Turn Simple Chord Progressions Into Harmonically Rich Music

ByDaniel Weiss

Hi everyone, how’s it going? Daniel Weiss here, and today I’m going to show you how to turn simple chord progressions like this one:

[Music]

which is a six two five four progression, which is common in any style, and how to spice it up and make it a little more interesting.

Understanding Chords and Dominants

So the first thing to understand is that in music we have a tonic chord and we have other chords that eventually want to bring us to a dominant chord, which wants to resolve back home. So it’s called the dominant chord because it has a very dominant character, which has lots of tension to it and wants to go back to a certain area within the scale, the most common one being the tonic.

Secondary Dominants

But there’s also secondary dominants, which means that we can lead into other degrees in the scale. For example, from an E:

[Music]

Instead of going right away into the sixth degree like we just did, we can aim with a secondary dominant. A secondary dominant is going to be located just a fourth below our target. So in this case, C sharp minor—G sharp is going to be our secondary dominant, which is going to be the five of six.

So now, instead of just playing one:

[Music]

into six, I can create a secondary dominant leading into it:

[Music]

So you can feel the tension into that chord. Right before we had just:

[Music]

but now it sounds like this:

[Music]

Right, so it’s a little more interesting now.

Adding Secondary Dominants

Our next chord is supposed to be the second degree, F sharp minor, but we’re going to also add a secondary dominant into that. So a fifth above, which is just like a fourth below:

[Music]

is going to be C sharp. We’re going to make it a C sharp seven because then we get even more tension because of this tritone over here. Now, this really wants to resolve into the second degree, F sharp minor.

Before and After

So here’s a before and after so far:

[Music]

And here’s with the secondary dominants:

[Music]

Five of two.

Adding Sus4 Chords

Now I can make it a five of five, and then instead of just going into the five, I can make a sus four chord on that one. So a sus four chord is taking the third from any chord and just pushing it up a step:

[Music]

Creating this tension within the chord of like a sus4:

[Music]

So it adds a movement of tension within that chord:

[Music]

I can also make that a B7 and then resolve it back. So here’s the result:

  • One
  • Five of six
  • Six
  • Five of two
  • Two
  • Of five
  • Five sus four

[Music]

  • Five seven
  • And back to one

Adding Tensions

So now I can take that four progression and start adding some tensions to it. So for example, I can make this chord a major seven. I really like adding nines to my major seven chords, so I really enjoyed this voicing:

[Music]

For the five of six, the G7, I’m going to add an 11 and also a flat 13, which is a really interesting sound, really cool because you get also this suspension of the 11 but also this alteration like augmented alteration from the open E string. So we have this:

[Music]

And then we’re going to go to the sixth degree. I’m going to add a nine, and I can also add a major seven into it:

[Music]

Advanced Chord Voicings

And then when making that chord a 7 chord as the five of two, I can make it a sharp nine chord, C7 sharp nine. So we get this:

[Music]

Really cool voicing, which is an inversion of the Hendrix chord:

[Music]

So so far we have this:

[Music]

Oh interesting. Then, you know, taking that into the F sharp minor, I can make it an F sharp minor 7 with an 11:

[Music]

And then:

[Music]

A dominant 7 with an 11:

[Music]

And then when I go into B sus4, I can make it a sus4 with a nine. In the case of my voicing, it’s going to be A over B, which gives me the root, the seven, the nine, and the eleven. And then when going to B7, I can— I really like this voicing, which gives me the root, the seven, the flat nine, the third, and the six.

Diminished Scale

Which is, if you know the dominant diminished scale—if you’re not sure what dominant diminished means, the diminished scale is a really magical scale. If you’re not sure about it, you can check out—I made a special video about just the diminished scale on this channel.

[Music]

And then you can resolve it back.

Final Comparison

So let’s do it before and after. Okay, let’s do it in three levels. The first level was what I just played when I started the video, which is:

[Music]

Just first degree into sixth degree:

[Music]

Then second degree into fifth degree.

Adding Secondary Dominants and Sus4

Right, now the second level was just adding some secondary dominants, so we had this:

[Music]

And then I did the sus4 into B7 resolving.

Final Level with Tensions

Now the final level, the third level, is where I started to go with my imagination and creativity and I added notes to those chords, right? So adding tension and some colors. So we get:

[Music]

[Laughter]

So this is really just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to harmony, but it’s a great place to start and understand the amount of potential that you can find when thinking about harmony. Hopefully, this was useful for you. Once again, love bringing you these kinds of stuff, and I’ll see you in the next video.

How To Spice Up Simple Chord Progressions

Are you tired of playing the same old simple chord progressions that lack excitement and creativity? Do you want to spice up your music and take it to the next level?

Well, you’re in luck because today we’re going to learn how to turn a simple chord progressions like 1 6 2 5 chord progression into an interesting and harmonically rich piece of music.

The first thing to understand is that in music, we have tension and resolution in our case today a tonic chord and other chords that eventually want to bring us to a dominant chord, which wants to resolve back to the tonic.

So how can we make this progression more interesting? Let’s start by adding some secondary dominant.

Instead of going straight into the sixth degree, we can aim for a secondary dominant, which is going to be located just a fourth below our target (or a 5th above). In this case, C# minor is our target, and the secondary dominant is G#, which is going to be the V/Vi.

So that means, instead of just playing I into Vi, we created a secondary dominant leading into that diatonic degree.

You can feel the tension in that chord, wanting to resolve to the Vi, and it sounds a little bit more interesting.

The next chord in the progression is supposed to be the 2nd degree F# minor (ii) , but we’re going to add a secondary dominant into that as well (V/ii)  C#. in our case today C#7 the 7 in add even more tension to our dominant chord.

Adding a secondary dominant gives us more depth and complexity to the progression.

Let’s Take This Progression A Step Further

to add more tension we can suspend note within the chords, for example Sus4 chords. A Sus4 chord is taking the third from any chord and just pushing it up a step, creating this tension within the chord, adding beautiful movement and tension within the chord. 

We can take the progression forward and start adding some tensions to it. All this and plenty of ideas and demonstrations I show in the video so make sure you watch it to the ends, a few times even. 

In conclusion, adding secondary dominant, Suspending chords, and adding tension notes to simple chord progressions can make them extremely more interesting and harmonically rich. and This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to harmony, but it’s a great place to start and understand the amount of potential that you can find when thinking about harmony. Hopefully, this was useful for you, and you can.

Daniel Weiss