degenaro
Active member
Until you get to the point where you can trust your ears how do you figure what to play over a progression?
Easy...I'll assume we all know the major scale and it's subsection I.e. Major pentatonic (if you prefer to think of it as a minor pentatonic just use that a minor third up from the key as in if you're in C major play C major or A minor pentatonic.
So...
Let's keep this simple for starters...
Say you have 3 power chords say c to d to g.
Without any fancy nonsense the obvious choice is to treat it like some G major thing.
The first one would be viewing it as C major to D major to G major...you'd play G major or G major pentatonic/E minor pentatonic.
Next up C major to D minor to G major. Play C major or C mj pent/A min pent
Less likely but still a viable option C maj to D min to G min
You'd play F maj or F maj pent/Dm pent
And lastly C min to D min to G min and use Bb maj or Bb maj penta/G min pent.
So...all you need is the parent key and off you go. How? Always the same you got 3 major and 3 minor chords per key and the m7b5 that for now we ignore.
So in C we have C, F and G for the major chords and d, e and a for the minors.
They happen on the root up a fourth and up a fifth for the major and up a maj 2, maj 3 and 6th from the root for the minor chords
Now make yourself a chart for G and F...and we take it from there
Easy...I'll assume we all know the major scale and it's subsection I.e. Major pentatonic (if you prefer to think of it as a minor pentatonic just use that a minor third up from the key as in if you're in C major play C major or A minor pentatonic.
So...
Let's keep this simple for starters...
Say you have 3 power chords say c to d to g.
Without any fancy nonsense the obvious choice is to treat it like some G major thing.
The first one would be viewing it as C major to D major to G major...you'd play G major or G major pentatonic/E minor pentatonic.
Next up C major to D minor to G major. Play C major or C mj pent/A min pent
Less likely but still a viable option C maj to D min to G min
You'd play F maj or F maj pent/Dm pent
And lastly C min to D min to G min and use Bb maj or Bb maj penta/G min pent.
So...all you need is the parent key and off you go. How? Always the same you got 3 major and 3 minor chords per key and the m7b5 that for now we ignore.
So in C we have C, F and G for the major chords and d, e and a for the minors.
They happen on the root up a fourth and up a fifth for the major and up a maj 2, maj 3 and 6th from the root for the minor chords
Now make yourself a chart for G and F...and we take it from there