Tonal harmony is the foundation of most Western music, from Bach to jazz standards. At its core, it is a contract between composer and listener: if you follow its rules, the listener will always feel a sense of home—a tonal center called the tonic. This sense of direction comes from how chords function and move within three main... Continue Reading →
Introduction: In this lesson, we will be discussing the harmony of the jazz standard "Misty" and applying some new techniques to "There Will Never Be Another You". This post is a follow-up to a previous video by mDecks Music, so make sure to watch Part One first if you haven't already. Learning Jazz Harmony the... Continue Reading →
If you’re a songwriter or a musician, you may have come across the term “harmony” before. But do you know what it means? Harmony is the simultaneous sounding of two or more notes, creating chords that give a sense of structure and tonality to a piece of music. In jazz, harmony is the best tool... Continue Reading →
Today we're going to talk about this chord: Nowadays we see this chord as a subV/V, but in the Classical period this chord was treated using a very different perspective. Composers back then, saw this chord as an augmented sixth chord. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsHK_5iPHKQ Watch the entire lesson here Although these two points of view are very... Continue Reading →
If you're taking a harmony course, you've certainly come across the concept of secondary dominants and endless exercises, where you're given a piece of sheet music in which you have to label all the secondary dominants. Well, today I'm going to give you a simple trick to spot and label secondary dominants. We won't get... Continue Reading →
Let me show how to analyze the jazz standard Recorda-Me. You can find the final analysis, along with 1300+ other jazz standards fully analyzed in The Jazz Standards Progressions Book by mDecks Music I'll show you the process we go through when we create an analysis of a jazz standard. https://youtu.be/1-1rfLAufvI The harmonic progression in... Continue Reading →
How did Beethoven write the opening for this first symphony in C major? Learn Beethoven's harmony and how tonality works.
mDecks Music Blog 