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The "complex" math in this poster disguises the simplicity of these chords and transitions.. If you're really interested in music theory (and why those transiti

The "complex" math in this poster disguises the simplicity of these chords and transitions.. If you're really interested in music theory (and why those transitions sound the way they do), "The Songwriting Secrets of The Beatles" is one of the best sources available today. https://www.amazon.com/Songwriting-Secrets-Beatles-Dominic-Pedler-ebook/dp/B003NX6KSM https://www.amazon.com/Songwriting-Secrets-Beatles-Dominic-P...

yesenadam 7y ago
Sounded interesting, so I started reading it.. (jazz pianist here, I learnt basic harmony in large part from playing Beatles songs as a kid) Hmm yeah, it's entertainingly written. I'd never heard the term "Three Chord Trick" (i.e. songs using just I,IV,V.) In "The power of I - the one-chord trick", Tomorrow Never Knows is described as "paradoxically structured around a single, simply embellished G chord, around which hypnotic modal melodies work their textural magic". Uh, no. It's in C, and there's distinctly a Bb/C chord in bars 5 and 6 of an 8 bar pattern - kind of like the IV chord in the first 8 bars of a blues. (Also, come to think of it, like the standard pattern in North Indian classical of not playing open tabla sounds in bars 5 & 6 of each 8 bars) Then "The Chuck Berry rhythm", "a rock'n'roll guitar pattern popularised most famously by Chuck Berry"..turns out to be the boogie-woogie piano left hand pattern, "a two-note diad...a basic root-and-fifth perfect interval...From there, a brief extension from the fifth to the sixth degree (and sometimes on to b7) can be made"–he makes it sound like rock guitarists invented it. Anyway, Rosetta Tharpe invented most of what Chuck Berry "invented", decades before he did it, the rock-n-roll guitar and the dance moves. Check her out! (on youtube) She's amazing.
- anentropic 7y ago
  to be fair the quote you quoted says "popularised most famously by Chuck Berry" which is pretty uncontroversial I think, no one claims he invented it Sister Rosetta Tharpe is awesome but T-Bone Walker is probably the more direct antecedent for Chuck Berry's guitar style and stage moves

yesenadam 7y ago

Sounded interesting, so I started reading it.. (jazz pianist here, I learnt basic harmony in large part from playing Beatles songs as a kid) Hmm yeah, it's entertainingly written. I'd never heard the term "Three Chord Trick" (i.e. songs using just I,IV,V.) In "The power of I - the one-chord trick", Tomorrow Never Knows is described as "paradoxically structured around a single, simply embellished G chord, around which hypnotic modal melodies work their textural magic". Uh, no. It's in C, and there's distinctly a Bb/C chord in bars 5 and 6 of an 8 bar pattern - kind of like the IV chord in the first 8 bars of a blues. (Also, come to think of it, like the standard pattern in North Indian classical of not playing open tabla sounds in bars 5 & 6 of each 8 bars) Then "The Chuck Berry rhythm", "a rock'n'roll guitar pattern popularised most famously by Chuck Berry"..turns out to be the boogie-woogie piano left hand pattern, "a two-note diad...a basic root-and-fifth perfect interval...From there, a brief extension from the fifth to the sixth degree (and sometimes on to b7) can be made"–he makes it sound like rock guitarists invented it. Anyway, Rosetta Tharpe invented most of what Chuck Berry "invented", decades before he did it, the rock-n-roll guitar and the dance moves. Check her out! (on youtube) She's amazing.

anentropic 7y ago
to be fair the quote you quoted says "popularised most famously by Chuck Berry" which is pretty uncontroversial I think, no one claims he invented it Sister Rosetta Tharpe is awesome but T-Bone Walker is probably the more direct antecedent for Chuck Berry's guitar style and stage moves