Vertical Pitch Organization

Chords
By playing more than two notes together, instead of one after another, we make chords. The common chords used in pop music mainly consist of three notes, using the intervals of a third and a fifth
you can also think of this as 2 thirds stacked on top of each other.

C Major Chord

I in the key of C major

Chords
Chords come in a variety of flavors, depending on exactly what intervals they are made up of. The most common flavors are Major - happy Minor - sad

Chords
We can label chords by using the step number of the diatonic scale that they are built on as a reference. It is convenient to use Roman numerals for this, as they have upper and lower case versions.
upper case for major lower case for minor

F Major Chord

IV in the key of C major

G Major Chord

V in the key of C major

D minor

ii in the key of C major

A minor

vi in the key of C major

E minor

Chords
If we build a scale on the note C, the notes and their corresponding chord references are C-I D - ii E - iii F - IV G-V A - vi B - vii

Chord Progressions
In most common music, the music will start with one chord, then proceed to a number of other chords, and will eventually end up at the beginning again.

Chord Progressions
In most western classical music, pop music and jazz, harmonic progressions can be seen as a way to reinforce the tonic key. The progressions can be conceptually reduced to movement between

I-V-I

Chord Progressions
Music theorists have developed a scheme for producing what is considered strong progressions, derived from classical music practices. We can use this technique in pop oriented music, without really understanding it, to create viable chord progressions!!!

Strong Chord Progressions

vi vi I iii IV V I ii

You can leave out the chords in the 2nd and 3rd columns

Chord Progressions
For our purposes Each progression should be a multiple of 4 bars in length There should only be one or two chord changes in a bar at max. We shouldnt hold the same chord for longer than eight bars!

Other Chord Progressions

There are many other ways to construct chord progressions, especially in folk, blues and rock styles. In some styles, the I-V-I concept is not present at all!
Songs like Smoke on the water do not have the V chord at all.

12 bar blues progression

A very common chord progression used in pop, rock and blues, which is NOT a functional progression.

||: I IV V

|IV
|IV

|I
|I

|I
|I

|IV

|I

|V

| | :||

Each | represents the end of a bar.

12 bar blues progression in C

||: C F G

|F |F |F

|C |C |C

|C |C |G

| | :||

12 bar blues progression in G

||: G C D

|C |C |C

|G |G |G

|G |G |D

| | :||