ColorMusic
Art • Music • Education
223 | Playing with Chord Substitutions
exploring harmony
July 05, 2023
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These are the diagrams that accompany the live stream about Playing with Chord Substitutions. There's a logic to the patterns of progressions -- and these examples help to clarify.

VIDEO:

https://youtube.com/live/AcgMgeI7E8o

DIAGRAMS:

Chord substitutions are used to add interest and variety to the songs you write. This is the rule of thumb when substituting certain chords for others in a progression:

To know which chords share common tones, it helps to see how harmonies are constructed in a given key -- where each is built by combining every other note from the underlying scale.

In the key of C, for example, 7 distinct chords are constructed by starting on each respective note and playing every other note -- or what musicians call intervals of major-thirds and minor-thirds (a.k.a. "tertian" intervals).

The loop at the bottom of this imagey takes this alternating pattern of tertian intervals and wraps them into a "circle of thirds." This loop shows how the 7 chords of a key form a daisy chain pattern of overlapping chords -- with each pair of neighboring chords sharing two common tones.

Because all 12 keys in music are cyclical and symmetrical, these same patterns apply to the key of G, for example ... and all other keys as well:

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221 | Welcome to the ColorMusic Library!

Hello. This is the place to access all ColorMusic resources on music theory for songwriting: https://www.mycolormusic.com/

Most of the content is only available to Supporters here on Locals (I love you).

You can find all the materials directly here on Locals:
https://mikegeorge.locals.com/content/articles/playlists

But mycolormusic.com is easier to navigate. So definitely check it out. This video explains HOW TO NAVIGATE THE PLAYLISTS. Cheers!

00:02:34
Tips for Breaking in your ColorMusic ChordMap
00:04:01
February 11, 2024
269 | Lesson 19 - Quick Update

Hey there. I worked on Lesson 19 (Circle of Fifths) all day yesterday. Here's a short update that we filmed last night. Enjoy!

00:00:33
November 02, 2024
301 | The guitar's standard tuning - EXPLAINED

Hey, all -- check out the latest video on Youtube. It's now live!

Hello everyone!

Has anyone done a color analysis of songs written by the band King Crimson? It would be amazing to see any of their songs looked at and understood using the color wheel to understand their unique and complex music.

Adrian

October 18, 2024

Hey, i love this and have some cuestions for the course. for lesson 1 exersices we are told to play each C note or each A note and so on for the 12 notes. how long should one wait between going from one lesson to another? lesson 1 exersices says play each c note on the fret and so on. should we learn this religiousily now? og do it a couple of time but then we will learn it better during other exersizses later on. so the mail question is how long to exersice untill going to the next lesson

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227 | Why Use Colors AND Shapes
a better look at music theory

Music theory is NOT confusing ... but the SYMBOLS people typically use to understand it are.

In this video, we look at how to quickly understand the patterns of music using COLORS and SHAPES.

https://youtube.com/live/mSWUhD0wDiQ

In other posts here, I explain the benefit of color to see music theory. But people often ask, “… but what’s up with the shapes? Why also use these alternating squares and circles?”

So here’s a synopsis of why the shapes are so helpful, which summarizes key points in the video.

Traditionally, musicians try to picture the invisible patterns of sound using uniform black dots … along with letter and number symbols:

The result is a visually complex system of blotches and squiggles that’s confusing and even counterintuitive.

But when you get down to it, the two most fundamental labels used to communicate musical ideas is those letters and numbers.

  • LETTERS that represent the 12 individual notes in music, and
  • NUMBERS that indicate the different intervals between the notes

And together, these two symbol sets — letters and numbers — are meant to illustrate the musical relationships or patterns, which is what music is all about.

 

 

But while the letters do at least a decent job of distinguishing each note from the next — like C versus C# versus D, etc. — the colors visually clarify which notes are which more vividly and immediately.

And the color-note assignments here are based on applying the color wheel to the circle of fifths — where both patterns follow the exact same structure and sequence.

For example, in the center image below, the major scales of each key overlap in music to form the circle of fifths. And just as all the keys in music form this daisy-chain pattern, all the colors in the color wheel also bleed seamlessly into one another....

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November 15, 2024
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Song Insight | Q&A

Join us for this new Song Insight -- breaking down a classic tune. All using the power of music theory (and the ChordMap), followed by a Q&A.

We're hanging out via live stream Saturday, November 16 at 9:00 a.m. (Mountain). Chat Live or post questions on Locals in advance.

This Open Hour is for supporters. THANK YOU!

Here's a link to the song PDF: 

And here's the link to join:

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November 01, 2024
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Open Hour - Saturday, November 2

Lesson 19 is out! And, to talk about it, we're hanging out via live stream Saturday, November 2 at 9:00 a.m. (Mountain). Chat Live or post questions on Locals in advance.

This Open Hour is for supporters. THANK YOU!

Here's the link to join:

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