If you raise one of the notes of an augmented chord by a half step, you get a minor chord, if you lower one, you get a major chord. And because of the symmetry of the augmented chord, it can be used as a "portal" chord, much like diminished seventh chords.
This is one of those things I discovered a long time ago and then forgot! Maybe another video is in order that shows those symmetries and tries to use them to compose.... Like you said, it is certainly a "portal" in MANY different ways, where as dim7 has a pretty strict resolution mechanism. Just thinking about the myriad possibilites kinda scares me.
@@SignalsMusicStudio This seems like having the portal gun with the blue and orange portals. You want to get to a chord and suddenly you have 2 options, you can go through the aug chord or through the dim7. So many colours to explore come to mind. (Without mentioning the possible colours that you can get from borrowing those aug chords from the parallel modes of melodic minor and harmonic minor, it makes me shiver just from thinking about it).
We literally live in a time, where advanced concepts are taught for free, on demand, not locally limited, to anyone willing to listen and with access to the internet, which is spread almost anywhere. Can we please take a moment to appreciate that, and to thank Jake Lizardboi for being one of the people making that possible?
faselblaDer3te You are right : thanks to him and all others who teach us. Amazing to notice synchronicities thanks to the internet : many teachers sharing on the same topic across countries in other languages too...
Interesting point: You can actually resolve ANYTHING to the 1, as long as it has the 5 note in the bass. So if you make a chord that has an E in the bass and any other notes on top (literally any), then resolve it to an A major (or A minor) chord, it will resolve well. This is a great way of introducing really weird melody notes into your song.
holy fuck that's actually true. and each combination has a slightly different color. i just don't like putting the #IV chord on top of the V to resolve to I for obvious reasons, but that's the only instance i didn't think it was resololving
Sorry for the slow upload schedule! I've been active on Patreon lessons but sluggish with UA-cam. Looking to change that this week for a faster delivery of Riffing with Modes #6 =)
Jake, I marvel at the grasp you have on many musical concepts. Not only that, you have a gift of presenting complex ideas in a simple and understandable way. There are those that can play music but cannot teach. There are those that can teach music that can't play. You are the rare bird that can both play and teach. It is simply a joy to listen and learn from you.
Bach: "Think I'll raise the 7th in minor to get a leading tone." (Harmonic Minor) "Cool! I get a dominant 7th on V, just like in Major! Yay!" (Looks back at the third triad) "What the hell is that?".
@@CMM5300 Yes. I found chord progressions difficult in melodic minor when I was in college, since typically the scale is only altered when ascending. Most of the chords I had trouble with during harmonic analysis were actually incidental chords created by the changing notes of the scale, and they really weren't part of the harmony. Yet, there they were! Resulted in a lot of "C" grades on my analysis tests.
@@tsisqua right. The classical version. Jazz melodic minor is the same ascending and descending. Then you get 7 modes from it also. 1 Mel min (Am maj7) 2 Dorian b2 (Bm 7 ) 3 Lydian aug (Caug maj7) 4 Lydian Dom (D7) 5 mixolydian b6 (E7) 6 loc natural 2 (F# Min7b5) 7 loc b4 (G# half dim )
@@CMM5300 Same usage has developed in Rock music for melodic minor. And yes, I was at first an education major. So everything was classical training in harmony until year 4 when we LIGHTLY studied Jazz and Rock music. I'm going to paste your reply into a notepad doc for future reference. Thanks, Chris!
@@tsisqua your welcome. I'm self taught. From what I understand the difference between min7b5 and half diminished is: min7b5 resolves down half diminished resolves up. Other than that it's the same chord.
Iron Maiden's "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" is a great example of augmented arpeggios (although played on the bass). The augmented tonality alongside the 'creaking boat' sound effects and the guitar swells really creates the ambience of a deserted ship on the water at night.
@Andrew Hager Metallica and Iron maiden are fairly different bands to be honest man. Both important bands of course I don't even listen to either particularly but you are comparing apples to oranges
I came into the comments specifically to point this one out. It oozes mystery, the unknown of being in fog, the shortness of how far you can see and the creepy lack of ability to know what is happening, or going to happen. Tonally as a chord, this could be resolved in two completely opposite ways and I think you internalise this even when those resolutions are not being offered. Could it go dark or light? Both are equally likely at this point, and you are simultaneously being strung between both.
If you take an augmented chord and the augmented chord a whole step above if you get the whole tone scale. I feel like that is important when discussing augmented chords
@@SignalsMusicStudio I'm waiting for that video, I love the whole tone scale!
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@@SignalsMusicStudio it works great to use the whole tone on top of an aug chord. It also works to "repeat a bass note" to force some kind of tonic to the whole tone scale
@ Yep, that's a neat trick, like "Veils" from Claude Debussy where he forces you to hear B flat as the "tonic," if you will, by repeating that note again and again.
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@@seiph80 not to mention the immense "release of tension" from just a pentatonic scale at the middle section, which, to me, is a major example of how to create excitement from non-traditional / diatonic sources
I actually love an augmented chord because it makes me feel sound in a way that I don't with non-augmented chords. It's the anticipation that makes life interesting.
You don't have a clue on how much joy watching your stuff brings me. I always like the videos before I even begin watching them because your musical knowledge, your teaching habilities, your musicianship and your sense of humour are all top-notch and I haven't been let down by your content since I found your channel a few months ago. Your videos always spark new ideas I want to explore, and this desire to create always shakes me off from the anxiety and depression. For someone who struggles with lots of stuff like I do, it's one of the most incredible feelings I can feel. Thank you so much.
There is also a type of augmented chord called the blackadder chord which is occasionally used in J-pop, where the bass note is a whole step above one of the tones in the augmented chord. The bass note usually resolves down by a half step, for example you could have Caug/F# approach Fmaj.
Augmented and diminished chords are one of mine all time favourite because of how much you can do with them and their sound you can create. I must say, you have managed to show a lot in such nice structure way about them in just 15 minutes that it's just impressive. Thank you !
Also worth mentioning that augmented chords contain notes of the whole tone scale. Playing whole tone over an augmented chord in place of the 5 chord sounds super good.
When I started getting into music theory and I was trying to memorize the circle of fifths I would draw it during the downtime at work, and then like some kind of lovecraftian plot or something I began to see all kinds of patterns in the circle and the relationship between notes that really opened my mind to the brilliance in it's simplicity. augmented is fun since it forms a triangle, drawing a right angle gives you the minor, drawing the right angle backwards gives you the parallel minor, etc.
Man, that Lydian Augmented sounded really cool how it was played. It made me think of the desert at dusk or something or some alien world with a civilization long-gone, dust twirling in the wind.
One of my favorites is the jazz standard “Do you know what it means to miss New Orleans”. The verse starts Cmaj7 / G7#5 / Cmaj7 / Am7. To me, it adds a feeling of longing or even daydreaming that fits the song really well. I really like the Harry Connick Jr. and Dr. John version. Of course, the first that came to mind was exactly the one you mentioned: “Oh Darling”. I would also like to point out that the Eagles used the exact same turnaround in “Please come home for Christmas”, which is almost a chord-for-chord rip-off of “Oh Darling”. Every Christmas, I make a point to sing the lyrics for “Oh Darling” over the top of it until my wife gets annoyed and makes me stop. 🙃
The Eagles didn’t write Please Come Home For Christmas. It’s a cover of a 1960 blues song by Charles Brown. The Beatles probably learnt it in Hamburg in ‘62 then borrowed it a few years later.
I've been playing guitar for 38 years and I think in this under 20 minute video lesson, I learned exponentially more about chording than I ever had from all of my musician colleagues that went to college and any person I had ever had the privilege of giving me a lesson. I'm sharing this with my colleagues.
6:38 & 8:15 - you're not imagining it, it's definitely an old time style. A great example of this is in the song 'Just like starting over' by John Lennon (in the last part of the intro and outro). It goes A - Aaug - F#m/A - A7 - D - Dm. The A7 creates even more tension to go to the D. Beautiful use of Chromatic movement. These arms of mine by Otis Redding also uses this progression in the chorus but I think it's in the key of A# rather than A. Thanks for sharing this Jake!
Every time I click on one of your videos, I think "what the hell is this video even going to be about, I've never heard of this" and then I quickly realize "oh dang, I've been trying to figure out what this musical concept was for years and years but never had the language to even know how to talk about it or look it up!" Seriously, every single time. Thanks so much for making music make more sense.
You are so generous that you share everything about things that took you quite some time to figure out. I can't thank you enough. 11:48 when you started playing this augmented lydian scale I kind of felt how you felt, you said indistinct but I heard you kind of wanna say an indescribable beauty, a moment before tears can stream out because of all that mystery... anyways so lovely and beautiful 🥰💖
I am learning SO much from you, my friend! I have been playing for decades, but never really paid attention to how to show other people what I am connecting together. Thank you so very much.
Liked and subscribed! I've been studying music for years, and even did jazz band in school for six years, and none of my instructors went this in-depth into the chord theory around augmented chords/triads and modality surrounding them! I'm a huge fan of getting technical with chords and how to implement them into a piece or song, so I appreciate the attention to detail you put into this. I'm a singer/songwriter and guitarist myself, so I'm always looking for new and different concepts to try to incorporate into what I write. The feel of augmented chords has always felt very space-like, like you're floating without solid ground beneath you, and learning from this that you can restabilize the feeling by using it as a dominant to the grounded, "home" tonic, that blew my mind. Thank you!!
@@fallout3freak360 I think that's because there is an augmented chord based on the 3rd note of a minMaj7 chord. If you have AminMaj7 for instance, the 3rd is C, E (the 5th) is a major third above it, G# (the maj7) is another major third above, and then another major 3rd back to C. And there you have it :)
I think the ? could be described as you don't know whats coming next. You know something is coming, but there are various directions it can goes to, so its kinda of a ? in a box that's contains a chord, but you don't what that is...yet..
I have watched many of your videos and am always impressed. You are like the Houdini of musicology. I honestly cannot play guitar and sing simultaneously, but you play really complicated stuff off the cuff and carry on a complicated conversation at the same time, with little or no hesitation. Your head must be like running processors in parallel. I'm amazed, but probably at the wrong stuff. Love your videos.
Without you I wouldn’t have been able to make any of the songs that I’ve made. Just dropped my first project and a lot of the theory I used was straight from you. Thank you! Best teacher on YT ❤
Aug Chords are a really mysterious and deeper way to say the same thing in my opinion. You could take the normal route, or you can take the aug route when it comes to chord progression. Aug Chords are something everyone should try!
As a musician who hopes to be professional, your channel is the best I could find on UA-cam about theory. Your way to teach is just perfect, thanks a lot for giving this freely !
Maybe it's because I write probably 90% of the stuff I do in minor, and use a lot of phyrgian and locrian (so lots of diminished), but I've never seen the augmented as "creepy" or "old fashioned" To me, it almost feels more like "I should be happy, but I'm not." Like getting a different answer to a question you thought you knew the answer to. Then again, I'm pretty much obsessed with the idea of "emotions of musical keys" which a lot of people say doesn't exist at all. (It's all just wavelengths!). Eh, for a guy whose main influences are metal 'n' Mahler, emotion is a big thing for me. If you want to simplify it that major is "happy" and minor is "sad," augmented is screaming at you that it will never let you see it cry, while tears stream down it's face. So I definitely get the "uncomfortable" part.
Yes, minor chords can easily come across as sad or angry or other emotions. I think of augmented the same way. Maybe it's weird or awkward in some settings. But it can tug your heartstrings in other settings, or downright sweet, or a kinda slapping you in the face to listen up
I never realized that there are only four augmented triads until I watched this video and the fact that there are only four augmented triads and only three diminished 7th chords blows my mind. This is a really excellent video. Eleven years ago, the late Duane Shinn made a video called Diminished 7th Chords: The Secret Doorway To Everywhere.
For a tonal example, Rachmaninoff has tons (e.g., his Etude-Tableaux op. 39, no. 9 with his developed chromatic language, Chochieva's or Haryoudinoff's recordings recommended). Also, Muse also has several songs with augmented chords, being Rachmaninoff an influence for Matthew Bellamy (e.g., Exogenesis Symphony, lol)
this goes a lot deeper then just music. music, colour theory and fractal mathematics can all be created by base 7 mathematics. on top of that, for the individuals who really want to jump down the rabbit hole, there is a book called "interference: a grand scientific musical theory". I highly recommend it.
👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽 You have truly “explained” it in “such an easy”, “clear” and “straight up” understandable way !!!!! 👍🏽👍🏽🥂🥂 - You’re Awesome !!!! 🥂🥂
Whenever you hear an augmented chord in a Beatles' song you can be sure that George Harrison put it in there, even though he doesn't always get the credit for it. Great video and lesson, thank you. This is my first time here and I will now subscribe to your channel, you are like Rick Beato for the slower learners. Anyone familiar with Rick Beato's channel will understand that that last comment is a compliment to both channels.
I think George was more a fan of the diminished chord. John Lennon uses the Augmented chord in "Just like starting over" from his final album, "Double Fantasy".
As well as "Oh Darling" that chord also acts as as the intro to the much earlier Beatles song "All I've got to Do". I usually play those two song back-to-back but never knew what the chord was called! Thank you!😁
Now, what’s really fun and where they fit is to take the Harmonic Minor Scale and backward convert it into a Harmonic Major Scale. It’s just a major scale with a sharpened fifth. Then rediscover the chords that fit in the scale. The fourth is weird because now it can be either major or minor.
@@MusicTheoryForGuitar once you find Ozilli the triangle of thirds will be complete and the gateway to Augmentia will be unsealed! you don't know what you're dealing with here!!!
I’ve known these chords were a gold mine of opportunity for a creator for awhile now but never studied them until I played one on accident trying to fret an A major as a rookie guitarist. Great content brother. Earned yourself a sub.
Not mentioned in this video is how, in modern jazz harmony, augmented fifths are very often part of voicings (frequently referred to as flatted 13ths) which provide a beautiful characteristic richness and texture which is not in any way "weird," "uncomfortable," "awkward" or "puzzling."
I got a lot from this - another great lesson. Demonstrates the highest of talent, professionalism, energy and heart. You are appreciated. Thank You - Ed Parkinson
Great video! 5:16 I can see exactly why that chord progression works. The E note is in both chords, so it stays where it is. The other three notes in E+M7 all move up by a semitone; (G#, C, D# move up to A, C#, E). "Blackout" by Muse has a GORGEOUS chord pattern that uses an augmented chord, as well as some inverted chords: Bb, Dm/A, Eb/G, F+, Bb, Dm, Cm/Eb, F+...
Search on youtube about how to use augmented chord in chord progressions I find this video of yours which really help me. I must say thank you for this video. It really supportive and informative.
Hi Jake, you're too young to remember Buddy Holly's Raining in my Heart back in the late 50s but it contains an augmented chord. The progression is D D+ Bm D7 and it's simple but effective. It's not too far away from Dear Prudence either. Also George Harrison's Something has a lovely change from Bm to F#+ . I think that the augmented chord is used more than you give it credit for. One of my favourite chords is the augmented seventh eg F#+ 2X233X which resolves nicely to Bm7. Nice lesson.
I was delighted to find one of my very first songs 20 years ago (before I knew much about chords at all) used an augmented I chord for upward chromatic voice leading in the melody, I I+ vi I7, with the 3rd note in bass throughout (C/E, CAug/E, Am/E, C7/E). Really proud of it, maybe I wrote more interesting songs back then!! Thanks so much, great video.
JAMES SCOTT NICHOLSON,ONTARIO, CANADA 🇨🇦 I JUST WANT TO SAY, I WATCH A LOT OF LESSONS,AND HAVE BEEN TEACHING MYSELF THEORY, ALL THROUGH THIS COVID PERIOD, THIS HAS BEEN,BY FAR THE MOST INFORMATIVE,STRAIGHT UP LESSON,WITH GREAT DISPLAYS ALONG SIDE WITH YOUR TEACHING. YOU, IN MY BOOKS DEFINITELY HOLD THE TEACHING TITLE BY FAR IN ALL THE WAYS I DESCRIBED !!! TOP LEFT 💜
Music Theory for guitar just released this same topic today....are you guys secretly trying to break our brains?? this is too much augmented for one day....oh, right, we're 2020....
I'd bet that before these awkward times, stuff like that was best kept trade secret...Know it is free, like programming courses, history lessons, etc. I think it is a matter of open you mind now or feel miserable for life.
Also in Us and Them- the third chord in the sequence can be parsed as a DmMaj7 or an aug triad played over D. Great to hear how the sax plays over that chord!
6:40 - I think that Elliot Smith does that in "Waltz #2". The I to the I+ to the vi sequence. The bridge where he sings "On and on and on.." Maybe not. It just really reminded me of that when you played that.
Jake: "What if i told you we can have a whole tonality that is built around that augmened chord?" Also Jake: *chooses lydian augmented* Augmented scale: Am i a joke to you?
I love augmented chords.. try adding a flat nine.. eg.. E7#5b9... great movement chord.. great passing .. the F... moves to a Am (add7 or a sus2 or sus4) and you can close the from Am (parallel harmony.. as in blues) or Am7sus4 gives you places to go all over the place from there. Think of them not as chord for harmony, but a passing chord to change direction of passing tone to add voice leading. Augmented to V/Iii or V/vi with added b/#9can lead you into Dimensions of Diminished realm... then the fun begins. I have learnt so much from play around like this these last couple of years on directs in voice leading, passing chords, chordal harmony and modulation.. etc.. I would encourage people to play, investigate and understand augmented chords.. I appreciate your podcasts you do. I have even picked up a few things from your teaching too..Thank you!
To add on to what the two persons above me said, when our ears hear musical intervals, they calculate the higher Hz pitch divided by the lower Hz pitch and try to interpret what they're hearing as the closest fraction, such as when we hear a perfect fifth, that's very close to a 3/2 interval (like 300 Hz against 200 Hz), when we hear a major third, that's pretty close to a 5/4 interval (like 125 Hz against 100 Hz), etc. The simpler the fraction the musical interval sounds like, the more consonant it'll sound to our ears. So intervals like 2/1, 3/2, 4/3, 5/4, 6/5, and 9/8 are the octave, perfect fifth, perfect fourth, major third, minor third, and major second respectively, and all of those musical intervals sound nice and consonant to our ears. But when we play musical instruments, we're not actually playing those exact fractions. For the past two hundred or so years, western society has used what's called 12 equal divisions of the octave (shortened as 12edo), where, as the name suggests, you take the octave (which is the interval 2/1, a very simple and super consonant interval) and split that octave into twelve equally spaced parts. By dividing the octave into twelve equally spaced parts, we end up with twelve different intervals, and believe it or not, besides the octave, none of the other intervals are exact fractions, meaning they're all slightly out of tune from the pure intervals (which are referred to as "just" intervals, meaning pure). Some of those 12edo intervals closely approximate some of the fractions I mentioned above. More specifically, the 12edo octave is by definition perfectly in-tune since it's exactly the interval 2/1, the 12edo perfect fifth and 12edo perfect fourth are almost identical to the intervals 3/2 and 4/3 respectively, and so they sound super consonant because they sound like those intervals, the 12edo major second is very close to the interval 9/8, and so it sounds somewhat consonant, the 12edo major third and 12edo minor third are a bit off from 5/4 and 6/5 respectively, and so when you listen closely to a major or minor third interval on say the piano then you can hear some wobbling since it's not perfectly in-tune with the just intervals they approximate to our ears. The major sixth and minor sixth roughly approximate the intervals 5/3 and 8/5, but just like the major and minor third (in fact, just like the major and minor third since the minor sixth and major sixth are simply inversions of those two intervals, so they're the same exact amount out-of-tune from just tuning as their inversions), but even though they're kinda off from just, just like the 12edo major third (roughly 5/4) and the 12edo minor third (roughly 6/5), to our ears they approximate simple/not complicated intervals, so they still sound pretty consonant even though they're kinda off and thus sound kinda wobbly when you play them on an instrument (that wobbliness is out-of-tuneness). At this point, you might be thinking, "how can musical intervals in our tuning (12edo) be considered out-of-tune? Aren't they perfectly in-tune?" Well ya see, if we tried to use perfectly in-tune musical intervals (fractions), the math would get ugly really fast because for example in 12edo (the tuning we use), when you stack a perfect fifth on top of itself 12 times, you perfectly line back up exactly seven octaves up (at the same note name you started with at the bottom). But if you tune those perfect fifths exactly to the interval 3/2, you actually don't get seven octaves up (which represented as a fraction would be (2/1, the octave) times itself (2/1) seven times, which gives you 128/1, which is the interval seven octaves up is. But if you stack twelve 3/2 perfect fifths, you actually multiply 3/2 by itself 12 times, which doesn't give you a clean octave of 128/1, but instead 531441/4096, which is a little sharper than seven octaves up, and would sound really dissonant if you played that interval on an instrument, such as the piano. So we use the tuning 12edo so that the math doesn't get all ugly and dissonant from stacking fractions on top of each other, but as a result, everything except for octaves are by definition at least slightly out-of-tune. For instance, perfect fifths sound really locked in and that's why power chords sound so supported, since the 12edo perfect fifth very closely approximates the interval 3/2. But 12edo major thirds are noticeably sharp from the interval 5/4, and so because they're distorted up somewhat higher than 5/4, our ears hear them as somewhat out-of-tune, and so they don't sound as supported nor "locked-in" as perfect fifths, and if you played a major third on the piano and listened closely, you can definitely hear wobbliness from it since it's a bit out-of-tune. So we use the tuning 12edo so that the math doesn't get all ugly from stacking fractions on top of each other, but as a result, everything except for octaves aren't perfectly in-tune, but instead "approximations" (which means they approximate just intervals, like the 12edo major third approximates the interval 5/4 even though the 12edo major third does not exactly equal 5/4, it's a little too high). And so at first thought, you'd think that symmetry in music would sound good to our ears, but that doesn't actually ring true since the most consonant chords are things like major triads like C E G which are definitely not symmetrical, but noticeably asymmetrical compared to an augmented or diminished chord. But with a major triad, the notes C and E are a major third that approximate the interval 5/4, which is simple and thus consonant to our ears, and the notes C and G are a perfect fifth that approximate the interval 3/2, which is simple and thus very consonant to our ears as well, and so a major triad sounds consonant and pleasing to our ears. But an augmented triad does not approximate simple intervals but instead giant complicated ones with those three notes together, nor does a diminished triad or tetrad approximate simple intervals but instead giant complicated ones too, so even though those chords sound symmetrical in pitch to our ears, symmetrical pitch does not equal consonance, and so the most consonant chords like a major triad or a minor triad are actually asymmetrical instead.
Just a thought, I run into this on old (40s and 50s) Christmas songs. They are all over the place. This video shed a different color on the light of my the use of modes and chord structures. I use these in my own writing, but my brain as a bassist at core is “how to get smoothly and expressively” to the next chord. I always run into problems (mostly) with guitarists, that “you need to just add a finger here” before tonic or fifth Nice explanation.
Jake my man, you're such a great teacher! My teacher taught me similar things about the diminished scale, and i was blown away. It never struck me to try and replicate the same thing with Aug chords are they too have a similar sense of symmetry. Your videos are great, I often re-watch your video on Polyrhythms just because how great is. In fact, today's video was so good, I'm going to go and re-watch that video. Keep up the great work!! Edit: The Hemiola One - ua-cam.com/video/HhODahQ-U4U/v-deo.html
Brilliant lesson! Not too fast, not too slow, not too simple, not to hard to grasp - just brilliant! Only one contradictory note: Augmented chords (and the augmented lydian scale in particular) don't sound uncomfortable to me at all. Just very colourful.
![How to Sound Like Daft Punk, Tool, or EVERY Rock Band using Minor/Aeolian [Riffing With Modes #6]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Bz_q96JhSOg/mqdefault.jpg)
![How to Sound Like Daft Punk, Tool, or EVERY Rock Band using Minor/Aeolian [Riffing With Modes #6]](/img/tr.png)
![Demonstrating 7 Ways that Composers Make Music Using Modes [SONGWRITING / THEORY]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/sC2qXLnVU3A/mqdefault.jpg)
If you raise one of the notes of an augmented chord by a half step, you get a minor chord, if you lower one, you get a major chord. And because of the symmetry of the augmented chord, it can be used as a "portal" chord, much like diminished seventh chords.
This is one of those things I discovered a long time ago and then forgot! Maybe another video is in order that shows those symmetries and tries to use them to compose.... Like you said, it is certainly a "portal" in MANY different ways, where as dim7 has a pretty strict resolution mechanism. Just thinking about the myriad possibilites kinda scares me.
"Portals: Fascinating" - Spock
Great stuff! Sounds like another excellent topic for Jake to expound on!
hell yeah man ty
@@SignalsMusicStudio This seems like having the portal gun with the blue and orange portals. You want to get to a chord and suddenly you have 2 options, you can go through the aug chord or through the dim7. So many colours to explore come to mind. (Without mentioning the possible colours that you can get from borrowing those aug chords from the parallel modes of melodic minor and harmonic minor, it makes me shiver just from thinking about it).
Raise the root! ￣\(°∀°)/￣
We literally live in a time, where advanced concepts are taught for free, on demand, not locally limited, to anyone willing to listen and with access to the internet, which is spread almost anywhere.
Can we please take a moment to appreciate that, and to thank Jake Lizardboi for being one of the people making that possible?
Can you please tell me why, I was thinking the same thing yesterday. Like I learn more about music on youtube than I did in college. Like wow!!!!! Smh
Thank god for people sharing this!!!
Been thinking about it a lot, As if we all choose to be part of a hive mind we call the internet.
faselblaDer3te
You are right : thanks to him and all others who teach us. Amazing to notice synchronicities thanks to the internet : many teachers sharing on the same topic across countries in other languages too...
Lol Lizardboi?
Interesting point: You can actually resolve ANYTHING to the 1, as long as it has the 5 note in the bass. So if you make a chord that has an E in the bass and any other notes on top (literally any), then resolve it to an A major (or A minor) chord, it will resolve well. This is a great way of introducing really weird melody notes into your song.
holy fuck that's actually true. and each combination has a slightly different color. i just don't like putting the #IV chord on top of the V to resolve to I for obvious reasons, but that's the only instance i didn't think it was resololving
does it work with the leading note (7th note)
“Tonal Pugatory”. I’ve heard that used to describe my playing more than once.........
LMAO
Bro hahaha
Hahahaa
Sorry for the slow upload schedule! I've been active on Patreon lessons but sluggish with
UA-cam. Looking to change that this week for a faster delivery of Riffing with Modes #6 =)
Thanks for everything you do, Jake! A funk guitar crash course (like the blues one) would be amazing though. If and when you find the time. Cheers :)
It’s alright man. Love your informative channel.
Dude, I know Mike Muggli in real life and I had no idea you two knew each other cuz I found you independently, that’s crazy!
@@ruud2661 gotta hear Jake funk some shite up[ fo' sho'.
Yes please more mode videos! Working on an E Phrygian metal song now
Jake, I marvel at the grasp you have on many musical concepts. Not only that, you have a gift of presenting complex ideas in a simple and understandable way. There are those that can play music but cannot teach. There are those that can teach music that can't play. You are the rare bird that can both play and teach. It is simply a joy to listen and learn from you.
The way the spaces line up in this comment make the perfect backwards slash and it’s really satisfying
Jake deserves way more subscribers for his intros alone, not to mention the top class content! Thanks brother!
Bach: "Think I'll raise the 7th in minor to get a leading tone." (Harmonic Minor) "Cool! I get a dominant 7th on V, just like in Major! Yay!" (Looks back at the third triad) "What the hell is that?".
Same thing in melodic minor. Lol what the hell is that?
@@CMM5300 Yes. I found chord progressions difficult in melodic minor when I was in college, since typically the scale is only altered when ascending. Most of the chords I had trouble with during harmonic analysis were actually incidental chords created by the changing notes of the scale, and they really weren't part of the harmony. Yet, there they were! Resulted in a lot of "C" grades on my analysis tests.
@@tsisqua right. The classical version. Jazz melodic minor is the same ascending and descending. Then you get 7 modes from it also.
1 Mel min (Am maj7)
2 Dorian b2 (Bm 7 )
3 Lydian aug (Caug maj7)
4 Lydian Dom (D7)
5 mixolydian b6 (E7)
6 loc natural 2 (F# Min7b5)
7 loc b4 (G# half dim )
@@CMM5300 Same usage has developed in Rock music for melodic minor. And yes, I was at first an education major. So everything was classical training in harmony until year 4 when we LIGHTLY studied Jazz and Rock music. I'm going to paste your reply into a notepad doc for future reference. Thanks, Chris!
@@tsisqua your welcome. I'm self taught. From what I understand the difference between min7b5 and half
diminished is: min7b5 resolves down half diminished resolves up. Other than that it's the same chord.
Instructions Unclear: every time I play this cord a mysterious stranger appears
You brought be back with that one
Hey, I understood that reference :0!!
Same with this video there's a misterious guy on the back must be the chord.
It's kind of the Donnie Darko chord.
Arnaldo Rivera Spelling...
Iron Maiden's "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" is a great example of augmented arpeggios (although played on the bass). The augmented tonality alongside the 'creaking boat' sound effects and the guitar swells really creates the ambience of a deserted ship on the water at night.
@Andrew Hager ok mister divide and conquer
@Andrew Hager Metallica and Iron maiden are fairly different bands to be honest man. Both important bands of course I don't even listen to either particularly but you are comparing apples to oranges
That's it!!
I came into the comments specifically to point this one out. It oozes mystery, the unknown of being in fog, the shortness of how far you can see and the creepy lack of ability to know what is happening, or going to happen. Tonally as a chord, this could be resolved in two completely opposite ways and I think you internalise this even when those resolutions are not being offered. Could it go dark or light? Both are equally likely at this point, and you are simultaneously being strung between both.
If you take an augmented chord and the augmented chord a whole step above if you get the whole tone scale. I feel like that is important when discussing augmented chords
I haven't done a video on the whole tone scales yet, when I do I'll refer back to this video :)
@@SignalsMusicStudio I'm waiting for that video, I love the whole tone scale!
@@SignalsMusicStudio it works great to use the whole tone on top of an aug chord. It also works to "repeat a bass note" to force some kind of tonic to the whole tone scale
@ Yep, that's a neat trick, like "Veils" from Claude Debussy where he forces you to hear B flat as the "tonic," if you will, by repeating that note again and again.
@@seiph80 not to mention the immense "release of tension" from just a pentatonic scale at the middle section, which, to me, is a major example of how to create excitement from non-traditional / diatonic sources
I actually love an augmented chord because it makes me feel sound in a way that I don't with non-augmented chords. It's the anticipation that makes life interesting.
You don't have a clue on how much joy watching your stuff brings me. I always like the videos before I even begin watching them because your musical knowledge, your teaching habilities, your musicianship and your sense of humour are all top-notch and I haven't been let down by your content since I found your channel a few months ago. Your videos always spark new ideas I want to explore, and this desire to create always shakes me off from the anxiety and depression. For someone who struggles with lots of stuff like I do, it's one of the most incredible feelings I can feel. Thank you so much.
What it makes me learn .... is When He smiles while talking .... it's like saying ALL THE TIME ... "It's a piece of cake !!!"
There is also a type of augmented chord called the blackadder chord which is occasionally used in J-pop, where the bass note is a whole step above one of the tones in the augmented chord. The bass note usually resolves down by a half step, for example you could have Caug/F# approach Fmaj.
Thanks for this, I never heard of it before. Time to do some studying!
Nice
Augmented and diminished chords are one of mine all time favourite because of how much you can do with them and their sound you can create. I must say, you have managed to show a lot in such nice structure way about them in just 15 minutes that it's just impressive.
Thank you !
Also worth mentioning that augmented chords contain notes of the whole tone scale. Playing whole tone over an augmented chord in place of the 5 chord sounds super good.
Nothing makes Jake smile more than making “uncomfortable” music.
really freaked me out with that pic of an asian baby
This comment makes me feel weird. It applies to me completely
Andrew Gibbons That make me smile.
Lol
@@andrewgibbons1558 Same
Every music theory video I have ever watched: "oh yeah the Beatles did it"
@Zizzi's Genetics you should just cover up all those gross old Hendrix stickers with Beibs then...
@Zizzi's Genetics haha that person's disgusting taste was the original taste, got to it before you and loved it up nice.
@Zizzi's Genetics whats wrong with dababy
Zizzi's Genetics lmfao
@@ileryon4019 a boring repetitive flow imo
When I started getting into music theory and I was trying to memorize the circle of fifths I would draw it during the downtime at work, and then like some kind of lovecraftian plot or something I began to see all kinds of patterns in the circle and the relationship between notes that really opened my mind to the brilliance in it's simplicity. augmented is fun since it forms a triangle, drawing a right angle gives you the minor, drawing the right angle backwards gives you the parallel minor, etc.
Please, please, be forewarned and guard yourself. The secrets of the late Eric Zann are located therein.
Awesome; men are very visual and that sounds like something I would do; especially at a boring desk job, 😉
Man, that Lydian Augmented sounded really cool how it was played. It made me think of the desert at dusk or something or some alien world with a civilization long-gone, dust twirling in the wind.
One of my favorites is the jazz standard “Do you know what it means to miss New Orleans”. The verse starts Cmaj7 / G7#5 / Cmaj7 / Am7. To me, it adds a feeling of longing or even daydreaming that fits the song really well. I really like the Harry Connick Jr. and Dr. John version. Of course, the first that came to mind was exactly the one you mentioned: “Oh Darling”. I would also like to point out that the Eagles used the exact same turnaround in “Please come home for Christmas”, which is almost a chord-for-chord rip-off of “Oh Darling”. Every Christmas, I make a point to sing the lyrics for “Oh Darling” over the top of it until my wife gets annoyed and makes me stop. 🙃
The Eagles didn’t write Please Come Home For Christmas. It’s a cover of a 1960 blues song by Charles Brown. The Beatles probably learnt it in Hamburg in ‘62 then borrowed it a few years later.
I've been playing guitar for 38 years and I think in this under 20 minute video lesson, I learned exponentially more about chording than I ever had from all of my musician colleagues that went to college and any person I had ever had the privilege of giving me a lesson. I'm sharing this with my colleagues.
6:38 & 8:15 - you're not imagining it, it's definitely an old time style. A great example of this is in the song 'Just like starting over' by John Lennon (in the last part of the intro and outro). It goes A - Aaug - F#m/A - A7 - D - Dm. The A7 creates even more tension to go to the D. Beautiful use of Chromatic movement. These arms of mine by Otis Redding also uses this progression in the chorus but I think it's in the key of A# rather than A. Thanks for sharing this Jake!
I was going to comment the same thing. I love that aug sound in Starting over!
You're a hero. Informative, chill, and good humor. Also, thanks to the patreons. This is the golden tier of youtube.
Every time I click on one of your videos, I think "what the hell is this video even going to be about, I've never heard of this" and then I quickly realize "oh dang, I've been trying to figure out what this musical concept was for years and years but never had the language to even know how to talk about it or look it up!" Seriously, every single time. Thanks so much for making music make more sense.
You are so generous that you share everything about things that took you quite some time to figure out. I can't thank you enough. 11:48 when you started playing this augmented lydian scale I kind of felt how you felt, you said indistinct but I heard you kind of wanna say an indescribable beauty, a moment before tears can stream out because of all that mystery... anyways so lovely and beautiful 🥰💖
"What if I told you we could have a whole tonality built around an augmented chord?"
Breaks out some King Crimson.
OMG What a video! Your Motifs + this video has been helping me a lot to compose songs better! Thanks a lot
13:20-13:55 reminded me so much of "Don't Leave Me Now" from The Wall.
Nice catch, it really has a similar vibe.
Also kinda reminds me of "Werships" by Portal
I am learning SO much from you, my friend! I have been playing for decades, but never really paid attention to how to show other people what I am connecting together. Thank you so very much.
Jake you haven't a clue how long I've been waiting for this video. Thank you my bro
Liked and subscribed! I've been studying music for years, and even did jazz band in school for six years, and none of my instructors went this in-depth into the chord theory around augmented chords/triads and modality surrounding them! I'm a huge fan of getting technical with chords and how to implement them into a piece or song, so I appreciate the attention to detail you put into this. I'm a singer/songwriter and guitarist myself, so I'm always looking for new and different concepts to try to incorporate into what I write. The feel of augmented chords has always felt very space-like, like you're floating without solid ground beneath you, and learning from this that you can restabilize the feeling by using it as a dominant to the grounded, "home" tonic, that blew my mind. Thank you!!
Augmented chords are literally just "????"
Sosig
I feel the same way about mM7 chords
@@fallout3freak360 I think that's because there is an augmented chord based on the 3rd note of a minMaj7 chord. If you have AminMaj7 for instance, the 3rd is C, E (the 5th) is a major third above it, G# (the maj7) is another major third above, and then another major 3rd back to C. And there you have it :)
Lmao yes
I think the ? could be described as you don't know whats coming next. You know something is coming, but there are various directions it can goes to, so its kinda of a ? in a box that's contains a chord, but you don't what that is...yet..
I have watched many of your videos and am always impressed. You are like the Houdini of musicology. I honestly cannot play guitar and sing simultaneously, but you play really complicated stuff off the cuff and carry on a complicated conversation at the same time, with little or no hesitation. Your head must be like running processors in parallel. I'm amazed, but probably at the wrong stuff. Love your videos.
Damn babies collage over Lydian Aug is insanely hilarious
I didn’t sense too much creepiness, personally
But it did make me wonder if those babies were up to something tho
Baby You Know Who had me in stitches!!!!
It made feel like they had been kidnapped
in my head i am just thinking "please, just make it stop, then ... yoda"
Also works with kitten pictures.
Without you I wouldn’t have been able to make any of the songs that I’ve made. Just dropped my first project and a lot of the theory I used was straight from you. Thank you! Best teacher on YT ❤
The little arpeggio that plays throughout in the video reminds me of "Music of the Spheres" from Portal 2
Same
Me two!!!
This kids the best UA-cam guitar/music teacher hands down. And thats coming for coming from someone who bought Rick Beatos book. That intro was gold
Aug Chords are a really mysterious and deeper way to say the same thing in my opinion. You could take the normal route, or you can take the aug route when it comes to chord progression. Aug Chords are something everyone should try!
As a musician who hopes to be professional, your channel is the best I could find on UA-cam about theory. Your way to teach is just perfect, thanks a lot for giving this freely !
Maybe it's because I write probably 90% of the stuff I do in minor, and use a lot of phyrgian and locrian (so lots of diminished), but I've never seen the augmented as "creepy" or "old fashioned" To me, it almost feels more like "I should be happy, but I'm not." Like getting a different answer to a question you thought you knew the answer to. Then again, I'm pretty much obsessed with the idea of "emotions of musical keys" which a lot of people say doesn't exist at all. (It's all just wavelengths!). Eh, for a guy whose main influences are metal 'n' Mahler, emotion is a big thing for me. If you want to simplify it that major is "happy" and minor is "sad," augmented is screaming at you that it will never let you see it cry, while tears stream down it's face. So I definitely get the "uncomfortable" part.
Yes, minor chords can easily come across as sad or angry or other emotions. I think of augmented the same way. Maybe it's weird or awkward in some settings. But it can tug your heartstrings in other settings, or downright sweet, or a kinda slapping you in the face to listen up
Augmented chords seem generally dramatic to me.
I agree. I hear something like 'pretty, sad.'
I never realized that there are only four augmented triads until I watched this video and the fact that there are only four augmented triads and only three diminished 7th chords blows my mind. This is a really excellent video. Eleven years ago, the late Duane Shinn made a video called Diminished 7th Chords: The Secret Doorway To Everywhere.
For a tonal example, Rachmaninoff has tons (e.g., his Etude-Tableaux op. 39, no. 9 with his developed chromatic language, Chochieva's or Haryoudinoff's recordings recommended). Also, Muse also has several songs with augmented chords, being Rachmaninoff an influence for Matthew Bellamy (e.g., Exogenesis Symphony, lol)
You are right, especially on Muse...That's the point which makes Muse make the listener , uncomfortably comfortable and,..adicted!
Yo, thank you. Rach-y isn't my usual hang, so I appreciate this as a case study.
Amazing video as always man! It would be awesome if you did a video about unusual darker scales like the neapolitan or the byzantine!
One of my fav teachers told me long ago: go crazy and put any junk you want on the dominant that everything works fine when reaching the tonic.
You’re an awesome instructor. I really appreciate you making these videos as I’ve learned a lot from them. Thank you!
this goes a lot deeper then just music. music, colour theory and fractal mathematics can all be created by base 7 mathematics. on top of that, for the individuals who really want to jump down the rabbit hole, there is a book called "interference: a grand scientific musical theory". I highly recommend it.
👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽
You have truly “explained” it in “such an easy”, “clear” and “straight up” understandable way !!!!! 👍🏽👍🏽🥂🥂
- You’re Awesome !!!! 🥂🥂
Whenever you hear an augmented chord in a Beatles' song you can be sure that George Harrison put it in there, even though he doesn't always get the credit for it.
Great video and lesson, thank you. This is my first time here and I will now subscribe to your channel, you are like Rick Beato for the slower learners. Anyone familiar with Rick Beato's channel will understand that that last comment is a compliment to both channels.
I think George was more a fan of the diminished chord. John Lennon uses the Augmented chord in "Just like starting over" from his final album, "Double Fantasy".
Love your deep dives into stuff like this. It is a HUGE help expanding my musical knowledge after 40+ years messing around with it.
The augmented babies cracked me up. Great video!
terrified by the phrase "augmented babies"
Happy to put in a good word for you! You are one of my favorite teacher's. The announcer's voice is a bonus! Carry on note playin' fellow.
As well as "Oh Darling" that chord also acts as as the intro to the much earlier Beatles song "All I've got to Do". I usually play those two song back-to-back but never knew what the chord was called! Thank you!😁
It's also the last chord in the opening D minor sequence of The Beatles "She's So Heavy".
Now, what’s really fun and where they fit is to take the Harmonic Minor Scale and backward convert it into a Harmonic Major Scale. It’s just a major scale with a sharpened fifth.
Then rediscover the chords that fit in the scale. The fourth is weird because now it can be either major or minor.
"how do you use a chord that sounds like ~this~" lol you JUST did it man sounded pretty good
These videos are pure gold! No bs just stright information
My subscribers sent me here. Seems like we both published a video on Augmented chords together. Musical minds think alike? :-)
Seriously what are the odds?!
@@SignalsMusicStudio I just realized... your last name is Lizzio. My last name is Zillio. This is getting weirder...
@@MusicTheoryForGuitar a collab is meant to be
@@MusicTheoryForGuitar once you find Ozilli the triangle of thirds will be complete and the gateway to Augmentia will be unsealed! you don't know what you're dealing with here!!!
Cool, I noticed that. I got both of you guys on my feed. Great stuff.
I’ve known these chords were a gold mine of opportunity for a creator for awhile now but never studied them until I played one on accident trying to fret an A major as a rookie guitarist. Great content brother. Earned yourself a sub.
Not mentioned in this video is how, in modern jazz harmony, augmented fifths are very often part of voicings (frequently referred to as flatted 13ths) which provide a beautiful characteristic richness and texture which is not in any way "weird," "uncomfortable," "awkward" or "puzzling."
More of a diminished sixth tbh
I got a lot from this - another great lesson. Demonstrates the highest of talent, professionalism, energy and heart. You are appreciated. Thank You - Ed Parkinson
Augmented chords always give me a mystery and sacred vibe
I love augmented chords. Listen to take a bow by muse. That song is chocked full of aug chords.
Also literally the entire king crimson catalogue..
Great video! 5:16 I can see exactly why that chord progression works. The E note is in both chords, so it stays where it is. The other three notes in E+M7 all move up by a semitone; (G#, C, D# move up to A, C#, E).
"Blackout" by Muse has a GORGEOUS chord pattern that uses an augmented chord, as well as some inverted chords: Bb, Dm/A, Eb/G, F+, Bb, Dm, Cm/Eb, F+...
The brazilian band "Nenhum de nós" uses exactly the A A+ Bm E in their song called "Eu não entendo"... it's an amazing chord progression!
Search on youtube about how to use augmented chord in chord progressions I find this video of yours which really help me. I must say thank you for this video. It really supportive and informative.
4:14
Replay button for Jake’s Oh! Darling.
thanks Anonymous Goat, very cool
I see what you mean .... those few bars at 12:25 were stunningly emotional... awesome lesson.
Lydian Augmented is actually a beautiful sound and is used in jazz quite frequently.
Do you have examples?
@@songfulmusicofsongs You'll find it used by modern jazz artists.
I mean how this just rolls out of his head so easily. amazing to this level of understanding to the point that you can explain it so well
Hi Jake, you're too young to remember Buddy Holly's Raining in my Heart back in the late 50s but it contains an augmented chord. The progression is D D+ Bm D7 and it's simple but effective. It's not too far away from Dear Prudence either. Also George Harrison's Something has a lovely change from Bm to F#+ . I think that the augmented chord is used more than you give it credit for. One of my favourite chords is the augmented seventh eg F#+ 2X233X which resolves nicely to Bm7. Nice lesson.
Eddie Money's song Baby Hold On To Me starts out similar to this progression. It's a D D+ D6 D7.
Lol I feel so lucky to be surrounded by such amazing musicians like all you guys. I feel so humbled.
there really are only 4 augmented chords.
i never thought about it like that, so thanks for pointing that out! :)
Thank You, Patreons !!!!
Thanks for the lesson, I had to share this !!!!
Liked, subbed.
I thought that scale was actually very beautiful, not scary.
I don't know if I'd use the word scary... I'd say it's uncertain/suspended/ambigous/disconnected
@@SignalsMusicStudio yeah I like that feeling
I think it's beautiful in an INDIANA JONES kind of way- exotic & mysterious...
This is what I wanted to say - Lydian sounds beautiful and mysterious, not at all uncomfortable to me.
@@argh01hass I agree! Even the diatonic tritone in Lydian is beautiful and isn't disturbing or uncomfortable at all.
I wanted to comment and say how well you teach music it helps me very much. Thank you.
Lydian augmented: “If you’re in a film score or some other cinematic thing, or Rick Beato’s instagram feed, I’m the mode for you!”
I was delighted to find one of my very first songs 20 years ago (before I knew much about chords at all) used an augmented I chord for upward chromatic voice leading in the melody, I I+ vi I7, with the 3rd note in bass throughout (C/E, CAug/E, Am/E, C7/E). Really proud of it, maybe I wrote more interesting songs back then!! Thanks so much, great video.
Oh man, those baby pictures around 12:38 "For just 1 dollar a day you could finance a meal for one of these poor children...."
JAMES SCOTT NICHOLSON,ONTARIO, CANADA 🇨🇦 I JUST WANT TO SAY, I WATCH A LOT OF LESSONS,AND HAVE BEEN TEACHING MYSELF THEORY, ALL THROUGH THIS COVID PERIOD, THIS HAS BEEN,BY FAR THE MOST INFORMATIVE,STRAIGHT
UP LESSON,WITH GREAT DISPLAYS ALONG SIDE WITH YOUR TEACHING. YOU, IN MY BOOKS DEFINITELY HOLD THE TEACHING TITLE BY FAR IN ALL THE WAYS I DESCRIBED !!! TOP LEFT 💜
Music Theory for guitar just released this same topic today....are you guys secretly trying to break our brains?? this is too much augmented for one day....oh, right, we're 2020....
Weird! Just like Aug chords!
Augmented August
I'd bet that before these awkward times, stuff like that was best kept trade secret...Know it is free, like programming courses, history lessons, etc. I think it is a matter of open you mind now or feel miserable for life.
I think that was the best video I've ever seen. You are freaking awesome man. The baby bit... I'll never look at em the same again.
Dont leave me know by Pink Floyd uses a C+ chord and changes the bass note. Amazing song.
Also in Us and Them- the third chord in the sequence can be parsed as a DmMaj7 or an aug triad played over D. Great to hear how the sax plays over that chord!
I’m pretty sure that Dogs has an augmented chord as well
@@drulemon yep, it has one
6:40 - I think that Elliot Smith does that in "Waltz #2". The I to the I+ to the vi sequence. The bridge where he sings "On and on and on.." Maybe not. It just really reminded me of that when you played that.
I cannot NOT hear “O Canada we stand on guard for thee” every time he goes from the major 1 to the augmented version of that chord.
i think the chord there sounds like major 3
Your the best teacher and narrator ! Thanks for your stuff please never stop
Jake: "What if i told you we can have a whole tonality that is built around that augmened chord?"
Also Jake: *chooses lydian augmented*
Augmented scale: Am i a joke to you?
I could not get past the 4 minute mark without hitting the subscribe button. You, sir, are an excellent teacher!
Was that “Reefer Madness” I spotted there?
PLAY FASTER!
@@SignalsMusicStudio Faster! Play it Faster!
I love augmented chords.. try adding a flat nine.. eg.. E7#5b9... great movement chord.. great passing .. the F... moves to a Am (add7 or a sus2 or sus4) and you can close the from Am (parallel harmony.. as in blues) or Am7sus4 gives you places to go all over the place from there. Think of them not as chord for harmony, but a passing chord to change direction of passing tone to add voice leading. Augmented to V/Iii or V/vi with added b/#9can lead you into Dimensions of Diminished realm... then the fun begins. I have learnt so much from play around like this these last couple of years on directs in voice leading, passing chords, chordal harmony and modulation.. etc.. I would encourage people to play, investigate and understand augmented chords.. I appreciate your podcasts you do. I have even picked up a few things from your teaching too..Thank you!
"If you want to find the secrets of the Universe, think of energy, frequency, and vibration."-Nikola Tesla
Thanks dude - I never really paid attention to + chords until this vid. Rock on, bro.
its very peculiar that symmetry in music sounds weird... (aug , dim , wholetone...)
its because the overtone series is not linear. and thus the tonal centre is unclear.
In 12-TET
To add on to what the two persons above me said, when our ears hear musical intervals, they calculate the higher Hz pitch divided by the lower Hz pitch and try to interpret what they're hearing as the closest fraction, such as when we hear a perfect fifth, that's very close to a 3/2 interval (like 300 Hz against 200 Hz), when we hear a major third, that's pretty close to a 5/4 interval (like 125 Hz against 100 Hz), etc. The simpler the fraction the musical interval sounds like, the more consonant it'll sound to our ears. So intervals like 2/1, 3/2, 4/3, 5/4, 6/5, and 9/8 are the octave, perfect fifth, perfect fourth, major third, minor third, and major second respectively, and all of those musical intervals sound nice and consonant to our ears.
But when we play musical instruments, we're not actually playing those exact fractions. For the past two hundred or so years, western society has used what's called 12 equal divisions of the octave (shortened as 12edo), where, as the name suggests, you take the octave (which is the interval 2/1, a very simple and super consonant interval) and split that octave into twelve equally spaced parts. By dividing the octave into twelve equally spaced parts, we end up with twelve different intervals, and believe it or not, besides the octave, none of the other intervals are exact fractions, meaning they're all slightly out of tune from the pure intervals (which are referred to as "just" intervals, meaning pure). Some of those 12edo intervals closely approximate some of the fractions I mentioned above. More specifically, the 12edo octave is by definition perfectly in-tune since it's exactly the interval 2/1, the 12edo perfect fifth and 12edo perfect fourth are almost identical to the intervals 3/2 and 4/3 respectively, and so they sound super consonant because they sound like those intervals, the 12edo major second is very close to the interval 9/8, and so it sounds somewhat consonant, the 12edo major third and 12edo minor third are a bit off from 5/4 and 6/5 respectively, and so when you listen closely to a major or minor third interval on say the piano then you can hear some wobbling since it's not perfectly in-tune with the just intervals they approximate to our ears. The major sixth and minor sixth roughly approximate the intervals 5/3 and 8/5, but just like the major and minor third (in fact, just like the major and minor third since the minor sixth and major sixth are simply inversions of those two intervals, so they're the same exact amount out-of-tune from just tuning as their inversions), but even though they're kinda off from just, just like the 12edo major third (roughly 5/4) and the 12edo minor third (roughly 6/5), to our ears they approximate simple/not complicated intervals, so they still sound pretty consonant even though they're kinda off and thus sound kinda wobbly when you play them on an instrument (that wobbliness is out-of-tuneness).
At this point, you might be thinking, "how can musical intervals in our tuning (12edo) be considered out-of-tune? Aren't they perfectly in-tune?" Well ya see, if we tried to use perfectly in-tune musical intervals (fractions), the math would get ugly really fast because for example in 12edo (the tuning we use), when you stack a perfect fifth on top of itself 12 times, you perfectly line back up exactly seven octaves up (at the same note name you started with at the bottom). But if you tune those perfect fifths exactly to the interval 3/2, you actually don't get seven octaves up (which represented as a fraction would be (2/1, the octave) times itself (2/1) seven times, which gives you 128/1, which is the interval seven octaves up is. But if you stack twelve 3/2 perfect fifths, you actually multiply 3/2 by itself 12 times, which doesn't give you a clean octave of 128/1, but instead 531441/4096, which is a little sharper than seven octaves up, and would sound really dissonant if you played that interval on an instrument, such as the piano.
So we use the tuning 12edo so that the math doesn't get all ugly and dissonant from stacking fractions on top of each other, but as a result, everything except for octaves are by definition at least slightly out-of-tune. For instance, perfect fifths sound really locked in and that's why power chords sound so supported, since the 12edo perfect fifth very closely approximates the interval 3/2. But 12edo major thirds are noticeably sharp from the interval 5/4, and so because they're distorted up somewhat higher than 5/4, our ears hear them as somewhat out-of-tune, and so they don't sound as supported nor "locked-in" as perfect fifths, and if you played a major third on the piano and listened closely, you can definitely hear wobbliness from it since it's a bit out-of-tune.
So we use the tuning 12edo so that the math doesn't get all ugly from stacking fractions on top of each other, but as a result, everything except for octaves aren't perfectly in-tune, but instead "approximations" (which means they approximate just intervals, like the 12edo major third approximates the interval 5/4 even though the 12edo major third does not exactly equal 5/4, it's a little too high).
And so at first thought, you'd think that symmetry in music would sound good to our ears, but that doesn't actually ring true since the most consonant chords are things like major triads like C E G which are definitely not symmetrical, but noticeably asymmetrical compared to an augmented or diminished chord. But with a major triad, the notes C and E are a major third that approximate the interval 5/4, which is simple and thus consonant to our ears, and the notes C and G are a perfect fifth that approximate the interval 3/2, which is simple and thus very consonant to our ears as well, and so a major triad sounds consonant and pleasing to our ears. But an augmented triad does not approximate simple intervals but instead giant complicated ones with those three notes together, nor does a diminished triad or tetrad approximate simple intervals but instead giant complicated ones too, so even though those chords sound symmetrical in pitch to our ears, symmetrical pitch does not equal consonance, and so the most consonant chords like a major triad or a minor triad are actually asymmetrical instead.
@@bragtime1052 wow great read
Jake I love the way you describe the topics you cover ... Thank you
i like those scales and chords that aren't major or minor, they aren't telling me how to feel... and i appreciate that.
Yes they are, or haven't you been listening to Jake. They're supposed to make you feel " weird".
Just a thought, I run into this on old (40s and 50s) Christmas songs. They are all over the place. This video shed a different color on the light of my the use of modes and chord structures. I use these in my own writing, but my brain as a bassist at core is “how to get smoothly and expressively” to the next chord. I always run into problems (mostly) with guitarists, that “you need to just add a finger here” before tonic or fifth Nice explanation.
Jake my man, you're such a great teacher! My teacher taught me similar things about the diminished scale, and i was blown away. It never struck me to try and replicate the same thing with Aug chords are they too have a similar sense of symmetry.
Your videos are great, I often re-watch your video on Polyrhythms just because how great is. In fact, today's video was so good, I'm going to go and re-watch that video. Keep up the great work!!
Edit: The Hemiola One - ua-cam.com/video/HhODahQ-U4U/v-deo.html
I dont play music myself, have no idea why this video got recommended, but after watching it, I subscribed! Very fun video! :)
I'm just gonna call this the Cuphead chord system.
dude you are so good at explaining complex music theory. you got yourself a new fan. greetings from MEXICO.
Damn, the babies scene was veeery uncomfortable / alien
Brilliant lesson! Not too fast, not too slow, not too simple, not to hard to grasp - just brilliant! Only one contradictory note: Augmented chords (and the augmented lydian scale in particular) don't sound uncomfortable to me at all. Just very colourful.