Is there a quick way to find out what note appears in which chords?

hollywoodrox

Thanks tannin  I have  actually made myself a little chart just as a quick reference .  I was going to add augmented chords to it but then wondered if it was worth it as you tend to use them more like diminished chords to give movement from one chord to the next 

hollywoodrox

Well here’s my stab at a chart 

Modellista

This discussion is like three-way chicken and egg - what comes first, the melody note, the chord root note, or the harmonic character of the chord?  As is apparent, any melody note can be played over any root note, but with widely varying harmonic results.  It's all in the head of the composer, but I would suggest each cadence does have chords that fit better than others, particularly with the home key in mind.

Thinking aloud, perhaps we have a melody on the top string E G F# A, in the key of Em.  The obvious harmonic choices are Em G F#m Am.  If we stick to the notes in the key of Em, the charts above are useful to narrow down alternative chords.

The G melody note could be the m7 of A, or the 5th of C.  (I don't fancy any of the others)
The F# melody note could be the maj7 of G of maj3 of D.
The A could be the 7th of B.

So using this concept the chord progression could be:

Em Am7 Gmaj7 B7 (heavy on the 7ths)
Em Am7 D B7
Em C Gmaj7 B7
Em C D B7

or you could re-substitute any of the root note chords if you like.

I do like this idea - although the relationship between root, chord and melody is something that happens subconsciously when composing anyway, it's nice to formalise it a bit.

By the way, the column for Dominant 7 is wrong from A onwards.

hollywoodrox

Modellista said:

This discussion is like three-way chicken and egg - what comes first, the melody note, the chord root note, or the harmonic character of the chord?  As is apparent, any melody note can be played over any root note, but with widely varying harmonic results.  It's all in the head of the composer, but I would suggest each cadence does have chords that fit better than others, particularly with the home key in mind.

Thinking aloud, perhaps we have a melody on the top string E G F# A, in the key of Em.  The obvious harmonic choices are Em G F#m Am.  If we stick to the notes in the key of Em, the charts above are useful to narrow down alternative chords.

The G melody note could be the m7 of A, or the 5th of C.  (I don't fancy any of the others)
The F# melody note could be the maj7 of G of maj3 of D.
The A could be the 7th of B.

So using this concept the chord progression could be:

Em Am7 Gmaj7 B7 (heavy on the 7ths)
Em Am7 D B7
Em C Gmaj7 B7
Em C D B7

or you could re-substitute any of the root note chords if you like.

I do like this idea - although the relationship between root, chord and melody is something that happens subconsciously when composing anyway, it's nice to formalise it a bit.

By the way, the column for Dominant 7 is wrong from A onwards.

Gosh darn it will have to look at that column

Cranky

I always liked what Jacob Collier said.  Any note can go with any other note(s).  Harmony is about feeling and expression.  The notes serve the harmony, and the harmony the feeling.  (Melody and motif, I think, are subsets of harmony.)

That said, I don’t think any kind of chart or fretboard diagram will substitute for applied, focused experimenting and practice.  It will become “second nature“ over time.

Even if you tend to play by shapes, e.g. know where the 5th is at all points and see how augmenting it feels.  That’s the tricky part is keeping that feeling going by knowing where to go on the board.

hollywoodrox

I’ve updated my chart ,it’s purely an aide for songwriting in the simplest form 

viz

Just a little rule of thumb here if anyone’s ever wondering whether to call something by its sharp or flat name:

Most major keys default to their flat version. B♭, E♭, A♭, D♭. Not A#, D#, G#, C#. The only exception is F# / G♭, where both will do. There’s literally six of one, half a dozen of the other

Similarly, most minor keys default to the sharp version. So F#m, C#m, G#m. Not G♭m, D♭m, A♭m. The only exceptions are B♭m, which is better than A#m, and D#m / E♭m where both will do. 

To make it simpler, I’d go with:

Majors are flats, though F# is OK
Minors are sharps, but avoid A#m (and E♭m is ok)

The purpose of that is to minimise the use of accidentals and avoid double sharps or flats. 

For example, B♭ major has two flats, but A# major would have A#, B#, C##, D#, E#, F##, G##. 

With sus2 or sus4 chords, it doesn’t matter, as the 3rd is absent so you don’t know if it’s major or minor until it’s resolved. But for consistency I’d probably go with the major option throughout.

guitarjack66

Melody note? Excuse my ignorance but some terminology is still a bit confusing to me.

hollywoodrox

guitarjack66 said:

Melody note? Excuse my ignorance but some terminology is still a bit confusing to me.

Like the notes you would whistle, sing or. Hum 

viz

hollywoodrox said:

guitarjack66 said:

Melody note? Excuse my ignorance but some terminology is still a bit confusing to me.

Like the notes you would whistle, sing or. Hum 

Melody means tune. Harmony means chords.

Sometimes the harmony can contain the melody. Like in Giant Steps. Other times the Harmony is a backdrop over which the melody is sung / played. Like the verses in Hotel California.

guitarjack66

viz said:

hollywoodrox said:

guitarjack66 said:

Melody note? Excuse my ignorance but some terminology is still a bit confusing to me.

Like the notes you would whistle, sing or. Hum 

Melody means tune. Harmony means chords.

Sometimes the harmony can contain the melody. Like in Giant Steps. Other times the Harmony is a backdrop over which the melody is sung / played. Like the verses in Hotel California.

I get that,I think. I know melodies can be played on one or two strings,so I guess the other stuff is the embellishments or padding?

allen

Not sure if this adds anything, but I've lately been messing about doing melodies with hendrix style embellishments/double stops/chords. 

Once I've found the melody I tend to experiment with the standard pattern Hendrix/SRV embellishments to add harmony. It's not massively sophisticated, but I get quite a bit of pleasure when it works.

I've most recently been fiddling about with 'he ain't heavy, he's my brother' using this approach.

I don't have a musical ear of any note (mixed metaphor alert) and I can hear straight away if a harmony works against what I hear in my head. My long term goal would be to be able to do this on the fly for any melody in my head, but at my current rate of progress I'll be 140 years old before I'm any good at it.

hollywoodrox

allen said:

Not sure if this adds anything, but I've lately been messing about doing melodies with hendrix style embellishments/double stops/chords. 

Once I've found the melody I tend to experiment with the standard pattern Hendrix/SRV embellishments to add harmony. It's not massively sophisticated, but I get quite a bit of pleasure when it works.

I've most recently been fiddling about with 'he ain't heavy, he's my brother' using this approach.

I don't have a musical ear of any note (mixed metaphor alert) and I can hear straight away if a harmony works against what I hear in my head. My long term goal would be to be able to do this on the fly for any melody in my head, but at my current rate of progress I'll be 140 years old before I'm any good at it.

That’s great Allen , I’m sure the more you do it it will accumulate like compound interest if that’s a good analogy lol , it’s great to apply different styles to songs you know & very rewarding when it works like you say. Good luck with it 

Tannin

viz said:

Just a little rule of thumb here if anyone’s ever wondering whether to call something by its sharp or flat name:

Most major keys default to their flat version. B♭, E♭, A♭, D♭. Not A#, D#, G#, C#. The only exception is F# / G♭, where both will do.

Similarly, most minor keys default to the sharp version. So F#m, C#m, G#m. Not G♭m, D♭m, A♭m. The only exceptions are B♭m, which is better than A#m, and D#m / E♭m where both will do. 

(snip)

A useful post.

I tend to make an exception for Db major (5 flats), preferring C# major (7 sharps) because it is simpler.  I don't have to think "err ... is this one of the 5 flat tones?" because everything is sharp, even B and E.Or I can think of it as being like playing in C major with a capo on the 1st fret. I have to use little tricks like that to stop my brain overheating.:)

viz

I think that’s a fair point, especially for a guitarist. Us guitarists, we often think in terms of raising notes. Maybe because putting our fingers on tFB raises the note, never lowers it, and like you say, the capo also only acts to raise the notes. Interesting.

As I grew up on the piano, I guess one of the reasons I’d prefer D♭ would be that it would avoid the two non-black-note sharps - B# and E# - they’d be C and F. Pianists, especially jazzers, seem to prefer playing in flat keys. I guess that’s because they’re easier to noodle on.

Same with B major on the other end of the scale; I’d be very disinclined to call that C♭ major. That’s probably true for everyone though, for obvious reasons. 

The other slight downside to C# major is that its relative minor is the dreaded A# minor, which is just about OK in Aeolian, but as soon as you raise the 7th of Harmonic minor and the 6th of Melodic minor, you get G## and F## instead of the A♮ and G♮ of B♭ minor.