The first chord isn’t always the key of a song
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- Опубліковано 10 тра 2024
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My video on songs with NO tonic chord: • Songs that never go to...
Although most songs will begin on their tonic chord, the home chord of the key, many songs don't and there is certainly a special feel, a momentum, to songs that don't start on the tonic.
The outro music to this video is my track "Kneel" which you can hear in full on Spotify: open.spotify.com/artist/0wKKJ... 🎶
And, an extra special thanks goes to Peter Keller, Douglas Lind, Vidad Flowers, Ivan Pang, Waylon Fairbanks, Jon Dye, Austin Russell, Christopher Ryan, Toot & Paul Peijzel, the channel’s Patreon saints! 😇
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0:00 Introduction
0:21 begin on IV chord
2:21 begin on ii chord
3:18 begin on V chord
4:35 begin on bVI chord
6:01 Hooktheory
6:50 what defines the key of the song?
8:44 Lost Woods from Legend of Zelda
9:54 (They Long To Be) Close To You
10:52 Deacon Blues
11:45 Conclusion
12:18 Patreono
Excellent topic! Here's some important additional song examples ;)
IIIm chord: Wild Horses by Rolling Stones
IIm chord: Goodbye Yellow Brick Road by Elton John, Harvest Moon by Neil Young
II chord: Amelia by Joni Michell (modulation)
bIII (in major): Coyote by Joni Mitchell
IVm chord: Idiot Wind by Bob Dylan
bVI in (minor): September by Earth, Wind & Fire
IV: Wichita Lineman by Jimmy Webb
V: Pink Moon by Nick Drake
bVII chord: You've Lost That Loving Feeling by The Righteous Brothers
Ooh really good call on Wild Horses. For the iv chord, my favourite example has to be Break My Stride by Matthew Wilder.
Some nice examples there 🙂
Wichita Lineman is a good example and one of my favourite songs!
Pedal Point, Kyrie: heaps of different major chords, somehow extended (mostly five-part), but the piece is not in any key. Reminds me of a modern version of the straying harmony (is this the right expression? In German it's called vagierende Harmonik) of the renaissance, but at a faster pace.
@@DavidBennettPiano Yes it's very interesting because the tonality is kind of all over the place. The A section starts on Bbmaj7 but then goes to G and then D, and the B section goes from D to Cadd9 and then ends on A7sus4.
@@urbangorilla33Wichita Lineman is pretty easy to analyze, it's just in F major but only weakly references F with an F/A chord, then it goes to D minor but with a borrowed parallel D major chord. All the root notes of the chords in the song belong to F major/D minor, but several of their major/minor qualities swapped using modal mixture
I'm glad you're addressing this. Often people try to guess a key just based on the starting chord, and while this often works, it's good to clarify this!
Exquisitely covered a lot of ground in a comprehensive fashion.
It's much easier to figure out the key by the last/penultimate note of the melodic line
Explain yourself @@realavi1
Finding the V chord works pretty well too
I just might give that a Go.@@realavi1
I love songs that start on the IV or V chord. They make me feel like I'm getting into a conversation that is already happening
your feelings are irrational
What I think is interesting here is how our brains keep chord sounds in memory as we move through the song. By that I mean that when we start a song on something other than the tonic, we don't know (or more accurately, feel) that we're not on the tonic until we move forward to a resolution. Unlike when a song builds to, say, a V chord, where we feel the tension of the V, when we start on the V we don't know where it's going. So we obviously subconsciously "remember" where we started, well after we started there.
Yeah that’s a good point! That is definitely a big part of how we perceive key. However I feel like our musical memory is only really a few bars long though. If a song slowly a subtly changed key or even gradually pitch-shifted during its runtime I don’t think we would notice. 😊
@@DavidBennettPiano Yes, I totally agree. I bet there are songs out there with lengthy (many bars) distance between the non-tonic beginning and when they resolve. I'd guess they have a very floaty, ethereal feel. Or maybe our brains are so hardwired to find a key that we'd think they're modulating between keys? I don't know. I can't think of any songs like this offhand, but I bet you could. ;-). Thanks for all you do here!
I was thinking the same. But I also think that this probably only applies on first listen. I think we'll know where it's going when we've heard it before. Even if we don't know the song that well.
Does that app work on a computer? Sounds really interesting. .
Can you make a video about videos that don't END on the tonic? I've always found it very interesting that some songs can leave you with tension.
Yes, especially when they end on the IV chord. To me it has such a melancholic feeling
I’ll keep the topic in mind 😊😊
An interesting example of a song that doesn't just not end on the tonic, it doesn't even end on a diatonic chord is Marooned by Pink Floyd. The song is essentially a long instrumental jam cycling through Bm-Gmaj7-Em over and over before ending on C. Although this being Pink Floyd who had a habit of making all songs contiguous on their records, this was probably to set up the next song.
@@DavidBennettPiano if you do that you must put I want you (she's so heavy) by the beatles
very few in popular music. Teardrop by Massive Attack, key of A, ends on F. Joining you, by Alanis Morissette, also ends abruptely on its VI chord.
I wrote a song in C that started on F, and noticed that it was difficult to decipher which chord was the tonic. C and F both felt like the tonic at points, like the context was changing throughout the song. Thanks for explaining the topic a little deeper
Yup - I've had the same problem.
Same thing
I wrote one in A that has 3 different preludes, in D, A, and F# minor, depending on how much time you want to kill. The verse is in D, the chorus in A, and it ends in either a fade-out in D or a long bother ending in F# minor, further confounding things.
Here's an idea for a video: theory of the 12-bar blues and why it works despite having a tonic 7, mixing major and minor, and resolving V-IV-I.
Would be interesting. 12-tone has covered 12-bar blues.
There's not really any great mystery to any of it unless you look from a stringent classical harmony perspective.
All of this is the result of using fifths cycles. Basically, take a bass note, let's say C, and build 6 fifths on top of it. This gives you a C Lydian collection. Then let's say we treat D as the tonic, which means we're in D Mixoyldian. Now let's extend our fifth collection by adding one fifth below the previous lowest C, which would be F. F in D Mixolydian would be the b3, our "blue note." D Mixolydian obviously naturally has dominant 7th as its tonic chord. Hence we can sit on the chord "nonfunctionally" since we're already on our tonic 7th sonority.
Now move down one 5th from D to G and we suddenly have the notes of G Mixoyldian available to us if we just use the 7 notes from the F up. And if we move one 5th up from our tonic of D to A and take the seven fifths starting from G and one fifth below G, we have A Mixolydian + the b3.
We can also recognize that with D as our tonic, moving to the V or IV just means moving one fifth in either direction and extending our fifths collection by one either way. Only the IV - V move is an exception, which is instead two fifths away from each other.
And that's it really. Everything comes from the cycle of fifths both as treating it as a prevailing mode and in its local harmonic movement. In that sense, blues is just an extension of classical Western harmony. In truth, nearly the entire history of Western harmony can be thought of as an exploration of pitch cycles (especially fifths), but that would take a lot more than a UA-cam comment to elaborate on.
@@prepcoin_nl4362 You said there is no great mystery to it, then wrote 4 paragraphs. To beginners like me it's not obvious, so there is more than enough there for a David Bennett Piano video
David, what is interesting on Dreams by Fleetwood Mac is that it is almost a word painting, cause the name of the song is Dreams and the song almost never reaches the tonic chord, seeming to be floating almost all the time during the execution, giving a sense of dreaming.
Dreams by Allman Bros. is similar. Chorus in G, but everything else is C and D.
Another IV chord example is Holland 1945 by Neutral Milk Hotel... very strong example as not only does it start on the IV chord, but the song even opens with a small four bar pattern of that one chord before Jeff Mangum sings "2... 1, 2, 3, 4," and continues to play a IV-I pattern in the verses.
Go back to 2010 /mu/
I love this guy for giving me new song writing ideas every time he uploads!
I love these videos, real lessons, going to the bottom of things, this is where you shine David! Thank you a lot!! ❤
While there are plenty of songs that start on a chord other than the tonic, and some that never even reach the tonic chord at all, the order in which we hear the chords of a song remains a significant factor (one of several) in determining how we will perceive the key centre. In the race to be perceived as the tonic chord, the first chord to arrive will always have a distinct advantage, which it’s more tardy competitors are going to have to overcome in other ways if they are to be tonicised instead.
Our brain instinctively seeks a tonic from the moment a song, or distinct section in a song, begins. Our brain is already doing it when all we’ve heard is the first chord. For that fraction of time, it’s the only chord in the song. Thus, at least if it is a relatively stable diatonic chord in its own right, it is automatically the default tonic until the second chord arrives. If the second chord in the sequence is consistent with the first being the tonic (ie it exists diatonically in the key in which the first is the tonic), that initial perception is likely to be strengthened. If the third chord is also consistent, it’s likely to be strengthened further. By the time a fourth diatonically consistent chord arrives, the root note of that first chord is (for most listeners) thoroughly and irreversibly tonicised. At that point, it’s usually going to require the arrival of directly contradictory sonic information (a chromatic chord or modulation) to force the brain to recalibrate.
To further illustrate the importance of order, here’s an admittedly rather strained metaphor: think of the chords in a given sequence as candidates for the coveted position of Tonic Chord, all running against each other in the Tonic Chord election. Your brain is the voter, and it’s come along to hear the candidates’ respective arguments for why they’re the right chord for the job.
But… the system is rigged. The first chord to speak always has an enormous, unfair advantage over their competitors. The first chord to speak has already had the opportunity to impress you with it’s impeccable credentials before you even know who any of the other candidates are: “look at me. I’m a perfectly stable diatonic triad in root position. Who WOULDN’T want me for their home chord?” And who can argue with them? They’re right. They are eminently qualified for the position, in the absence of any information to the contrary.
Now all the other candidates have a really tough act to follow. They now have to provide a specific reason why that first chord can’t be the home chord, if they are to have any chance of being perceived themselves as the tonic. The easiest way for them to do that is simply to not exist in the key in which the first candidate would be the tonic. This won’t automatically win the election for the second chord, but it will raise doubts about the first chord’s suitability. It will problematise the first chord’s status as default tonic and force your brain to do more work to figure it out. But if the second chord to speak DOES exist in the key, they’ve not only lost their own chance to be perceived as the tonic, they’ve now made it even harder for the third chord to counteract the now solidifying impression that the first chord is the chord for the job.
This is why the classic “axis of awesome” chord sequence I/V/vi/IV (eg C/G/Am/F), when begun on the third chord in the sequence rather than the first (eg Am/F/C/G), does NOT automatically become vi/IV/I/V. The composer is, in fact, going to have to do some fancy footwork if he/she wants the typical listener to perceive it that way - with the third chord in the sequence as the tonic chord - because that is not the natural default way most people would perceive that sequence in its basic form, all else being equal. The position of the chords in the sequence, which determines whether they fall at the beginning, end or middle of phrases, will tend to fundamentally change their function, and the overall tonality of the sequence, unless that tendency is very specifically counteracted in some way. Rather than vi/IV/I/V, it becomes (to most ears) i/VI/III/VII
This can even be the case with exactly the same piece of music, depending on the point at which a given listener’s attention is captured by it. If you were to start playing a basic I/V/vi/IV Chord sequence, as a perpetual loop, and you did so in a sound-proof room, everyone who was in the room with you when you began would likely perceive it to be in the major key. But if a latecomer entered the sound-proof room just as you were playing what you would be thinking of as the third chord in the sequence and the iv chord functionally, they are more likely to perceive that chord as both the first chord in the sequence and the tonic I chord, and thus the sequence as whole will seem minor to them, with a different key centre to the one everyone else is perceiving. We would have exactly the same simple piece of diatonic music, simultaneously being perceived by different listeners as having two entirely different tonalities. This demonstrates just how psychological, cultural, subjective, ambiguous, unstable, and just all-round slippery tonicisation can be.
Absolutely brilliant video, so glad you covered this. It’s been a mystery to me for such a long time! Thank you so much as always
Thanks for the video! especially on the effects created when starting with V, IV or VI chord instead of expected I.
We can add to the list :
- Umbrella (Rihanna)
- Diamonds (Rihanna)
- Lost on you (LP)
- Talkin' about a revolution & Fast car (Tracy Chapman) - both starts with IV
- Shake it off (Taylor Swift)
- Eh eh (Lady Gaga) - verse only
- Englishman in New York (Sting)
- Adventure of a lifetime (Coldplay) - progression similar to Lost on you & Englishman in NY
- Blinding lights (The Weeknd) - to me the tonic is either the 2nd chord (Cm) or the 3rd (Db), definitely not the 1st (Fm)
- When you're gone (Bryan Adams & Mel C)
- The rythm of the night (Corona)
- Popular (Nada surf)
- Maybe tomorrow (Stereophonics) - starts with IV (F, key of Am)
- Not up to you (Stereophonics)
- As it was (Harry styles) - riff starts on IIm chord, verse starts on IV, chorus on I
- I won't give up (Jason Mraz)
- Enemy (Imagine dragons) - very weird, only F & E chords, never seems to reach Am
- Sexual healing (Marvin Gaye) - chord progression is mainly a V - VIm - IV - I
- In the shadows (The Rasmus)
- Hey Joe (Jimi Hendrix) - hard to find the key until the C-G-D-A-E progression ends
- Lucky man (The Verve) - i think it's A mixolydian and goes bVII - IV - I
- Against all odds (Phil Collins)
thats all i have in mind right now, but probably moooore.
4:03 Elton John actually seems quite fond of starting on the V chord like this. Another song in which he dies it is Don't Let the Sun Go Down on Me. It starts on G, and it sounds like it's in G, until it clearly resolves to C. But every time in loops bsck to the start of the verse, it sounds like you're in G again.
Crazy in love doesn't even really start on those chords because that intro sample (ie. the only reason any of us even listen to that song) is taken from the Chi Lites' Are You My Woman? (Tell Me So)
Great video as always, David. Each time I've got a question while watching a video, you immediately come up with an answer (like in this one the fact why a specific song starting on IV is not in lydian mode)
😊😊😊
I appreciate the Zelda reference on here. So much of video game music is valuable to the music world for learning.
And Hook Theory has been a fun website for a while. I love showing students of mine the website if they feel lost with chord progressions to certain songs.
You say it creates a bit of a tension but tension is always relative. When the first thing you hear is an F chord without knowing C is the Tonic chord it is just an F. F could also ve the tonic chord. You can‘t tell it in advance.
Ok, you adressed the topic later!
outstanding summary of a examples from well known tunes that I has able to quickly relate to.
I love that you put guitar chords above the sheet music!
"Bizarre love triangle" by New Order has the same chord intervals as Time after time. Never thought about it sounding unusual though.
Since I know you're a fan of First of October (love the shirt every time), their song Do You Want To? from the second album starts on a B chord, and the entire intro is just on that B chord so it sounds like it's in the key of B. But then the verse starts on B and then goes to F#maj7, and all of a sudden, B sounds like the IV chord and we're now in the key of F#. Super trippy.
Another excellent topic David ! Enjoyed !
I love your teaching style so much. Using popular songs as examples makes all the difference in the world. If I could make a suggestion, I think it would be cool to see more prog rock discussed on this channel. Rush is my all time favorite band, and it'd be really cool to hear your analysis of some of their longer songs, with my personal favorite being "The Camera Eye".
This vid got me wondering if modes were just conceptualised for more confusion 😂😂. Also seeing a David add on a David video was a madness, tripped me out.
Love this Chanel ❤
Hey David!! This is one of my favorite Topics in Music Theory, It really makes you Better Musician if you can figure out a songs key which doesn't start on a Tonic Chord. You Really are my Favorite on UA-cam.. Thanks a Ton for your Awesome Work here..
Regards /Navin
How do you know what key it's in based on the first chord in order to feel any tension? How can you distinguish a G chord being the 5th in the key of C as opposed to the first in the key of G?
This is the topic I am wrestling with at the moment on my music-path.
Thanks for having this type of approach.
I was thinking whole video: ”He’s talking about lydian and dorians.”
Until ”Time After Time”which, according my logic, is written, and ment to be in F-Lydian, and resolution to c is to add some instability/uncertainity or because melodia naturally wants to resolve to c.
Great video as always! As a guitar teacher the 2 songs that stand out are Sweet Child Of Mine and Sweet Home Alabama which both go D, C, G in their progressions but as you say they are moving to the ‘one’ chord. I used to always get confused by songs that didn’t start on the tonic but vids like this will really help people out 👍🏻
i am faster than youtube notifications. i already know this video is 🔥
Happy Birthday David! 🎂
...Happy Birthday doesn't start on the tonic.
It does start on the tonic, the upbeat is not counted.
Another great video. My question is why is it that the progressions ending on a vi =A minor, not considered to be in the relative minor scale A minor? Especially Viva La Vida and even more so with Bette Davis Eyes that has no Major I chord (the IV vi V progression could be considered Mixolydian?)
Great video! As always.
🙏
"Time After Time" is a good example for asking the question, "Is this actually in F Lydian rather than C Major," since it does have sort of an "ethereal, mystical" quality to it, like we associate with Lydian.
Yes, this is exactly what I thought!
It does tend to feel more Lydian to me, too. Another song with what I think is the same chord progression has a similar sense of tonal ambiguity: Bizarre Love Triangle by New Order. The chords, bassline and arpeggios seem to strongly hint at Lydian, but the melody emphasises other scale degrees which gives it a minor feel. That contrast between the bright and ethereal Lydian and melancholy minor adds up to a lovely bittersweet ambivalence.
Super interesting. My piano teacher, with an exclusively piano playing background, tends to refer to the first chord in a piece for its key. With my violin playing background, I tend to look at what chord the piece resolves on at the end for the key. Granted not all songs end on the tonic, but that’s a whole different topic!
another great video david, i'll watch it later
But... How can you know it's great until you've watched it? I mean it is David Bennett so fair enough
@@althealligator1467 great video one of his best, cant wait to watch it
Take Another Look - Cliff Richard. Great use of extended chords in that song.
Could you make videos about the relationship between vocal melody and harmony / chord progressions?
Thank you for your wonderful work.
Such great heights is the first song I noticed this sort of thing, without being able to figure out what was happening. The intro sounds like it's in C major, but the song is actually in F. So when the "I'm thinking it's a sign" comes in, it still sounds like C major, but by the time he gets to "mirror images and when we kiss they're perfectly aligned" the song has fully revealed itself to be in F major, making that Bb note really jarring the first time you hear it.
Another informative video. Thanks!! 🙏🏻
Thank you!
There are a lot of Japanese songs that start with the IV chord. This is a reason why anime openings sound so harmonically distinct and vivid. They use a lot of the IV V iii vi progressions which is named "Oudou Shinkou" and is characterized by continuous movement, similarly to how David explained it at the beginning of the video
he actually has an entire video on that progression
Also the 'stock, aikman and Waterman' progression
I'm so happy you mention "Close to You" by the Carpenters. I had a heated discussion with 2 other musicians, who claims the first chord is the tonic chord and I told them they were wrong, it's in G. Now I can show them this video to proof they were wrong anyway :D
Excellent. Thank you.
Gerry Rafferty's Right Down the Line is fun
It's in C but starts you off at Dm
Cool synth line going on throughout it
Paul Simon, "Still Crazy After All These Years". The intro starts on the V (I think) of a different key than the verse of the song, then modulates down before the vocals start.
Yes, that is actually the bridge section being used as the intro. That song is one of the greatest productions in popular music history, with an instrumental interlude that is almost an avante garde classical piece and also features a key change, moving up a whole tone right in the middle of the last verse. Extraordinary.
Thanks for another great video :)
I wouldn't have realized that songs not starting on the tonic's chord are uncommon. I would have thought that tons of rockers begin with V, IV, I, I, I, I etc..
"There is a Light that Never Goes Out" by The Smiths starts on F#m in the key of C#m. So technically that is the iv chord if we make C#m the i. Or if we keep the numbering for the relative major E, F#m would be the ii chord.
I think of starting on the IV as that Coldplay thing as they are very fond of doing it. Great vid as always mate, im going to try and use this in my songwriting. If anyone is interested im currently making an album all about being a dad
Always interesting, well done ;)
Thanks!
Oh thanks. I've been learning Close to You, and I was wondering about that "chord change" because I didn't think it sounded like a chord change, but it sounded like something.
Excellent! Here's another, indeed one of my favourites: My Love by Paul McCartney
duude ! your videos are just GREAT § THANK YOUU ♥♥
Hi David. I've just seen your video on line clichés and it reminded me of 'Between the Bars' by Elliot Smith and 'Anyhing you Want' by Roy Orbison. They have chord progressions that produce an ascending line of two semitones which are so satisfying
Love that you included music from Ocarina of Time!! More please! :)
The first part is valuable, the second part is invaluable.
Probably the world could spare several years of uncertainty in understanding music theory if it were emphasized that modes depend on the moment and the listener and is not something carved in stone. Just like in this video.
Hello Goodbye - The Beatles
Starts on IV (major key)
Yellow Submarine - The Beatles
Starts on V (major key)
Yellow Submarine is in G major. The first chord in the stereo version is D but only because the opening G has been wiped from the tape. The mono version starts right on G.
@@davideckert7919 The melody still "starts" on the D (in fact it's Db since it's in Gb)
I always heard the “Crazy in Love” opening vamp as going between Bb and G7, not Gm7. I now hear that there actually is a pedaled Bb bass note in the mix that continues under both chords, which would imply Gm. But there is also definitely a B natural in the brass. I suspect the sample they used was straightforwardly Bb to G7, before they added the bass pedal. Now it’s sort of both, with a dissonant “rub” between the Bb and B.
But it also complicates whether the vamp can truly be said to be “in” D minor in any meaningful way. If, as mine always has, your particular brain interprets that chord as G7, then the vamp is just cycling between two chords, each of which is chromatic relative to the other. There really isn’t a sense of any stable key, and certainly nothing to signpost that we’re in Dm, other than the entirely intellectual knowledge that the song will go there later, strictly for those who’ve heard the song before. I don’t think a first time listener would ever guess D minor was going to be the main home key of this song from that vamp. It’s arguable that the shift to the Dm is actually a modulation.
I feel like you could make an argument in the Lost Woods theme that it IS in F Lydian. The B section using a different progression while not changing the key signature can lend to this. Dm to G to C to Am in the held note with a change in the bass implies C, but easily sets up Am as the fifth to Dm to perform a v-i. It could be that the B section in D Dorian as a relative to F Lydian the way that Dm would be relative to F major, performing a kind of i IV VII v i progression. VII and v share a lot of the same notes, making for an unabrasive (if not powerful) transition back to i. The later transition to the loop also ascends in this similar i IV VIII and wildly ends on E Major. That's not a chord present in C Major or F Lydian due to the G#, but it sure makes for a compelling VII to I with the sharp note resolving onto the third and the B resolving to C for the F Major chord at the beginning of the piece. It's all half steps up to lock back onto the tonic F chord.
"21st Century Breakdown" by Green Day has something of a subversion of this, starting with a I-V vamp that sounds like a plagal cadence until the tonic is established with the vocals.
Winnie the Pooh Theme song starts on a minor ii7. It is such a harmonically interesting song from one chord to the next like there is a full diminished augmented i chord in the chorus! Like no one does that!
I've never thought of that, but you're right, that is a strange beginning. The Sherman Brothers were really brilliant songwriters and could be very sophisticated. They're underestimated because they could make it all sound so natural. (And when they were simplistic, like with "It's a Small World", it was intentional ... and still deceptively "simplistic".)
Regarding songs starting in other keys, I've heard Richard Sherman talk about "Jolly Holiday" in MARY POPPINS, and how they purposely gave it a floating, ambiguous feeling through the whole introductory section, so you can't really feel what key it's in ... until -- WHAM -- it clicks into obvious place with "It's a jolly holiday with Mary". From there I've noticed they do similar things in other songs, like "Feed the Birds": The whole introduction is very ungrounded, ambiguous, and mysterious ... until it clicks into place with "Feed the birds, tuppence a bag."
There's one from CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG that I'd love to hear Richard talk about, because it's the only song of theirs that seems to stay in that floating, ambiguous place throughout the whole song, seemingly *never* clicking into a home key, although it keeps feeling it wants to -- "Lovely Lonely Man".
A great way to have an ambiguous key is to have a song that continually vamps between the relative major and minor chords without settling on one or the other. A good example of this is Talking Heads's "Road To Nowhere". Most of the song is a constant back and forth between E major and C# minor. The song is ultimately in E major, but for most we're not quite sure.
Another common chord for songs in the major key to start is the vi chord. However, just like what you said about tonal ambiguity in this video, the problem with this is that the vi chord in the major key is the tonic chord of the relative minor key, which means when a song starts on (what's supposed to be) the vi chord in the major key, it can sound like it's in the relative minor instead. Therefore, it can be hard to tell whether a song starts on a vi chord or a minor tonic chord, which is why you'll often see songs sometimes cited as being in a major key, and others times cited as being in the relative minor. For example, Faded by Alan Walker starts on a D#m chord, and is cited by some as being in D# Minor, but cited by others as being in F# Major.
Western/classical musicologists have a bias towards putting everything in standard major keys with a resolution to the I, but most EDM - and indeed most loop-based pop music - doesn't resolve (end) as such, because it just goes round and round in a loop, where the first chord is often a minor chord. I find it quite annoying that musicologists try and force contemporary loop-based minor key songs or non-Ionion mode music into the same analytical rules as classical music from 300 years ago. In short, most dance music starts on the 1, and it's usually a minor chord. It can't resolve to a major I, because it doesn't resolve. It loops.
Another smart video !
Thanks!
Interestingly enough, in school on music lessons we were taught to judge the key of the song by the last chord in the song. Like most songs would end with a final resolution to the tonic cord (debatable, not all of them do, of course), and it was enough for the 12-13 y.o. us at he time to learn.
And then loop-based pop music took over the world but music teachers continued to talk about resolution (endings) when loops don't have a resolution or ending; they just repeat by going back to the 1 that they started on.
This is a rare occurrence of "the product placement is 100% accurate to the topic of the video and can be actually relevant to the targeted audience". Well done!
Proud Mary starts on the bVII I guess -- C major. I'd say it's this series of major chords built on a descending minor pentatonic scale to land on the tonic of D.
An interesting video could be about songs which remain ambiguous throughout - for example I had an argument about Bon Jovi's "Dead or Alive" because apart from the intro (on Dm), for me the verses are on D major whereas someone insisted it's on G because it's similar to "Sweet Home Alabama" where the D is the V. I see the D as the I. Anyway thanks for the video and well done as usual.
Great Stuff 👍
Thank you 😊
Yet another song that starts on the IV chord is "Dead in the Water" by Noel Gallagher, which is in the key of Bb but begins on an Eb(add9) chord. One other thing of note in that song's chord loop is that every chord in it contains the tonic note Bb, which helps establish Bb as tonic and avoid tonal ambiguity.
I like Red Ribbon by Madilyn Bailey, it's in A major, but it lives in the relative minor F#m for the verse before resolving to A during the chorus.
Space Oddity is in C I think, but starts on a sort of funky F7 to Em vamp. Which definitely works with the movement of the song.
I know nothing about music other than that I like some it but I love this guy's videos (even though it's like he's speaking Greek).
I know it's as if he's speaking Chinese to me.
Hey David, I’d love you to do a video on 12-bar blues variations. One variation that piqued my interest in the subject is Fast As You by Dwight Yoakam, which substitutes the V chord with the II.
Everytime i start writing a song from a chord other than the tonic, i get confused and end up scrapping it. I love the way pros do it though. 💖
“Mermaid” by Train is in C minor but starts on the bVI chord
I think there is an unsettled feeling that you describe when you don't know what key you're in until you hear which scale notes are being played, or the context of hearing phrases ending on the presumed tonic. But once you know the song well, this probably goes away, because as soon as the song starts, you know exactly where you are in the chord progression, since you've heard that progression so often. So to people who know the song, maybe it doesn't seem so unsettled?
One interesting song that MAY fit into this is Dark Read by Steve Lacy. Most chords websites like hooktheory say its in Gb but the first chord is Bb major (III). I personally hear the song as a phyrgian dominant-ish in Bb as the B7(or Cb7 for nerds) sounds like a tritone-subbed dominant back to Bb
My preferred one is the second movement of new world symphony
yay music
I'm writing a song starting with the following progression: C Em G D.
The context will emphasize Em as the tonality of the verse but when starting from C going to Em, at that moment Em doesn't feel like the root but a development from C major. It's only when we get to D, so at the end of the phrase that we hear Em as the root.
So yes, starting from a different degree brings a lot of ambiguity. And I really like to play with this. And particularly in my song where I want to emphasize an idea of "things are not what they seem to be".
Then the chorus starts on Em (as we would expect in the context provided by the verse) but we have the following progression Em A Bm, that resolves now to Bm using a E Dorian as a pivot. Here again there's a new ambiguity. The verse established E eolian as the main scale (but starting with a C Lydian flavour). And then we switch from E eolian to E Dorian (bringing brightness) to end up in Bm.
After the first chorus, we return to the verse. This time the starting key (C) feels briefly like a ii chord (but since it is a repetition of the first verse, we quite immediately understand where we're going and that we're back to the original key.
Then there's a bridge after the second chorus (which now settles Bm as the key) which finally ends up in the key of D major (which is the relative major scale of Bm).
Finally, the last verse keeps the last key and ends up on Bm (except that it ends on a A chord which is meant to be resolved on BM but I keep it sustained). So the last verse starts on a G (which is a VI chord within the context) but does no longer have the Lydian flavour because the context has sealed Bm as the root (D being just a temporary major resolution on the bridge).
Well, I can explain my own music very technically and how this ambiguity of not starting on the root can be used to highlight the purpose of the lyrics. But in a matter of facts, this is an analysis done afterwards (which is important for writing orchestration and arrangements), but this is something that in fact came naturally when drafting the song. And that's quite funny to see we can do really fancy stuffs we can latter explain, but that was in fact driven by some kind of musical intuition based on what is meant to be said through the music. I mean by that, that the music theory knowledge didn't drive the composition even if it goes to subtitles key changes through mode switches. Understanding it afterwards was then necessary to write the song and it's arrangements but the theory didn't drive the creation process (that's something the AI isn't ready to do yet).
David, I would be glad to send a backtrack of my song so you can hear what I'm talking about here. If so, how could I send it to you ?
Great video! Sweet Home Alabama is one really popular example that comes to mind. SO many guitarists say it's in D when it's really in G and it is SO frustrating lol
But D is clearly the tonal center and the chord you would resolve to
@@gerardmichael8523 That's true but the scale is D Mixolydian. Which means it's in the key of G
@@gerardmichael8523 I see what you're saying. The title of the video says "songs that dont start on the tonic chord". You're right it's just people say it's in the key of D all the time which iirks me lol
@katkong281 I still think it's the key of D. You can borrow chords from other keys/modes, doesn't mean you leave the key. To say it's in G I think is even more incorrect. D is clearly home
@@gerardmichael8523 Quote from Google, "In music a key is the major or minor scale around which a piece of music revolves. A song in a major key is based on a major scale. A song in a minor key is based on a minor scale. A song played in the 'key of C major' revolves around the seven notes of the C major scale - C, D, E, F, G, A, and B"
So by your logic the D major scale would be the scale the song revolves around. But the note C# doesn't ever fit into the context of the song. So the D major scale is not the scale the song is revolving around, it's D Mixolydian or G Ionian. So it's in the key of G.
I see what you're saying but you're confused about the meaning of "key of a song"
"I've Never Been To Me" by Charlene is my favorite example of a song that starts with a Ⅴ chord but sounds like Ⅰ at first.
Mr Jones by Counting Crows. They go through 2 whole verses of vi IV ii V vi IV V before finally landing on I when they hit the chorus.
I think Elation by the Levellers is in a mode of G because G feels like home but it starts with Dm.
Here are a few more:
The 59th Street Bridge Song (Simon and Garfunkel) starts on the IV, as does Gerry Rafferty's Baker Street (though arguably that might be ii). Give a Little Bit (Supertramp) starts of the V.
How about A Place to Call Home by Big Wreck (the chorus)?
Peter Gabriel - Red Rain is a great example. It's in Em, but the intro builds up with C (bVI) and then jumps between C (bVI) and D (bVII) before resolving to Em (i).
Knowing Peter's work, you wouldn't be surprised if he was trying to write in C Lydian, but it's subverted.
And I had to dig for a Rush example, because I think you need more Rush on the channel 😁 Animate from Counterparts (1993) begins pretty firmly with an Am, goes to F ("Okay, we're probably in Am." ), but then goes Bb, C, Em, Dm. We're in Dm, but they cover it up really well.
Somewhere in my head i made the connection that "stronger than you" from stephen universe is the same as just the teo of us just with a different context and bpm 😮no wonder it feels so spacy and adventurous. Home is the 3rd planet from the sun. Were in space till we crash into earth
Understood barely but still enjoyed.
I was thinking, but David, what about modes? And he answered it.
Plenty examples in 80s Japanese City Pop (I'll limit it to one per album lol):
Goodbye Boogie Dance, by Anri, album Bi • Ki • Ni
Vitamin E• P • O, by EPO, album same name as this song name
Telephone Number, by Junko Ohashi, album Magical
Friday Magic, by Meiko Nakahara, album same name as this song name
Jody, by Tatsuro Yamashita (English version featured in the album Big Wave)
If You, by Toshiki Kadomatsu, album After 5 Clash
Morning Highway, by Anri, album COOOL
Anklet, by Toshiki Kadomatsu, album On The City Shore
and yes, Plastic Love counts
I think "Alison" By "Slowdive" starts on fourth chord of E major.
It goes from Amaj7 to B7, which is lydian vamp, but then resolves into E major.
I always looked at Dreams as a vamp of IV chord and V chord of the major scale, and it doesn't really resolve, but if you play a Cmajor at the very end of your performance, it resolves quite nicely to Cmajor
You're telling me starting with F provides "immediate tension" when it's the IV in C but not when it's the I in F? Or is this tension only apparent in the context of the whole progression and therefore not really immediate?
Indeed. The supposed tension only arises in analysis of the whole piece. That tension only exists in the context of Western classical tonal analysis. To untrained ears, all songs start on the 1 and there is no tension.
Many jazz standards/ Broadway songs from 1920s and 1930s will start on an augmented 5th chord.
Would be great if you could do a video on how to tell what key a piece of sheet music is in. You touched on it here but how can we, for example, decide if a key is C major, A minor or indeed F Lydian.
One of Us by Joan Osborne. In A Major, but first chord F# minor
Hey David, great video, you have made me discover some interesting tunes. I have to address one question: Dreams by Fleetwood Mac, is not in F Lydian for the verses?
I’ve seen some people describe Dreams as F Lydian, but to me the melody clearly resolves to note A throughout, not the note F. I actually discussed this in my video on the Lydian mode:ua-cam.com/video/ll8UwRWVkP4/v-deo.htmlsi=3coiUh81nxAWE-Gw 😊