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Posted by: crushpuppy Nov 15 2011, 11:07 PM

Ok I'm pretty sure I already know the answer to this but i'll ask anyway.

When you have a chord progression in a "minor" key is it always related back to the relative "Major" key to define the chord progression?

Say we have this progression -

A min - F Maj - C Maj - G Maj

In the the relative "Major" key it would be a ( vi - IV - I - V ) in the key of C - Major

But....

Is it ever looked at as a ( I - vi - iii- vii ) in the key of A min?

Just curious


Thanks

Posted by: Daniel Realpe Nov 15 2011, 11:47 PM

It is looked as ( I - vi - iii- vii ) in the key of A min.

Why? Because the tonal center is Am not C.

Major and minor are two different worlds so to speak. Yes, you can relate them but there's only one tonal center at a time.

Posted by: crushpuppy Nov 16 2011, 12:03 AM

Thanks Daniel!
I was a bit confused on this.
I knew the tonal center in A min but not sure of the correct way to "spell" the progression.

Posted by: Gabriel Leopardi Nov 16 2011, 03:01 AM

It's like Daniel said.. and the same happens with the different modes..

Posted by: The Professor Jan 28 2013, 06:00 PM

Yeah, it can be tough sometimes to distinguish between major and minor keys, especially when both chords, like your C and Am, are in the progression.

A quick trick you can use is to look at the first and last chord of the progression. If it ends on C it will probably be in C, and if it ends in Am then it's probably in Am, same for the starting chord.

This isn't always the case, but it can be a good starting point when finding the key of a progression. If it doesn't line up that cleanly then you can dig deeper from there, but a good place to start.

Posted by: PosterBoy Jan 29 2013, 10:26 AM

I could be wrong but just to add the Nashville Number system always references the major scale chord intervals.

Can someone clarify this?

Posted by: klasaine Jan 29 2013, 04:59 PM

Indeed it does 99% of the time.
A song with the chord prog: Am C Dm E7 (quasi House of the Rising Sun) would be written in NN: 6 1 2m 3⁷

*and exception would be a one minor chord modal jam ... which you don't hear a whole lot in country and western music.

Posted by: clamps Feb 1 2013, 06:34 PM

the answer to the question is yes. Sometimes those chords would be seen like that (in schenkerian analysis of certain types of music) but it would be represented with capital roman numerals for major chords and regular numerals for minor chords like this: (note that there is also a b to represent a flat symbol....the interval distance has changed so that must be reflected in our analysis)

i bVI bIII bVII (i) in the key of am: Am F C G6/9 (one, flat six, flat seven, flat three)

I suppose that to fully investigate, I'd suggest adding sevenths to those triads.
again, that would be Am7 Fmaj7, Cmaj7 and G7

For example, I was working on some voice leading through this progression and I came up with an interesting rising inner voice for the chords AmMaj7 Fmaj7/A Cmaj7 Gmaj79

the inner voice goes G# A B A

I guess it's something to think about