Reader level: Arranger
Connections between topics: key, functions, cadences, progressions, and form. (25)
All theory articlesWhat Is Resolution in Music: How Tension Moves Toward Stability
What resolution means in melody and harmony, how it differs from stability and cadence, why stepwise motion is so common, and how to hear delayed, partial, and redirected resolution.
Stable and Unstable Notes: How Scale Degrees Create Rest and Motion
Which scale degrees sound stable or unstable, where their tendencies lead, and how to use this hierarchy in melody, improvisation, and analysis.
Circle Progression: Chord Cycles in Major and Minor
How the circle progression works, why chord roots move by fifths, how its major and minor forms differ, and which songs use this pattern.
Relative Keys: The Same Notes, Different Tonal Centers
What relative keys are, how C major and A minor are connected, and why the same notes can sound like two different keys.
Parallel Keys: Major and Minor with the Same Tonic
What parallel keys are, how C major differs from C minor, and which scale degrees change when moving between major and minor.
Common Chord Progressions
Explore common chord progressions, their scale degrees, harmonic functions, character, and ways to adapt them for songwriting and arranging.
How to Build Chord Progressions
A step-by-step method for building chord progressions by choosing a key, harmonic functions, harmonic rhythm, cadences, and smooth voice leading.
Main Types of Cadences
Learn the main types of cadences: complete, half, interrupted, authentic, plagal, perfect, and imperfect cadences.
What Is a Cadence in Music?
A simple explanation of cadence: how a chord pattern closes or pauses a musical phrase, with the main types and examples.
Tonic, Subdominant, and Dominant
Learn how the three main harmonic functions work: tonic, subdominant, and dominant. Formulas and examples in major and minor keys.
What Is Chord Function?
Learn what chord function means in a key, how function differs from chord name, and how to hear stability, motion, and tension.
Chords in a Minor Key
Learn which chords belong to natural minor, why minor keys often raise the seventh degree, and why V or V7 pulls to the tonic more strongly than v.
Chords in a Major Key
Learn which chords belong to a major key, how the I–ii–iii–IV–V–vi–vii° pattern works, and how to build and transpose progressions.
What Are Diatonic Chords?
Learn what a diatonic scale is, how its notes form the chords of a key, and how Roman numerals help transpose chord progressions.
Scale Degrees in a Key
Learn how scale degrees work inside a key: how they create stability and tension, change their role over chords, and help transpose music.
What Is Musical Tension?
A clear explanation of musical tension: where it comes from, how it relates to keys, scale degrees, and chord functions, and why it often seeks resolution.
What Is the Tonic?
A clear explanation of the tonic: how it creates a sense of home, why it is not always the first note, and how to hear it in melody and harmony.
Major and Minor Pentatonic Scales
Learn the difference between major and minor pentatonic scales: their formulas, characteristic degrees, parallel and relative relationships, chord choices, and guitar applications.
What Is a Pentatonic Scale?
A clear explanation of the pentatonic scale: the formulas for major and minor pentatonic scales, how they are related, how to use them in improvisation, and how to find them on the fretboard.
What Are sus2 and sus4 Chords?
A simple explanation of sus2 and sus4 chords: why they do not contain a third, how they sound, and how they differ from major and minor chords.
What Is a Slash Chord?
A simple explanation of slash chords: how to read C/E, how slash chords relate to inversions, and how to use chords with a separate bass note.
What Is a Chord Inversion?
A simple explanation of chord inversions: what changes when the bass note is not the root, and how this affects harmony and voice leading.
Main Types of Seventh Chords
A reference guide to the main seventh chords: maj7, 7, m7, m7♭5, and dim7, with formulas, sound, and harmonic function.
What Is a Seventh Chord?
A simple explanation of seventh chords: how they are built from a triad plus a seventh, why they matter in harmony, and how to hear their tension.
Diminished and Augmented Triads
A simple explanation of diminished and augmented triads: formulas, sound, differences from major and minor, and practical harmonic use.