Chords for Dream Pop Chord Progressions - Major Seventh Chords

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [F] _ _ _ _
_ _ [Am] _ _ _ _ _ [C] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [F] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[C] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ [F] Hi everybody out there, this is Corey at Gemini Guitar.
This lesson today is going to focus on a topic that _ relates to one of my personal preferences
when composing and playing.
This is in the ambient sort of scheme of things and we're going to be focusing on the F major
7 to C major 7 progression.
One of my first experiences with this progression was when listening to Jim Neppetti by Eric
Satie, the minimalist composer.
_ And it's always seemed to stick with me over the years.
I just enjoy the simplicity of going from this F major 7 to the C major 7.
And of course then once you've explored that you can then transpose it into different keys
and add different things to it and whatever.
But it's a very simple idea and very beautiful in its sound.
I find it quite therapeutic.
Okay, the first voicing is F major 7 in the 8th position.
So we have the F note, _ _ [Fm] the C note, _ the [Am] E note _ _ _ and the A note.
_ _ _ And in fact, [F] now that I think about it, I actually started a song that I wrote, Remember,
with this chord.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [Am] _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [F] _
_ _ _ _ Because string 1 is E as well, this gives us an interesting addition _ to the chord.
So if we play from the 5th down to the 1st string.
_ _ _ _ I like that sound a lot. _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ This helps it to ring out a bit more. _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [Am] _ _ _
Okay, now basically there's two options here.
We can keep the same shape that we've got and transfer that back _ basically two and a
half steps to the C note. _
That would be in the 3rd position.
So we'd have C, [C] _
_ _ G, _ B _ and E.
_ _ If we want to throw in the 1st string again open, we can do that. _ _
_ And that's interesting.
It's interesting too because where the 4th finger sits is the same [E] note _ as the open 1st string.
As many of you would probably pick up on if you're used to tuning your guitar that way.
So it's like a unison.
_ _ _ _ So it just helps to add [C] a bit of _ _ body to the chord basically. _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ Now if we do this, _ in my opinion, this is probably the better option. _ _
One of the biggest reasons for that is when we're transferring the shape obviously, we
don't have to fiddle around and get our fingers into a different spot.
So we just slide from one to the other.
So for [F] example, _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [Am] _ _ _ _ _
[C] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [Am] _
_ _ the other cool thing you'll notice there too is that nice sliding effect
that we get by, well, sliding basically.
So when we change, _ _ [C] _
_ we get that nice lazy slide.
_ _ _ [Am] _ _ _
And what I like to do is take the 1st finger off.
I find this helps the slide a bit and then we can concentrate on these 3 notes doing the slide.
_ _ _ [C] _ _
_ _ _ _ [F] _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ Okay, so there is another option here.
So we can play the Fmaj7 as we did.
_ _ _ _ _ [Am] And then we can actually stay in the same position here pretty much.
Play Cmaj7 like this.
[C] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ So then we've got the C note, the [B] B, the [Em] E and the G.
Open E if we want to [C] include that.
_ _ _ So basically a slightly different order of notes there. _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ Another thing we could do is do these both in the open position.
So Cmaj7 in the open position looks like this.
C, E, open G, [Em] open B, open E.
_ And I also like this one a lot [C] too. _ _ _ _
_ _ _ Fmaj7 [G] is not far away.
So we [F] have F, A, _ C. _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
This one is probably good if you want to do stuff like [Am] in the vein of Cocteau Twins
or [B] another one of my favorite guitarists is Johnny Marr from the Smiths.
And I know that he likes to do that sort of really jangly stuff with chords like these
occasionally in ballads.
I think one of my favorite ones which was I Know It's Over Off The Queen Is Dead.
That's probably my favorite Smiths album.
And I'm sure that he uses a bit of these or these voicings in that track _ which is cool.
_ So yeah, so you can get like a sort of this type of [C] thing. _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[Em] _ _ Let's change the feel a bit so if we did more of like a sort of [C] waltz type rhythm. _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [F] _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [C] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [F] _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ You could also be creative there with the Fmaj7 too.
So you could do things like _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ just [E] a little nice idea like that.
Pick the open first string, hammer to the first fret on the same string and then repeat it a few times.
_ _ Or a couple of times [F] and just end on the E.
I _ actually _ _ _ _ get a nice ghost note when you take the first finger off which is the open B note.
_ _ You _ _ _ _ _ [Em] could also use the G note on the first [F] string. _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [A] Which changes the chord a bit but I [D] like to think of those as just melodic additions that _ _ spice it up a bit.
So there you have it.
And _ because I've got a really nifty new program that's Neck Diagrams.
Anybody wanting to draw scales and chords, check that one out.
It's just been a total revelation to me.
Thankfully a friend of mine found it for me in an advert in a guitar mag somewhere.
Thanks for that Dave.
Go check that out.
I'll post a link for it in the lesson but I'm going to put up some chord shapes on the website.
GeminiGuitar.com.au
And you'll get to see how