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I analyzed the chords to 1300 popular songs for patterns. This is what I found.

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Re: I analyzed the chords to 1300 popular songs for patterns. This is what I found.

#71

Post by aamar »

DanBC wrote: post #33
taylorbuley wrote: post #16

I'd love to build this data into a neural network and see if I can come up with robosongs. It should be quite good at coming up with "What chord should come next?"

I'd love to hear a Markov chain. I don't think it'd be pleasant. But it'd be fun.

Quite a few of these online:

MC trained on classical composers: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOZ2Q-Ls48U

Iannis Xenakis was a major 20th century composer who incorporated MCs into some works: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTzOWKaDrVI

Haven't seen a serious effort with pop/rock though. Lyrics might be the sticking point.

Re: I analyzed the chords to 1300 popular songs for patterns. This is what I found.

#72

Post by Goladus »

msluyter wrote: post #35
colanderman wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He doesn't go nearly enough into depth to say anything surprising. That "C/Am" is by far the most common is not surprising at all; C major is the first key any music student learns. I wish he separated out the major keys from minor keys. It's easy to tell the difference; almost no-one writes pop music in the natural minor (which shares a key signature with the relative major), as it has no dominant fifth. Rather, mel…

I was going to write up pretty much the same analysis of the Em->X progression. I think you aptly covered it. Interestingly, though, as you say Em->C sounds relatively static, I bet you see a lot more C->Em than the reverse (which should suffer from the same problem), and I'm hard pressed to say why exactly.

I can't speak for pop music, but you can move from Em to C/E to F, which is basically a delayed resolution of the E to F, but the C Major is definitely there.

Re: I analyzed the chords to 1300 popular songs for patterns. This is what I found.

#73

Post by jimmytucson »

Probably more interesting than the actual notes would be the figured chords and their progressions.

In other words, "C G a F" isn't materially that different from "G D e C" or "F C d Bb". All three are instances of the same progression: "I V vi IV" ...which happens to be the most hackneyed (or "effective", depending on your point of view) chord progression in popular music over the last 30 years.

If you transform each chord progression into its figured representation then you can pick up more significant trends such as the above, or blues changes (e.g. "I I I I / VI VI I I / V VI I I") and then you can start to discern when they rose to popularity and which ones are falling out of favor.

For example, in the 50s and 60s, I have no doubt "I vi IV V" was more popular than "I V vi IV" but I have no way to prove it currently and would love to find out if I'm right or wrong on that.

Re: I analyzed the chords to 1300 popular songs for patterns. This is what I found.

#74

Post by dfan »

te_chris wrote: post #70

The article was down, but I assume this will be relevant: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schenkerian_analysis We spent a lot of time doing this sort of stuff to flesh out harmonic and melodic patterns/meaning of pieces while at music school. To (grossly) simplify, it's essentially a form of reduction analysis, but the final step of the analysis is always I - V - I chord progression (tonic - dominant) with the 3 blind m…

He's doing stuff at a way way lower of musical theory (just saying things like "what chords occur the most?") than Schenkerian analysis. He's certainly not looking at the shape of a song as a whole.

Schenkerian analysis is a ton of fun, although you have to remember to just use it as a tool and not take it too seriously.

Re: I analyzed the chords to 1300 popular songs for patterns. This is what I found.

#75

Post by Darmani »

planetguy wrote: post #25

What I'd like to see is a plot of the number of chords used in a song versus time. Possibly even broken down by genre, or correlated to other qualities (sex of singer) et cetera. If you start at the 1950s, you'll see very simple rock songs; your classic three-chord rock songs. As you hit the 1960s you'll see more complexity; The Beatles, for instance, had more harmonic complexity than what had come before, which cont…

A simpler explanation is simply the changing market and distribution. It was really only in the last two hundred years that composers could support themselves by selling their music rather than relying on patronage, with Beethoven being the first to do so. Cheap recordings and broadcasting have changed the game entirely. You might not be able to name a single popular singer of the 19th century, but that's not because they didn't exist; the practice goes back to the troubadours of nearly a thousand years ago.

It's not that art music has had a big fall from grace and lost its grip on the public's heart, paving the way for rock and pop. It never had that grip in the first place. The musical descendants of Bach and Beethoven are alive and kicking; just look at John Williams.

Re: I analyzed the chords to 1300 popular songs for patterns. This is what I found.

#76

Post by cliffbean »

snorkel wrote: post #28

Reason: It's easier to play these chords on a 6 string guitar, which has been the dominant instrument of choice for pop song composers. The first C chord on a guitar is easy to hit with no finger twisting required. It's also easy to switch between the first C, Am, and G chord, you can even do it quickly and repeatedly while drunk as you can imagine many pop songs are written. The first F chord requires a little more…

There may be some truth to this, but it also goes the other way.

The modern 6-string guitar became popular in part because it was good for the kinds of music people wanted to play. I, IV, V, and vi (C, F, G, and Am) have a long history after all.

It's an interesting idea, that the evolution of music might be guided by an interplay between people choosing and designing new instruments to suit their tastes, and people developing new musical tastes using whatever existing instruments happen to be available.

Re: I analyzed the chords to 1300 popular songs for patterns. This is what I found.

#77

Post by anigbrowl »

UrLicht wrote: post #59
wheels wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately your explanation doesn't hold water if you consider other instruments. C major / A minor are even easier on piano. (C major and A minor are relative keys – they contains the same notes, just with a different note emphasized as the root, or tonic.) They're the two keys that are made up of just playing the white keys on the piano. In contrast, G major / E minor is probably the easiest key to play in on gu…

Only easy because they are traditionally taught first. This is because from a music theory standpoint the keys in which those chords are tonic have the least number of sharps and flats. From a memory and hand position standpoint chords that have a black key in the middle (D maj. E maj. etc) are the easiest.

From a memory and hand position standpoint chords that have a black key in the middle (D maj. E maj. etc) are the easiest.

Disagree. You can move around the chords on the white keys without changing your hand shape and everything will sound harmonically related and therefore in key, plus it's easier to count on the white keys. I've been playing music as an adult for 15 years (and had 5 or 6 years of piano lessons as a kid), I know a great deal of music theory and am familiar with a wide variety of scales, modes, and alternate tuning systems, and I still find it easier to move around on the white keys. I happen to particularly like the Phrygian mode, but tend to just play things in E Major when I'm trying out ideas and then transpose afterwards, because as long as I'm playing on the white keys and remember what the root is I literally can't hit a wrong note.

Some people just stick with the original key that lets them play this way; music teachers refer it as 'white note fever.'

Re: I analyzed the chords to 1300 popular songs for patterns. This is what I found.

#78

Post by wyck »

Interesting but a melody analysis would be way more insightful.

Pop music is all about the simple melody, in terms of impacting a recognizable pattern on the brain. That is why it's popular, and you see the same melodies repeated over and over, and over, and over.

Re: I analyzed the chords to 1300 popular songs for patterns. This is what I found.

#79

Post by zellyn »

wheels wrote: post #56
snorkel wrote: post #28

Reason: It's easier to play these chords on a 6 string guitar, which has been the dominant instrument of choice for pop song composers. The first C chord on a guitar is easy to hit with no finger twisting required. It's also easy to switch between the first C, Am, and G chord, you can even do it quickly and repeatedly while drunk as you can imagine many pop songs are written. The first F chord requires a little more…

Unfortunately your explanation doesn't hold water if you consider other instruments. C major / A minor are even easier on piano. (C major and A minor are relative keys – they contains the same notes, just with a different note emphasized as the root, or tonic.) They're the two keys that are made up of just playing the white keys on the piano. In contrast, G major / E minor is probably the easiest key to play in on gu…

IMHO C major / A minor, C scales, etc. start out easier, but don't necessarily stay that way: sometimes it's nice to have a couple of black notes in there as a reference point. Especially if you aren't looking at the keyboard.

Re: I analyzed the chords to 1300 popular songs for patterns. This is what I found.

#80

Post by anigbrowl »

sliverstorm wrote: post #63
planetguy wrote: post #25

What I'd like to see is a plot of the number of chords used in a song versus time. Possibly even broken down by genre, or correlated to other qualities (sex of singer) et cetera. If you start at the 1950s, you'll see very simple rock songs; your classic three-chord rock songs. As you hit the 1960s you'll see more complexity; The Beatles, for instance, had more harmonic complexity than what had come before, which cont…

I think there is one thing you are overlooking: IMO, the reason the 1980s had simple music wasn't anything complicated; it was the electric guitar. Power chords are super easy to use, and with an electric guitar they still sound good.

The electric guitar wasn't a enw things in the 1980s. I suspect the return to simplicity was a combination of two things; punk rock musicians' antipathy to the complex arrangements and elaborate production of disco, and the availability of (relatively) cheap and reliable digital synthesizers, which led to a proliferation of electronic 'one man bands.' It's easy to make all the music in a track yourself with a few electronic instruments, but if your primary skill is in the production of said music, then the rhythm, melodies, and harmony are going to be more basic.
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