-IV. The G-ers hear G as the home chord. They hear V-IV-I-I. 

Plenty of no-question I-bVII-IV-IV progressions exist, like ACDC's Back in Black, Fleetwood Mac's "Don't Stop Thinking about Tomorrow", Journey's "Anytime", “You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet”, or J Geils Band's "Centerfold". 

Here they are, if anyone's interested in what other I-bVII-IV-IV songs sound like. Nobody would say Back in Black is in A! 

The real question is, what, if anything, makes SHA any different? 

Back in Black (in E)  

Don't Stop Thinking about Tomorrow (in E)  

Anytime (in E)  

Centerfold (in G)  

welshboyo

Which Solo are we talking 'bout here...

1st one is anchored loosely around D major

The 2nd is most definitley in G Major with plenty of country Em penta licks...

The song is G

For me anyway...and I play it at least once a week in front of audiences and yet to have anyone come up to me and say its wrong...

Roland

HAL9000 said:

Move along now - nothing to see here...

Yes, it's attacking my will to live.  Definitely taken SHA out of tonight's set list, although I might slip the riff into SCOM for fun

ennspek

Best.Thread.Evah!

exocet

It's in G. Forget the guitar solo stuff, listen to the main vocal melody which is in G Major.

Rox

So, as the guitarist who played on the original recording says it's in G, why the continuing debate?

Intrigued....

MatthewShreddery

Because to me it sounds like its in D. 

People confuse the key of a song with which scale they use to play on it. 

I just can't imagine hearing this in any key other than D. 

The vocal melodies are very much D. Or G. It really doesn't matter. 

I'll say it now though, as I didn't address this earlier; the occurrences of C naturals have no significance whatsoever in deciding whether it is in D or G. 

It is simply an accidental. Saying that it can't possibly be in D major just because there are no C#s is slightly naïve. 

 A few posts ago somebody asked if people honestly thought it was in D just because it was the first chord. Their tone was, I assume, to suggest that this I somehow wrong or stupid perhaps. 

Well I'll put it out there that I certainly am of the opinion that on first hearing the D chord of the opening riff, this firmly cements D as the tonic. 

 For me when I get to the G chord it sounds like it needs to go back to D again. I'll also say that when we get to G, I like the sound of a G mixolydian scale over it. Oh no, now we have F naturals too!

mike_l

Simply take the 3 chords C/D/G

Take the notes from those chords

C-E-G D-F#-A G-B-D and which scale (or derivative scale) is it? Gmajor........

 

Not saying that other scales cannot be played over the chords, or other basic tonality cannot be heard......

 

MatthewShreddery

The approach of simply finding the best fitting key for whichever notes are in use will only get you so far.

Just because the notes of D C and G chords would appear to give you G major, it is not always going to be that simple.

You also need to give the chords a context. ie by using your ears to hear where the tonal centre actually is.

I've already touched on this in previous posts, but if you rearrange the chords you can get entirely different tonal centres.

For example:

let's play them in this order - C D G.

Any harmonic rhythm you like.

This chord progression is in C major.

It does not matter that there is an F# in the D triad. This is just a secondary dominant chord, or you could just say that the ii chord has been chromatically altered to make it II.

The tonal centre is still C.

What's my point?

My point is that in SHAlabama, I hear the song in D. The riff starts with a D chord - this does not always mean it's the key, but in this case I believe it does.

To my ears, the tonal centre D is driven home hard from the outset. The C and G pull back to D. It does not feel settled on G in any way, shape or form.

The progression is little more than a I IV, with a little visit to the b7 chord. The C chord could be interpreted as a D7 chord in a way. This might explain why so many people think this song is in G, as the D(7) gives the impression that G is the tonic by masquerading as a dominant 7th in G.

I do not care if the guitarist who played the original solo says the song is in G. There's probably some more to what he was saying, or something has been lost in translation, or he just doesn't understand what he's actually doing.

(sorry if this makes no sense - I'm very hung over)

Rox

MatthewShreddery said:

I do not care if the guitarist who played the original solo says the song is in G. There's probably some more to what he was saying, or something has been lost in translation, or he just doesn't understand what he's actually doing.

As he talks about the producer banging on about the solo needing to be in D, and he the guitarist says it's actually in G, the context is all there.

Here's the full quote, so there's no confusion:

But I remember when I recorded that in Atlanta, like we recorded that song four days after we wrote it. And we were thinking about putting it on the first album because our first album wasn't even out yet, but Al Kooper wanted to save it for the second album. But Kooper argued with me the whole time I was there, saying "You're playing the solo in the wrong key." Because it starts on a D chord but it really resolves in G. It's really in the key of G. And he says "The solo should be in D." And he, unbeknownst to me, was telling the rest of the guys, "Look, we can't have this guy do the solo on the record."

But the guys stood behind me. You know why they stood behind me? Because they said, man, he saw the solo in a dream. And you know how like the whole Southern mysticism thing really kind of fell in, played in my hands, because I'm not that big into Southern mysticism, you know? I'm from Southern California. But I figured, well, it meant enough to them that I saw it in a dream that it has to be used. I thought that was pretty cool.

MatthewShreddery

Yes, I've read the quote.

Doesn't really prove anything.
 

This is about guitar players trying to find one scale that will fit all the chords in a progression. ie finding a short-cut, an easy option. 

Oh yeah - look, I found one. G major scale. That's because it's in G yeah?

No.

It's in D and we're actually hearing mixolydian.

viz

Well he doesn't actually play the solo in D. He follows the chords, so he solos over the first bar in D, then he moves to G for bars 3 and 4, so I agree with Shreddery, it's not because of what the guitarist says it's in that makes it what it is. It's how they play it. Having heard a few live versions now, it's clear to me that they are playing it in G, they're forcing it into that key by the way they play. Far more so than in the studio version. But it's perfectly possible to play it in D, and I prefer it in D personally. I think it has more movement.

viz

Besides there's a B flat in the solo which makes it in G minor!

MatthewShreddery

Viz mate, it's either D or G

Doesn;t matter how they play it - the riff is what it is so choose a side and stick with it (join my side because I'm right)

daveww

In in G major or D mixolydian.  Take your pick 

viz

MatthewShreddery said:

Viz mate, it's either D or G

Doesn;t matter how they play it - the riff is what it is so choose a side and stick with it (join my side because I'm right)

Lol ok - it's in D (today) . And anyway, your whole premise is that it's what it is purely BECAUSE of the way they play it! There's plenty of V IV I I songs around, just look at punk - but you hear it as a I VII IV IV, because of how they play it. Not because it's D C G G so therefore it must be in D. But because of the phrasing and the rhythm and the notes. And I completely agree with that approach. It always comes down to the phrasing and the rhythm and the notes.

MatthewShreddery

I'm pretty sure you could phrase D C G G any way you like and it would still sound like D was tonic.

BTW everybody - I'm not trying to force anyone to agree with me, nor do I really actually care about this topic that much. I just find it quite interesting how we hear the same music differently and like to understand other peoples' opinions/outlooks etc on things like this.