Songwriting Questions, Chord Progressions, modes, etc. Options

[Capt.Z]

I need help from a guitar player I have questions.
And I want simple answers an idiot like me can understand.

1. How do you write a song? I mean the chord progressions, the key..
hows it work??

2. The Mode. Can it change in a song? Like for a solo or something?

3. Scales. Lets say a song is written in D major.
if the chord progression is like..
D-D-A-D do you use the D major scale than at
the "A" part use the A major scale???

sorry if these questions are confusing... I'm confused..

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[JeroenKole]

To shamelessly quote Marcus L

"If it sounds good, it is good"

Keep jamming and suddenly something good comes out of it like an chord progression. Record it and work on the song from that on. Tabbing it out works well too.

hope you understand.

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[Slammer]

You should check out Ivan great lesson on Songwriting, it explains a bit about Theory as well,

https://www.guitarmasterclass.net/misc-less...writing-lesson/

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[Ivan Milenkovic]

You obviously haven't understood mode theory properly mate, no worries I'll try to explain, and for details you can go to Andrew's theory lessons:

1. To write a song it is useful to know the chords you are going to use. This can be very helpful when making a progression. Chords within a key are derived from notes in a scale.

For example D major key -

D major scale - D E F# G A B C# ,

you have 7 chords that you can use

Dmajor, Eminor, F#minor, Gmajor, Amajor, Bminor, C#diminished chord.

For a good example check out my Songwriting Lesson

2. Modes are scales within a key. If we use D major key you have 7 modes within that key.

D ionian
E dorian
F# phrygian
G lydian
A mixolydian
B aeolian
C# locrian

All these 7 scales are different because they have different whole tone-semitone layout between the notes. Ionian mode is major scale, and aeolian mode is natural minor scale. So for example:

if you play Bminor chord in D major key, B minor scale will sound perfect over it,

if you play G major chord in D key, G lydian mode will sound perfect over it.
if you play G major chord and play G major scale (ionian) over it it will not sound to perfect because you have F note there, and in G lydian you have F#. So you would change the key then to G major key in theory.

3. Let's take your example now and apply the above:

We play Dmajor - Amajor chord progression

This kind of simple progression allows you to use 2 keys -

(1) D major
(2) A major.

(1) In Dmajor key, D note is the first note, and A note is the fifth note. (D E F# G A B C#)
This means that you can use Dmajor scale (ionian) over D major and A mixolydian over Amajor.

(2)In Amajor key, D note is the 4th note, and A note is the first note. (A B C# D E F# G#)
This means that you can use D lydian mode over D major and A major scale (ionian) over A major.

So the answer to your question is YES, you can combine both keys, as long as you keep the progression simple and use chords with tri tones only. If you throw in 7th note and build 7th chords then, it would be obvious what the key is.

Hope this helps, if you have more questions, feel free to ask.

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[audiopaal]

I agree on the "If it sounds good, it is good" part

I almost never think about modes, scales or chord progressions when I write songs.
Usually I just end up playing something cool while practicing and find other riffs that go along well with it in my ears
When I get the rythm section of a song done I usually go straight to melodylines or small solos that fits the song, again not thinking about theory
I've always trusted my ears when it comes to songwriting, and that along with the fact that I never took any guitar lessons might be the reason I never learned to much theory

I'm planning on learning some theory now though, but just because I want to know more about it, not because I think I need it to write songs


But it's always useful to know theory, so if I could go back in time and know what I know now, I'd probaby learn some more theory to begin with..

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[Nemanja Filipovi...]

I think Ivan made some beautiful explenations there,I think there are few things that make progression as is.of course all the rules stands,but,try to sing one line melody with out guitar and the latter add guitar,the progression will adapt to your melody(so,thats the one that you dont think of chord progression,she is just coming a long).
And there is the system where the melodies are made in relation to chord progression,in that way you need to learn the rules good(and break them some times).Before you go to complex playing on guitar it is always good to know progression you want to use.

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[kjutte]

I need help from a guitar player I have questions.
And I want simple answers an idiot like me can understand.

1. How do you write a song? I mean the chord progressions, the key..
hows it work??

2. The Mode. Can it change in a song? Like for a solo or something?

3. Scales. Lets say a song is written in D major.
if the chord progression is like..
D-D-A-D do you use the D major scale than at
the "A" part use the A major scale???

sorry if these questions are confusing... I'm confused..

Firstly, you gotta define your root. D and A can mean many root characteristics.
Let's say you're in Aminor.

Amin has these notes:

A B C D E F G.

That means you can for example use your D5 A5 powerchord progression.
OR, you can make it a complete minor progression

Minor has this chord sequence: Minor, Diminished, Major, Minor, Minor, Major, Major
That means we'll have this:

Amin Bdim Cmaj Dmin Emin Fmaj Gmaj.

However, in your D A progression, as I said, that can be alot. Many scales have D5 and A5 notes in them, so you can choose!
The easiest way to get this down is to learn the majorscale and its chords.

And to your mode question, yes, they can change whenever you want.
To change the mode, you have to change your chord progression (mostly)

But this is really a bit hard topic!

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