Lesson 16

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Lesson 16 TEF's

Notes to Lesson 16

Lesson 16 is about connecting the chord forms to get chord progressions that fit in any tune.  Mickey divides the progressions into 3 parts:

This is a subject that can be as easy just playing Mickey's exercises and learning by rote, or we might want to delve a little deeper into "why?"

Using Mickey's point of view, these can all be thought of as V to I (i) progressions.  One can ask "I understand 'dominant to minor or to major' as a V to I or i, but how can we analyze dominant to dominant as V to I?"  A series of dominant progressions, such as the first bridge example we studied in Lesson 15 is usually written as III7 - VI7 - II7 - V7.  A circle of fourths of dominant chords is often called "barbershop harmony" due to the harmonies of tunes sung in 4-part harmony and a capella by Barbershop Quartets.  But, a circle of fourths of major triads doesn't naturally exist for more than two chords in any scale. Musicologists say that this really is a series of key changes or modulations.  Let's put this progression in the Key of G (or should we say "start out" in the Key of G?)  B7 to E7 to A7 to D7.  B7 is the V7 chord in E Major and E Harmonic and Melodic Minor.  E7 is the V7 in A Major and A Harmonic and Melodic Minor.  A7 is the V7 in D and D Harmonic and Melodic Minor.  D7 is the V7 to G and we've returned to the original key.

So from this brief discussion we might conclude that Mickey puts a big importance on a V - I or i progression.

Analyzing any of these three, we find that all have a fourth type of progression, a minor to major.   In a major scale this occurs naturally in the ii - V progression.  In the Key of C, that's a D minor to G as triads or D min7 to G7 as 4-note chords.  By moving the C or the 7th of the D min7 down a half step to B, we have a D min6 or the 3, 5, 7, and 9 of a G9 chord.  If we know what note is the 7th of a minor 7 form, we can move it lower one fret and have an instant ii - V chord progression.  Let's look at a score, starting with Mickey's chord forms and add a few more.

OK, so I'm stretching the definition of a "few"!!  All of the forms are in D minor, either a 7 or 6.  All of these forms are common and found in compositions that we may be familiar with.  First, take your guitar and play them all or download the ii7 - ii6.tef and play the MIDI of the TEF.    We can hear that each pair is the D min7 to D min6 or D min7 to G9, but due to the bass note and the juggling of the voices, each has its own personality.  Note that in each pair, we've just moved the C(7) to B(6). 

As you play through the exercises that Mickey wrote, note the number of progressions where the chords change by a single note.  Review Lesson 10 where we touched on this concept.

Just keep it FUN!