What key?

Totally non essential information

dintymoore said:
9 times out of 10 (at least) the final chord of a song is the key the song is in.
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I once read that on the 2nd side of Revolver {the English version}, the first four songs end in a different key than that which the song began in.
Wah~hay !
 
themdla said:
fifths.gif


this may also help... maybe


Notice that..... E major has 4 #'s and B Major has 5 #'s (the difference is the A or A#)

your song, depending on weather or not A is natural or sharp, is in either of these key signatures.

but if you play in B major and start on E (aka 4th degree of B major) (like the first note/chord of your song) then you will be playing E Lydian.


confused yet?
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Utterly. Truly. Madly. Deeply.
 
dintymoore said:
All dead on.

It should be noted too that there are times when you can play a "bad note" and not resolve it and it can sound fine.

I played with an old jazz pianist and when he saw a C chord he'd be playing clusters of notes around C and it was amazing what "bad " notes he could use that sounded musically cool.

I think the secret isn't "what note?" but "when?".
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This thinking is how I taught myself how to play the piano and most of what I know of guitar, Its to a point where practice makes the bad notes less frequent. and hey! who cares how your playing it, if what your playing sounds great. And if the bad notes come out too often call it atonal and youll still be loved :D
 
Y'all are off a couple of notes, chord #1 has an F#, chord #2 has a C#. I hear it as B/E, F#sus4/E, C#sus4. I think the progression needs an E#dim (really C#7) real bad ;)

With the implied Emaj9 you could lean that way, although I think it wants to resolve to F# myself . . . with no thirds, you can go a lot of different directions . . .
 
????

mshilarious said:
Y'all are off a couple of notes, chord #1 has an F#, chord #2 has a C#. I hear it as B/E, F#sus4/E, C#sus4. I think the progression needs an E#dim (really C#7) real bad ;)

With the implied Emaj9 you could lean that way, although I think it wants to resolve to F# myself . . . with no thirds, you can go a lot of different directions . . .
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you know he's not in standard tuning right?

he's in drop d tuning....

where is f# coming from in the 1st chord?
 
E lydian

now that i've gotten home and played your chords i def think you should choose A# and play in E lydian.
 
themdla said:
you know he's not in standard tuning right?

he's in drop d tuning....

where is f# coming from in the 1st chord?
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The first string, second fret . . .

I think it's a toss-up between F# mixolydian and E lydian, could go either way; I wanted to play with B & F# tonality myself, which means tossing in an E# every now and again . . .
 
themdla said:
... hey how do you do that triangle thing? (i just copied yours)
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To get the triangle, on my Mac you hold down the option (or Alt) key while you press a "J".

There's a few useful characters you get while holding the option/alt key and hitting other letters, like ∆ ˚ Ω ® © √

Greg_L said:
Will there ever be a day when people finally get over the fucking Beatles?
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I recall a George Harrison interview in the 80's when he said pretty much exactly that, his view was "get over it".
 
Ok this is confusing as fuck :P i hoped it would be alot more strait forward than this. But In summary so far wat ive grasped is that The key is Amaj and the theoretically (Wow thats a real word?) correct scale to use over this would be E Lydian?
xxx
 
No! You are definitely not in A, unless you add a few thirds in there to clarify. But your progression basically wants to resolve to F#maj, so I say F# mixolydian.

Now you could screw with that tonality and make it go somewhere else, you don't really have many thirds so there is a lot of tension and not much resolution. For example, you could change up the chords to something that was more straightforward F# for the chorus, and even F#m-->A for a bridge or something
 
I suspect that all the chords mentioned are major chords and that the numbers he wrote down are meaningless. Looks to me like a power-chord-type rock song in E.

People will get over the Beatles around the same time they get over Bach.
 
billabob said:
Ok this is confusing as fuck :P i hoped it would be alot more strait forward than this. But In summary so far wat ive grasped is that The key is Amaj and the theoretically (Wow thats a real word?) correct scale to use over this would be E Lydian?
xxx
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I'll be blunt: this is insane thinking! You can write any song out in any key. Your song could be in C. You can use any scale over any progression. There are never any notes that don't work.

I really question this whole thing of "what scales can I use" etc... it's unmusical thinking.

There is, and never will be "a correct scale to use". All notes work.

The only scale you need to know is the chromatic scale, and you can learn that in 10 seconds - there! End of scales. Don't think scales!!!

Best advice I have - use your ear. You cannot "logic" what to play - we're musicians, not scientists.

I've played with musicians who think scales and theory and they suck! Sorry to be blunt but I discourage people from this "Mr. Spock learns how to play guitar" type of art logic.

I know music theory (I'd rather call it nuts and bolts) but I play 100% by ear.
 
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