KVR Audio

advaya · Post by **advaya** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 8:50 pm

camsr wrote:This HAS to be THE most important thing that defines the "feeling" of music. Quick chord changes keep things exciting mostly, and long drawn out chords are more immersive.

Cool topic. I've been looking at ways of breaking up my chord progressions as well (I'm very guilty of the '8-bar-8-chord' phrases for longer than I care to admit). Seems I've had most luck with throwing in a quick inversion on the 2nd or 3rd beat, but beyond that, I get blindsided with composers anxiety.

jee_pack · Post by **jee_pack** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 9:00 pm

I guess, I mean I don't care about NCT's technically, it will be the same if we us the inversion symbols like this:
(I)xxx(vi6)xxx(iii)xxxXxxx

And question: do you have a piano or keyboard? Cuse before I got my Shitty keyboard for 40$ from a friend who had it for 9 years, I was also doing the 8 bar 8 chords thing, but now that I use the keyboard, things seem to be coming along better

jee_pack · Post by **jee_pack** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 9:14 pm

For this thread I will post the pattern I composed yesturday night for a trance track... but only the patern

C is a chord change on the first beat, c is a chord change on the 3rd beat (half of the mesure). x is a beat, X is a down beat.

First I took the melody and worked out a chord rhythm/progression in major and at the same time I wrote one in minor where the melody are mostly the same in both except for some exceptions.

Major CHORD/Rhythm: CxxxXxcxCxxxXxcxCxxxXxcxCxxxCxcx
Minor CHORD/Rhythm: CxxxXxxxCxxxXxxxCxxxXxxxCxxxXxxx

yeah the minor one looks doll, but I think it will serve its purpose as it objective would be to realy send the melody into deep emotion mode wich nice pads or strings, while the major one, allows me for more variations, I still need to perfect that one thoug, it might change when I get a chance to work on it...

camsr · Post by **camsr** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 9:15 pm

Yeah I got all that but I don't have it with me right now. Its true I find that on the keyboard some of my best songs have been born on it. Simple rhythms though because Im not a great player, but great progressions. Thats why I wanna work on this whole idea of this rhythm, and maybe make up for this fact in my music writing.

I'll have something to add later when I go get my keyboard and come back from school and stuff

nuffink · Post by **nuffink** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 9:34 pm

It's difficult to talk about harmonic rhythm without talking about metrical weight.
Not all beats are equal. In 4/4 the perceived metrical weight of the beats goes STRONGEST - WEEK - STRONG - WEEKEST
Typically the chord changes on the stronger beats. This can be boring.
If you play the chord changes on the weeker beats or (even more so) on the offbeats you're playing with syncopated harmony. This, though of limited interest in the world of trance, is rarely boring.

jee_pack · Post by **jee_pack** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 9:47 pm

I'm not a great player either, but as you said, the song is born on the keyboard, I have no choice but to 'raise' it on my computer later, for part writing and stuff.

Here a little annecdote that totally proves this keyboard progression thing (at least for me)....

That hard trance track I analysed, when I finally got the chord progression. I started playing it on my keyboard, and it didn't sound good at all, I couldn't even recognise it or feel the melody through the chords. But then I tryed to play them at different spots on the keyboard, figured out what's the best positions I could play them in (root or inversion)... Figured out when I should retrigger tones that are common to the previous chord (I pretty much decided that I shouldn't cuse is sounded more connected)... and then all of a sudden, it sounded so nice I wish I would have came up with it without that track analysys. The moral of the story: A well played, well structured chord progression, that sounds good on a piano (ps: use strings, it realy makes these things sound better in my opinion) can be the seed that gives birth to awsome tracks, and great melodies. I'm even sure that with this simple progression, I could make another 5 different melodies... But the point is, the progression is really simple (4 chords, with one added on one variation)... And trust, with the adequate part writing, it ends up being an awsome hard trance track

jee_pack · Post by **jee_pack** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 10:04 pm

nuffink: about your last reply, I would indeed be surprised to see this in any kind of trance. I'm sure its doable.... buttttt...

My guess is these kind of chord change would be nice with a house track that has a groovy bass melo...

camsr · Post by **camsr** » Wed Feb 07, 2007 7:34 am

I just tried something based on this lil pattern:

CxxcXxcxXcxxCxcx

It sounds pretty fast. I just alternated between a i chord and a iv64 chord. Kinda cool actually.

camsr · Post by **camsr** » Sat Sep 29, 2007 4:36 am

BUMP for nostalgia

musikjock · Post by **musikjock** » Sun Sep 30, 2007 2:21 pm

nuffink wrote: Not all beats are equal. In 4/4 the perceived metrical weight of the beats goes STRONGEST - WEEK - STRONG - WEEKEST .

never even looked at it like that. good insight.

Toxikator · Post by **Toxikator** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 3:09 pm

nuffink wrote: Not all beats are equal. In 4/4 the perceived metrical weight of the beats goes STRONGEST - WEEK - STRONG - WEEKEST .

I always heard it went STRONGEST - WEAKEST - WEAK - STRONG... but then you can articulate 4/4 a number of ways... like WEAK - STRONG - WEAK- STRONG, too.

nuffink · Post by **nuffink** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 3:29 pm

My mistake, STRONGEST - WEAK - STRONG - WEAKEST

camsr · Post by **camsr** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 4:26 pm

Pattern for my newest song:

CxxxXxxcXxxxXxxx

with various syncopated variations

The Rhythm of Chord Progression