Holdsworth Chords part one

Here is my video on chords in the style of Allan Holdsworth. Check it out for some interesting guitar chords.

Breaking down different genres

Today's post is about how to break down different types of music so you can learn from them or just straight copy them. Last week I talked about why you should learn different types of music and today I'll go over how. Music has a few elements and if you can figure out how each applies to a genre you can usually come up with something that comes pretty close to that style.

The first thing you should do is listen to a variety of songs in that style. Then answer the following questions below for your chosen genre.

1). Instrumentation 

What instrument a are used in this genre? In rock music it will usually be drums, electric bass, electric guitar, and vocals. Of course some sub-genres will have keyboards, horns, etc this is the generic rock sounds. Of course it's great to experiment and add or subtract instruments, but the more you do this the less it will sound like the original genre. I've heard, double basses, glockenspiels, violins and saxophones in rock music, but a song consisting of only those instrument a won't be rocking very hard.

2). Rhythm

What time signatures does it use? Are the songs mostly 3/4, 4/4, 12/8, etc? What rhythms do the drums play? Is the bass drum on 1 & 3? Is the snare drum on 2 & 4? What rhythms is the keyboard playing? Whole notes, syncopated 16th notes, steady 8th notes, etc. Answer these questions for every instrument and you should come up with something that sounds close to the genre you've chosen. Also keep in mind the tempo. You won't find many slow 40bpm metal songs or 270bpm disco songs. 

3). Melody

Are the songs mostly fast with a lot of movement in the melody or do they have lots of long sustained notes. Does the melody stay around the same few notes or does it go from very high notes to very low notes. Even the scale can be important. What would the blues be without the blues scale. When trying to replicate music from other cultures this is even more important. Ex. If you want to make music with a middle eastern flavor try the harmonic minor scale(its 5th mode).

4). Harmony

Many types of music have common chord progressions and by using them you"ll can save yourself a lot of time. Some genres such as the blues are defined by their chords. Some genres such as funk will can stay on 1 chord for the whole song, while a jazz song might go through 2 chords and 1 key every measure. A lot of ethnic music(non-European) doesn't use chords at all. They'll drone on one tone and use that instead of a chords.

5). Form

The form of a song is very important too. The blues form is usually 12 bars that repeats indefinitely, where as jazz is usually AABA. Study these forms and it will help you understand how these genres work. Modern dance music usually has a laid back intro that moves into a slightly higher energy section. Then comes the riser and finally the drop. After that there is a cool down section and then finally another drop. The reason this form exists is because it helps hype people up, but still gives them time to rest so they aren't going hard for 7 min straight. With jazz you don't have to worry about this, so different forms are used.

6). Nuance

This is one of the more difficult parts to get right. Every genre has certain ways they do things and if you don't adhere to them your music will sound inauthentic. Think of an opera singer and and R&B singer. If you took the best singers in each genre and switched their songs it would be a disaster. The way each uses vibrato, bends etc. is completely different. As another example think of the violin and the fiddle. These little things can make all the difference and if you want to add the flavor of another genre to your music, this is the 1st place you should look.

This was a basic over view of how to break down different genres, but next time I'll try to actually give an example. Until then leave a comment below and if you'd like to request a genre breakdown let me know.

Why diversify your musical portfolio?

  Today I'd like to talk about the benefits of not only listening to different types of music, but also trying to make it.

Imagine if you lived in a world where all you could eat was food from your area. Just think of how boring that would be and how quickly you'd get sick of the same 4 or 5 foods. 

Most people understand expanding their taste pallet, but won't try the same thing when it comes to music. Although there are people who listen to different types of music, there aren't many people who try to make different types of music. I'll list some reasons to try making different types of music.

1). The more types you can make the more work you can get.

2).  99% of creativity is combining different things together. The more you know the more combinations.

3).  You can play with more people.

4). What you learn from one type of music can be carried over to another.

5).  It's fun to learn new things.

I know this was a short post, but next time I'll talk about the how part of learning new styles of music.

Chasing Holdsworth's tone

      The first time I heard Allan Holdsworth I was 16 years old. I remember reading online someplace that he was a completely unique player that resembled John Coltrane on guitar. Being a huge fan of Coltrane I thought I'd check him out. I bought 'Metal Fatigue' on LP for about $2 despite the fact that I didn't have a record player(nobody was listening to records anymore back then). Luckily my uncle had one and I remember thinking it sounded a bit dated, but interesting. Then it got to the solo and I was blown away. As I listened to more songs on the album I couldn't believe what I was hearing. The tone, the technique, the melodic-ism, the harmonies. It was all so impressive and it still is. It took me a long time to figure out how to get close to his tone. It's not exact, but hopefully I can help some people get close to his tone. Anyway here is the video explanation of how I go about getting his tone.

If you don't want to listen to the explanation just watch this, which is just the demo songs.

If you enjoyed these videos subscribe to the Chandlerguitar youtube page.

Songwriting: melody first

Last time I talked about starting with chords and then adding a melody. This time we're going to reverse that and start with a melody.

Obviously you can just do this by ear, but there is a faster way. First find the key of your melody. After that's done try to determine if your melody is major, minor or perhaps some sort of modal tonality. Once you know this, look at your melody and try to find the strong notes of each measure. Here is a melody I composed quickly. It's in the key of C major,

I'm sure you're thinking, how do I know which ones are the strong notes. Look for long notes, notes that occurs on down beats or notes that are repeated. Of course use your ears, but in general those tips will help you identify them. Here are what I chose as the strong notes, but keep in mind this is more art than science, so it's possible to come up with different notes than what I have here.

Now you should have 1 or perhaps 2 strong notes for every measure of you melody. Once you have that look at the chords in the key you found before. Take the notes that make up the chord and assign them to measures containing those strong notes. Of course this doesn't have to be random. Use your ears and think of common progressions that sound good. After you've done that insert the chords into your song and see if it fits your melody.

I think it's best to consider the overall key and common chord movements. For example have the 1st chord be the Root major chord of the key and have the last be the V major chord of the key. Check out my post on common chord progressions for ideas. That said, you can try some new ideas and try to come up with something a little more original. Here I added some 7th chords with extensions to get a different sound.

Ultimately you have to decide for yourself though and as I always say let your ear be your guide. Also another method to use when there are few long notes is to look for arpeggios inside the melody as often then can be you guide. That's it for this article. I hope it helped and if you have any questions, leave them below.

Songwriting: Chords first