Chord progressions from scratch

[DWb]

I've read a fair bit about how to harmonize a melody if you are (for instance) writing an accompaniment to a song, but what do you do if you're writing something where the chord progression is pretty much all there is - drum and bass, house or trance, for instance? I've spent a great deal of time playing around by trial and error deciding what sounds good only to realize that I've come up with a progression in fifths again.

Are there any general principles for writing freestanding chord progressions, or ad hoc methods that people have found to work for coming up with them?

[tee boy]

Well, you see the progression itself is only a tiny aspect. The voicing also plays a massive role. How the music is arranged and voiced can make the same progression sound a million different ways. I mean, just changing the register does alot!

So my advice to you would be to stick with simple progressions, but try to find ways to use them in different ways by:

- experimenting with the voicing (number of voices, register, homophony / polyphony etc)

- extending the chords

Here's another useful tip - second and third root movement is great when used at the beginning of a progression. You use those root movements to begin with and still go to a V-I cadence.

While on the subject of cadences, there is a lot you do there too.

But as always, the best advice I can give you is to listen to the music you like and learn from it. Its likely that most D&B produces just hit block chords that sound good, rather than trying to work anything out.

TB

[sp0rk]

It's all about the voicings/etc. Like tee boy said - I can take a i - V - i progression and beat it to death and do a ton of different things with it. I could voice it in roots and jump, or do the V chord in a second inversion, make the v chord minor, stack an 8va onto the melody line, write second or third moving voices for it, put a different rythm patter under different areas, etc.

The best thing to do is have a difinitive bass line, then MAKE the chord progression out from it. Start with using the basic I - iv - v stuff, then start to substitute by saying 'ok this is the 3rd note of the scale, what other chords will fit with it?' and move from there. Chord substitution like that can lead to a variety of different things.

What you probably need to do is familiarize yourself with more 'orchestration' techniques. It's how the pros make the same old same old sound better. Here are a few tips:

1) try to keep everything within 1 octave of each other (ie melody, bass, with the harmony lines right between them. The melody/bass can be 3 octaves apart or so as long as the harmonies chain them. Ie - bass line - harmony less than 1 8va higher - second harmony less than 1 8va - melody. A good sandwitch will always sound good, but sometimes you can stretch the interval inbetween the two harmonies to get a different sound.)

2) it's always ok to double the melody an 8va higher, but almost never ok to double the harmony just up above the melody. You can even double/triple 8va the melody depending on the voicings and sound good. Sometimes it's ok to have harmony doubled up and sandwitched inbetween melody lines, as long as the melody sticks out.
3) you can double the bass line and octave down, but never more, and there should be no harmonies in between.
4) you can get away with the melody being slightly higher than the next highest harmony by a 13th or 14th sometimes.
5) You can put all the harmony in the top voice and the melody in the bass voice, but the top voice has to be quiet enough so it's clear what is melody.

etc etc etc.

[tamahome]

2nds & 4ths up, 3rds down

[Beregond]

I believe the chordmaps site has been posted before as a good music theory site, but some of the answers that you're looking for involving progressions can be found in the chord map pages: http://chordmaps.com/chartmaps.htm Skip past the chord charts--about halfway down the page--and you'll see the chord progression maps. These begin with "The big map in C" and is followed by all the other keys and a 'generic' chord progression map. These maps will give you a lot of new chord progression ideas.
The overall site IS a good site for beginning theory also: http://chordmaps.com/

[wrench45us]

borrow from the best and make them your own

i mostly develop just from chordal progressions and add bass and lead lines (or not) later -- mostly cause that's what I'm interested in

I will again advocate any of the songwriting books by Rikky Rooksby as a very good place to get started as he's taken a lot of time to analyze song structures and provides lots of examples, including intros and turnarounds. It may not be exactly the genre you're looking for, but it helps to train the ear to recognize certain common and uncommon progressions.
For something that is more direct, you might want to check out the 'Dance Music Manual' -- that does go into dance music forms and progressions.
Once you learn pretty much what the notes are, then if you find a good book or two that goes into voicing that's a big step forward. There should be all these boring practice exercises with closed and open voicing, but the transitions and forms are really useful things to know.
My method has been take what I find immediately useful and keep coming back to dig a little deeper.

[JumpingJackFlash]

I've read a fair bit about how to harmonize a melody if you are (for instance) writing an accompaniment to a song, but what do you do if you're writing something where the chord progression is pretty much all there is - drum and bass, house or trance, for instance? I've spent a great deal of time playing around by trial and error deciding what sounds good only to realize that I've come up with a progression in fifths again.

Are there any general principles for writing freestanding chord progressions, or ad hoc methods that people have found to work for coming up with them?

A little general harmonic advice for starting out:

Roots of chords a fourth and a fifth apart generally sound good.
Roots of chords falling a third is good.
Roots of chords rising a third is good strong to weak, but bad weak to strong. (In 4/4, the strongest beat is the 1st, then the 3rd)
Don't sandwich chords (ie, have at least 2 different chords before having the same one again).
Try to use a mixture of root position and 1st inversion chords. (Avoid second inversions)
Avoid diminished or augmented chords (eg. chord VII, and chord II in a minor key)
Avoid chord III.
Avoid the progressions II to I, and V to IV.
Avoid the bass note of a chord on a strong beat the same as the bass note of the preceding weak beat.
The top line and the bass should not approach an octave or 5th in similar motion, except by step in the top part.

The bass is also very important.
It should generally move by step whenever possible, and should not leap around all over the place.
Contrary motion between the bass and the top line is good.

My posts on Voice Leading, and my Introduction to cadences might also be useful to you.

[DWb]

Cool, thanks for all the advice! I'll be trying to put some of that into practice.

Oh, and noone's said it, but I'm guessing that step zero is getting my keyboard skills up to the point where I can noodle around with chords, to make the whatever I approach a little easier to work with than trying to add things to a loop in sequencer.

(Although now I come to think of it, I could just use Chordspace... hmmmm...)

[Beregond]

I will again advocate any of the songwriting books by Rikky Rooksby as a very good place to get started as he's taken a lot of time to analyze song structures and provides lots of examples, including intros and turnarounds.

Rikki's How to Write Songs on Keyboards

+1 !

[chardin]

This lesson is written toward guitar players but others might find it useful:

http://www.acousticguitar.com/article/1 ... SONS-1.asp