The A in B Major

[Gretsch Stretch]

Hi guys, first post.
Forgive me if I'm over thinking this one, early in the journey and all that.

I have a simple chord progression , B7-E-B7-F#-A-G#7, the G#7 is just a very quick passing chord on the way back to the next repeat. I'm going with B Major for the key here.
The melody is also simple comprising of the notes F#-A-B-D-E, which sort of implies E Major.
The A note is sung over the F# chord and one of the B's over the A chord.

It all sounds fine but should I be moving things around a bit so the melody hits the chord tones to be "doing the right thing" as it were?

If I play across it on the guitar it's definitely in B Major (to my ears anyway!)

[claudedefaren]

...

[someone called simon]

A is the flat 7, D is the Flat 3 - you mention these notes are in the melody. None of the chords have the flat 3, and the flat and sharp 7 both appear (B7, A vs F#).

So it sounds to me that it's really a blues kind of thing. The blues scale can happily (or sadly!?) accommodate all this. Plus all the blues derived Mixolydian (like a normal major scale but with a flat 7) bluesy rock styles.

If it sounds right you don't need to move anything anywhere. Having said that, you're ear develops as time goes on and what sounded correct to you once can sound like some weird rookie thing a few years later... perhaps. Lots of charming and effective music has those kind of naive 'wrong' things in it.

[Septimon]

I guess you are right with E major being your harmonic centre (Tonic). You wouldn‘t consider a dominant chord (B7 Here) to be the Tonic, even though it has the major third and is therefore „major“ but B7 has a flatted 7th which makes it a dominant sept chord (while the Tonic in Basic structures has a major 7th (if played))
B7 as the Dominant,
A subdominant,
F# probably should be F#m (minor) since you mentioned A in the melody: the Second degree can function as subdominant here (Dorian).
You’d expect G# to be minor as well to fit in as third degree (phrygian). But you are Free to borrow chords for more tension.
Try if it sounds right for you to end the tune with E major.

[jancivil]

"Dominant" is a function. The major/minor 7 chord (major triad/minor 7th) in a James Brown or any sort of funk number where it just sits there on a 7th chord, or say Hendrix Foxy Lady is not any dominant function. The F#7#9 in the latter is the I chord. Say It Loud, the I chord is a M/m7.
So the conclusion "You wouldn‘t consider a dominant chord (B7 Here) to be the Tonic" is premature and in this kind of case a mistake. In quite a bit of music it is the tonic chord. There are ample examples where you *would* consider a M/m7 chord the tonic chord.

To tell what this does requires hearing it. Strictly informationally speaking, a lot of A natural there tends to bely the label "B major". This isn't all that important right now, though.
I would recommend taking statements like [F#] "probably should be _" [F#m] with a healthy-sized grain of salt.
So since there's these A naturals with a B maj triad, the F# harmony should conform? It's not good to try and shoehorn some music (which we have yet to experience except in text) into this simplistic and inchoate grasp of principles.
And if the OP is solidly hearing it "In B" (leaving the label "major" out of it) chances seem good they have a handle on it where this pseudo-theory has not/cannot.
Answers like that illustrate 'A little knowledge is a dangerous thing", operational term being "a little".

[jancivil]

And I highly recommend ignoring the remarks there using names of modes*. There is no use value of them there.
There seems to be a basic grasp of roman numerals/scale degree conforming to major key there, but stuff like "you'd expect", 'should be' just don't universally apply. Let's take a bog standard 12-bar blues: I7, IV7, I7; V7, IV7, I7. Let's take them all as M/m7. The only possibility of a meaningful dominant so far in these is V7, and that kind of elides function heading to IV7.

*NB: the third degree of a major scale does not through itself indicate 'Phrygian'.
If the tonic is D# and there are basically 5 sharps, you may have D# Phrygian. The terms Phrygian, Dorian et al do not apply <in major>. They are_not properties of major. For a thing to genuinely be this or the other mode, there is a solid central referent, 'tonic' for lack of a word. The mode is a relationship of tones to this central, home note or tonic along with the internal relationships with that center as, well, central.


(side issue = the G# M/m7 may simply pass, chromatically, whatever it may not function at all, have to hear it. I don't see function ("dominant" which would be secondary dom) from the bit of typing there.)

With prevalence of A natural, major 3rd = D#, and tonic B it may be or kind of be B Mixolydian, but again we are just looking at typing, not yet hearing the music.

[Septimon]

OP, did you find any of the answers helpful? If yes: would be interesting to hear which ones.
Thanks

[ChameleonMusic]

Hi guys, first post.
Forgive me if I'm over thinking this one, early in the journey and all that.

I have a simple chord progression , B7-E-B7-F#-A-G#7, the G#7 is just a very quick passing chord on the way back to the next repeat. I'm going with B Major for the key here.
The melody is also simple comprising of the notes F#-A-B-D-E, which sort of implies E Major.
The A note is sung over the F# chord and one of the B's over the A chord.

It all sounds fine but should I be moving things around a bit so the melody hits the chord tones to be "doing the right thing" as it were?

If I play across it on the guitar it's definitely in B Major (to my ears anyway!)

It would be much easier to put together a useful reply if we could actually hear it!