Hi all, I’m in the beginning steps of learning guitar. hands are very broken in, chords sound good, I know a few from 1st to 5th but I wanted a better understand of the progressions.
if it better to follow c, d , e, e# etc… or c, g, a? or would it depend on the music? I’m focusing heavy on bluegrass. Doc Watson is a big focus for my end style, or Billy strings.
i currently practice/play about 4 hours a day 7 days a week. (a lot I know) my focus is flat picking and finger style mostly rather then traditional strumming.
does any.one have and good guides or books I should read up on for how to do good proper cord progressions? even a simple info graphic that is easily understandable for a beginner?
I’m focusing mostly right now on chord runs. C is memorized and working on getting some others that can meld with the c run.
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Learn a lot of Bluegrass songs and you’ll get a feel for what chords go together - Bluegrass does not tend to use a lot of Jazz chords, but you will need a capo.
Look at the white keys on a piano, starting at C (white key next to the two black keys rather than three). The intervals between those white keys are TTSTTTS (tones and semitones). If you play C-E-G, you get a Cmajor chord. Now, if you take those three fingers and work your way up the keys, always skipping one key, the chords you will get are C, Dm, Em, F, G, Am, Bdim, and back to C.
If you start at any note on the keyboard, and figure out the TTSTTTS pattern from there (G is an easy one, the notes of the G Diatonic Scale are G-A-B-C-D-E-F# and back to G - the farther away you get from C in the circle of fifths, the more Flats or Sharps (Accidentals) will be in the scale),
Anyways, you can follow that same pattern and you’ll that same sequence of Maj-Min-Min-Maj-Maj-Min-Dim, which are called Diatonic Chords. Basically, all these chords fit together beautifully with each other, in various combinations, with the most common set being the I-IV-V, which in C corresponds to C, F and G - the roman numerals refer to the chord you find at a given step in the diatonic chord scale. So for the G scale, your chords would be G-Am-Bm-C-D-Em-F#dim.
But there are all kinds of ways to mess with that basic harmonious formula, that I will not get into here, but find yourself a good theory course and go all the way through it. But mostly, learn those Bluegrass classics, and realize just how many are mostly I-IV-Vs with some tricky little bits thrown in here and there - it’s not Jazz and never tries to be, though there is virtuosity everywhere.
I found this general theory series really helpful. Doesn’t matter that he uses piano, it’s universal, just a bit easier to visual on a keyboard
I read online that you can incorporate shifts like V-I at the end of a bar, and usage of I-vi and II-V are common in your genre. For C major, this means:
G-C C-Gm D-G
And here is a simple guide on why the Roman numerals and what they mean. You have to apply the number in the sequence to the correct note and then correspond it to a chord. Lowercase for minor chords.
Good luck!
thank you, I’ll read up on it. the Roman numerals threw me for a loop which is when I make this post.
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