Songs To Analyze

MikeS

Student Of The Blues
Staff member
Proud Mary (Not sure how the intro fits in, so just look at the verses & Chorus) C G Am
Across The Universe the F#m has me stumped. D F#m Em7 A7 Gm
All My Loving Em A7 D Bm G C
Peaceful Easy Feeling E A B F#m7
Already Gone F C Bb
Authority Song D G A
Baby I love Your Way Stumped B Ebm Abm E A7 Dbm Gb7
 
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JPsuff

Blackstar Artist
I can't speak to the other tunes but Baby I Love Your Way is one of my favorite strummers and I've always played it in G.

The progression is:

Verse:
G, D/F#, Em, C, F7 (x2) then Cm, Bm, E7, Am, D7 (or just D) and then the chorus is just G, D, Am, C.

The two chords I love most in the verse are the D/F# which creates the "walk down" that makes it "Frampton" along with the subtle change from Em in the first part of the verse to E7 in the second part which sets up the Am, D7 which then transitions perfectly to the chorus.

It's the subtle things that make a tune a classic! : )
 

MarkKnudsen

Liver & Onions
MikeS, Good start at discussion based on yesterday's "Theory" webinar.

Proud Mary: I agree with you on the intro to Proud Mary; don't know where those intro chords fit into the song key. I've always played "PM" in D with D, A, & Bm (I, V, & vi which is the same as your progression in C).

Across the Universe: I think the Gm is just the "Beatles iv chord" - normally would be major and in the chorus, they go back to a G major. The F#m is just the iii (minor) chord in the key of D (since key of D has two sharps, F# & C#).
 

JestMe

Student Of The Blues
I missed the webinar but it sounds like it was interesting. I'll have to catch it via the archive.
 

Paleo

Student Of The Blues
Just listened to Proud Mary. The recording I have is "approximately" in D. I think it's slowed down slightly.

Anyway...

The intro: C A C A C A G F D

5 Major Chords!!! Obviously not all in one Key.

D Major would be:

D Em F#m G A Bm C#mb5

So C would be a bVII?
A = V
G = IV
F a bIII?
D = I

Would bIII and or bVII be considered "borrowed" from the Natural Minor or Dorian? Both have a bIII & bVII.

The verse is a D chord (I)
Chorus A (V) to Bm (vi) to D (I)

This part is the same as Mike's C G Am, just a whole step up.
 

david moon

Attempting the Blues
Just listened to Proud Mary. The recording I have is "approximately" in D. I think it's slowed down slightly.

Anyway...

The intro: C A C A C A G F D

5 Major Chords!!! Obviously not all in one Key.

D Major would be:

D Em F#m G A Bm C#mb5

So C would be a bVII?
A = V
G = IV
F a bIII?
D = I

Would bIII and or bVII be considered "borrowed" from the Natural Minor or Dorian? Both have a bIII & bVII.

The verse is a D chord (I)
Chorus A (V) to Bm (vi) to D (I)

This part is the same as Mike's C G Am, just a whole step up.
Are you sure the A in the intro is major? If it was minor I would just consider the intro in the key C, and then landing at a new tonal center D for the verse.

If the A is major maybe it is a foreshadowing of the coming D ( the V of D.)
 

Paleo

Student Of The Blues
I think of other songs like "In The Midnight Hour" that also just "walk down the fretboard" in Major chords for the intro.

Maybe Fogerty was actually doing an homage to that song when he wrote "Proud Mary"?

Anyway, I think it might be one of those situations where you can't fit something nicely into a key.

At least for the intro.
 

Paleo

Student Of The Blues
From Wikipedia:

In the Macintosh program "Garage Band", Fogerty explained that he liked Beethoven's Fifth Symphony and wanted to open a song with a similar intro, implying the way "Proud Mary" opens with the repeated C chord to A chord.
 

Paleo

Student Of The Blues
Maybe we should also look at "Midnight Hour"
Key of E:

Intro "walk-down":

D-B-A-G

If you play these chords in the "Proud Mary-Beethoven rhythm", D D D B D D D B D D D B A G it would be the exact same progression one whole step higher.

Then:

E-A (x10)
B-A (x2)
D-B
 
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Griff

Vice Assistant General Manager
Staff member
Well, luckily, you don't have to solo over the intro to Proud Mary... so I've never really analyzed it that closely.

To move a major chord by a 3rd (either major or minor 3rd) is called a chromatic mediant move (The "mediant" is the fancy name for the iii chord, FYI.)

It comes up a lot in blues when you think about stuff like La Grange going from A to C to D, which comes from John Lee Hooker doing it from E to G to A. In "China Grove" by the Doobie Brothers, the last part of the verse right before the chorus goes from A to C also - it's fairly common in modern music.

So the C A C A C A at the top of Proud Mary is called a chromatic mediant, that's easy to name. The A, G, F part is what I call the "Lola" progression because Lola is the first time I saw it (C D E at the beginning of the song.)

However, we could also bring in some jazz theory - the rule is that any minor chord can be made into a 7th chord (and a major chord is just 3/4 of a dominant 7th chord) so you could say it's a I VI I VI I VI V IV in C - and that's probably how I'd describe it to someone if I had to.

From the last F it jumps to D and then clearly moves to that key for a while. F to D is, again, a chromatic mediant relationship so that's not hard to accept.

Once on the D, the verse is D for a while, A, Bmin which is all in the key of D easily. Fortunately, if you solo over this tune that's what you'll solo over and it's straightforward. In the Tina Turner version (which we play in Yard Sale) it's D, then A, Bmin, G, and I usually play the G as a G7 which distorts the key center even more but I like it and I think I hear it in there somewhere so I do it.

That's about all I got on that one - it's a pretty oddball chord progression... almost more of a melody or a riff than a chord progression.
 
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