5 Chord Progressions Every Music Producer NEEDS to Know!

[@EDMTips]

EDIT: I did a whoopsie! The first example ("The Optimist") is in B Minor NOT D Major

[@waleedkhalifa1971]

The Epic, in which key?

[@barion45]

That was not the whoopsie you made. You correctly assumed that the song is in D Major scale. What you got wrong is the chord progression of "The Optimist". You see from the melody it is apparent that the resolution is on the D chord which is the tonic of the progression, hence the correct notation should be Bm (vi) -> G (IV) -> D (I). The A (V) chord serves only as a hook for the next bar.

[@barion45]

Also I believe John Newman - Blame is not in your "The Epic" progression but instead a III -> v -> IV -> i of F minor scale as the melody suggests.

[@MicroChipMonk]

@@barion45 Thanks... I thought I was taking crazy pills.

[@jrobertj14]

My ears told me you played (for The E P I C) Gm --- Bb---Dm--C Which seems like it would be iv---VI---i---VII, with the i replacing your v No? Thx!! R

[@EDMTips]

Hope you enjoy this format, fam! Let me know if I should make more of these shorter vids (suggestions welcome!) 🙂👇

[@Westlake72]

Hi Will, How about something on progressions that feature borrowed chords?

[@neilmccourt259]

Definitely do more short videos like this will

[@rtdude1]

@@Westlake72 Yes! This please

[@EDMTips]

@@Westlake72 Great suggestion!

[@markmallory2528]

First, showing how all the progressions are quite common amongst hit music. But even more so how you can rearrange them making them your own and deciphering the emotional values of each. This is just getting better and better. I really liked the video on melodies and making chords. That was epic for my studies! 👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽

[@EDMTips]

Thank you so much, I really appreciate the kind words of support :)

[@markmallory2528]

I’ve have listened, learned and understood more from you in 10 minutes than I’ve learned in the last 10 years. Well that’s not completely true. I now understand what all those other tutorials were TRYING to tell me. Thanks! 🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽

[@EDMTips]

You're welcome, glad it was helpful! Which part did you find the most helpful in this vid?

[@michaelvandersteen7188]

Again great content 👍 Since Ben Böhmer is a thing right now: he uses the IV-I progression a lot. Sometimes IV-I-III. Both have this warm “coming home” feeling, especially when played with a deep bass 😊

[@Amatteus]

My dear Friend... The first progression, The one you call the Optimistic is in D Major.. Yes, I agree but to my knowledge is VI, IV, I, V.. and not what you say... But I am just a simple student. You are the Master. The f. King and Master of the great Univers of electronic music. Let me know...Maybe I am wrong and need to go back to study harmony again. You know I love you....

[@MohammedAliIsmailAlshaikh]

The heart melting chord, just love it, big fan of lean on

[@joshuakhokhlan]

Will, your tutorials are amazing. My progression in production has grown so much from your tutorials in a matter of a year. Thank you for what you do!

[@EDMTips]

Awesome! Really glad to help :)

[@VV-yh3ni]

Nice. The "Emotional" chord progression has been my personal favourite for years. You find it in many modern hits but also in a lot of 90s songs.

[@EDMTips]

Absolutely!

[@veetoutas]

I really like that you are giving some real song examples made on these chords, this makes it much more inspiring and eye opening

[@mageprometheus]

Love and light.

[@Boaugustin]

thanks for this great video !!

[@EDMTips]

You're welcome, glad you liked it! 🙂

[@justinscheapguitarsandreviews]

This is also very useful for guitar as well. Excellent content! Subbed.

[@EDMTips]

Thanks for the sub!

[@BestFitSquareChannel]

Fascinating. Well done. Thank you. Best wishes.

[@johngammon963]

Shows looking great, well done guys!

[@EDMTips]

You're welcome! 🙂

[@jl9205]

Damn, Will! The new studio looks amazing!

[@EDMTips]

Only temporary, unfortunately!

[@thedj5914]

Loving all your videos dude, hopefully when ime finished my course your vids will help massively 👍

[@EDMTips]

Love to hear that! Keep it up!

[@Vegguit]

I have a disagreement with your notation. If you are using the Nashville number system. Everything should be referenced from the Major scale. Your Optimist progression, that you note as i - VI - III - VII, is incoherent. I think most musicians in a session would have problems with it. The actual progression should be vi - IV - I - V (With the I chord being D) Once you deviate from the major scale, you get questions such as are the intervals major or minor. Like when you go from i to VI in your progressions, is that up a minor 6th from the root, or a major interval? That is the least confusing one too Other than that, generally great content. Thanks

[@FrostysTunes]

can i just say the camera quality at the start is so good man. loved the video :)

[@EDMTips]

Thanks!

[@laurakastner6102]

thank you for this! great video

[@EDMTips]

My pleasure, glad it was helpful!🙌🏻

[@anythingspossiblemusic]

Interesting. Thanks. I'm a bass player looking to get into synth pop. I sort of know about these in string format but good to see it in keys format.

[@EDMTips]

Hope it helps! :)

[@EDMTips]

Anything else you'd like to see me cover?

[@CarinaSol_Trance_Techno]

Thank you, great tipps!!

[@cormz655]

Thanks so much for your videos, iv learned so much since starting watching your vids :)

[@EDMTips]

You're welcome! 🙂

[@gbigbo_zjebeezjeboo]

Great tips ! Tip: would be great if you could also add this video or the tips provided in them to the music theory for edm producers course

[@abletonprodigy4515]

Hi Will! I just wanna say that since I've been watching you my game has significantly improved. So a MASSIVE thank you for that! I was wondering if you could do a tutorial on electronic (EDM) song structure? It would be a massive help. Many thanks for you top advice. =) Greetings from the UK!

[@LADJLUSHI]

you are simply amazing! such a great content! thank you so much for the explanations and the downloads!!!

[@StevenOsburnHollywood]

Thanks! Shared it.

[@innersense432]

Superb. Thanks ❤❤

[@EDMTips]

You're welcome, glad you found it helpful! 🙌🏻

[@EDMTips]

Most welcome 😊

[@robholton8153]

awesome stuff thank you

[@top5gamers69]

For any beginners out there, just play with your heart. Digging into music theory is good when your stuck but you are much more likely to make something actually like if you do it by ear!

[@EDMTips]

Thanks for sharing!

[@huguesandrepierrard4254]

again, great !

[@EDMTips]

Cheers, glad you found it helpful! 🙌🏻 🙂

[@kausambirajbarua5293]

Thanks 🙏 will for such a amazing video cause I never understood roman numerals.

[@EDMTips]

Glad it helped :)

[@kausambirajbarua5293]

@@EDMTips Yes it did.

[@coach_manando]

The smooth descender🔥❤️

[@zyberbob]

Great video.

[@EDMTips]

Thanks!

[@AzureSymbiote]

This was very good!

[@dmwm771]

Thanks for sharing these nice chords! May I ask how did you get this wonderful rich piano sound?

[@ElectricEddieDaus]

Hey Will, Just recently started to follow your channel. Some pretty cool tips. I am not a beginner, but I have picked up some tips along the way. However I saw you flip the 1st Chord with the 3rd Chord what looked like you were using a Short Cut to do so. It was at timestamp 7:52 to 7:58 what was the Short Cut, how did you do that? I have never seen that one before? Thx ElectricEddie 😎

[@donaldschroeder2902]

I'd like to start trying to make EDM and I was wondering what peoples" thoughts are on which DAW is the easiest/most intuitive to begin.

[@mastergeezy]

This is beautiful

[@CompetitiveWormsArmageddon]

Hi Will, when doing "The Epic" you didn't mention which key it was in, was hoping to copy the notes to reverse engineer lol.

[@byronsonic6538]

First of all, great content and video! I like the format and presentation. One point i did not fully understand: You say that we should change the chords so that they are not just copied. I think you mean that for creative purposes, right? Because chord progressions you mention from David Guetta etc. are still used in thousands of professional released productions. That is because there is no patent or copyright on chord progressions, because they are basic elements of music production. They cannot be said that it is invented by David Guetta, or so...

[@RahulMehra0361]

Very good brother 😀

[@upplysta3497]

Hell yeah!

[@EDMTips]

BOOM! 🙌🙌 😎

[@LoneGRoEnt]

This was so good

[@EDMTips]

Thank you, glad you liked it! 🙂🙌🏻

[@kausambirajbarua5293]

Will, Please 🙏 😄 do Galantis tutorial next.

[@gbigbo_zjebeezjeboo]

Great explanation. One thing confuses me however. At 2:38 you're saying the optimist is in D Major but you show the following Roman numerals: i,VI,III,VII) ? As I understand it those numerals are wrong and they should be: i,vi,iii,vii0, because the Roman numerals for major keys are: I,ii,iii,IV,V,vi,vii0, I Correct ?

[@neilmccourt259]

Hi will when you did the chord inversions, people talk about 1st imversion 2nd inversion etc what did you do?

[@nanob0zo]

First inversion is the 1 of the chord moves up an octave. Second inversion is when the 1 and the 3 are moved up an octave. You do this to smooth out jumps between chords in the progression. Also open chords are when you take the 3 only and move it up an octave. But at the end of the day you can do what you like, if it sounds good it is good.

[@neilmccourt259]

@@nanob0zo thanks alex 👍

[@PhoebeMostafa]

Too fast! I couldn't write the chord progressions down quickly enough. But I still love the channel.

[@EDMTips]

Thank you, Phoebe! Feel free to slow down the speed and watch several times :)

[@StevenOsburnHollywood]

I think the Sia progression, number 5 is what they used in Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up” back in the 80s.

[@LabofmusicRecords]

Instant LIKE :)

[@EDMTips]

Nice! Thanks :)

[@joaosargo5215]

When a tutorial on one of the HARDEST music genres there is? HARDSTYLE!!!!!

[@marcelocunhadj]

when I have the midi keyboard open on my ableton, it doesnt make any sound when I click on a key... only if i am recording

[@marcelmachedanz1056]

can you also make a video about the absorber you have, I like the technique with the wood

[@kausambirajbarua5293]

Cool.

[@EDMTips]

😎

[@joeygproducedit7863]

Thanks!

[@EDMTips]

Thank you so much for the support, mate!🙏

[@PYRO_CREATIONS]

That roman numeral came out of nowhere.. I can't understand a thing

[@kingsouther]

MORE LIKE THIS!!!!!!

[@marcinfilip7405]

Hell Yeah!

[@EDMTips]

Hell yeah indeed!

[@thilankavithanage1891]

this really needs a follow up video

[@prodbyvian]

Love from india ♥️

[@EDMTips]

♥️

[@elkidosKer]

man ima have to cop one of those shirts! where’s the merch at?! 😱

[@kausambirajbarua5293]

I learned something cool 👍.

[@EDMTips]

Thanks for watching :)

[@kausambirajbarua5293]

@@EDMTips 😃

[@JJ79ty]

I'm sorry I've got lost - 1:51 "And that is a minor chord".. Is it? On mine Abelon scale A3 is not on C minor ... I belive I'm stupid and I can not understand that :) IS there somebody who can be so nice and send me some link to "Chords for dummies" ... :)

[@johnscarratt8914]

Hi your videos are great. I dont use Ableton are your can I work using Cubase? Cheers John

[@EDMTips]

Absolutely! The techniques still apply

[@johnscarratt8914]

@@EDMTips perfect thank you

[@ashokflash]

thank you. give more

[@r3asonmusics766]

Heyy.. can you please make like stmpd rcrds track from scratch or something? that will be great for us. and your videos are awesome.i watched ur videos nonstop these days

[@frankvet1]

Sorry guy but you start out talking about the key of C, then in EPIC your chord progression states a "minor 5th".... in the major scale, the 5th is a MAJOR chord! All major keys have the same pattern, M m m M M m 1/2D. Love your work and energy and will continue to follow-- need the help as I start out making EM.

[@frankvet1]

Also, the second chord progression "EPIC" (on the track) shows a VII not VI.

[@justclegg]

Just wondering..isnt the optimist actually in the relative minor of dmajor..bminor..It starts with i..thats a minor scale no?

[@EDMTips]

B Minor...I made a mistake!

[@justclegg]

@@EDMTips i am just glad i am finally starting to understand some theory😁

[@rtdude1]

Borrowed cords and modes please. and thank you for what you do.

[@EDMTips]

Great suggestions, and you're welcome! 🙂

[@madrigal.666]

Hi men. Im from Mexico, when will you teach your next class and how much it cost?

[@EDMTips]

Which class are you referring to, the Accelerator?

[@madrigal.666]

@@EDMTips im a begginer, which one do you think is for me?

[@jamesrbrindle]

I still get confused with ‘i’ vs ‘I’ in the same scale. Love the tips.

[@EDMTips]

"i" is a minor chord, "I" is a major chord

[@jamesrbrindle]

@@EDMTips apologies, explained the problem wrong. In the key of Cmaj, “I”’s notes are C,E,G - a basic triad - what are “i”’s notes? Thats the translation confusion i’m having. Normally my google-fu is awesome but I don’t know the correct terminology to search for.

[@jcwolinsky]

@@jamesrbrindle In the key of C major the "one" chord is going to be major or "I", it would only be minor if it were a minor scale, such as the scale you were using is c minor. The first chord is always major or minor, mirroring what scale you choose to work in. The only time there would be a "i" chord is if you chose C minor or any other minor for example. The notation is basically irrelevant as long as you pick the appropriate chords for the scale you are working in

[@vincechihak4062]

​@@jamesrbrindle You've probably sorted it by now but just in case, with the "i"(minor), the 3rd note of the scale(or middle note of the chord triad) would be a minor 3rd instead of major...so in your Cmaj(I) example the 3rd is E, in Cm(i) it is Eb and the triad is C,Eb,G.

[@jamesrbrindle]

@@vincechihak4062 thank you. I understand it better now you’ve written it that way.

[@Judasz696]

D major is D-F#-A or em I missing smth? The optimist is in Bminor.

[@prodbyvian]

Hey man,I had a doubt.How can we release our music on spotify or a big music app,I started producing around 8 months ago,any tips appreciated 😀

[@djkebbe]

I think this video is lacking alot of info, each tune would be explained with the key before the numeros, also telling that some of the chords are "borrowed" from major or minor scales in the same key. othervise good video . like the shm numeros 1 6 3 7 . tha last 7 is taken from the same key but pararell key major, for beginners this is important info i think , to understand the different chord progressions . if im wrong then tell me ,

[@ShadowD2C]

in "The Epic" chord progression, how does VI go to v with only one note changed??? does not make sense to me

[@bmurda_]

Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe the 3rd chord in EPIC is a minor first?

[@dannyfrederixmusic3312]

I was about to ask the same thing, I concur.

[@danielstoicamusic]

Hey Will! How come you don't release music of these different genres that you teach?

[@EDMTips]

Too busy with EDM Tips nowadays! I release tracks every now and then, but not often anymore

[@kausambirajbarua5293]

Can I make Progressive House drop with only chords ?

[@EDMTips]

No! You'll need a bassline and beats, too!

[@kausambirajbarua5293]

@@EDMTips Yeah I know . Actually I meant with only chords and no melody and bass and drums.

[@ruslaitdi1228]

👍

[@spandauneu2185]

what was the name of the plugin which tom hades use? creating chords ? i hate this topic

[@Carlho80]

Captain Chords? Also Scaler 2 is decent too check. That out.

[@anzatzi]

@2:40 the one chord of D major is not a minor chord. i don't get it

[@frankvet1]

It's ME not you, but a few of the patterns list MAJOR Chord when the scale degree (in a minor scale) is actually a minor chord. Maybe I should ignore the KEY and just focus on the chord progressions in this video REGARDLESS of the key! (clear as mud?). Thanks again.

[@nbuehster]

One question I have is about a chord progression you hear a lot in dance music. (mainly from the mid 90s) kzbin.info/www/bejne/jJqzaWqNntWGo5I I want to know why, like I said, you hear it in a lot of 90s dance music. And it's one of my favorites.

[@GregKletschka]

Forgot about this track. Sounds like its i-VI-VII or C#m A B. A lot of dance tracks from the 90's used a variation of this chord progression. Hope this helps.

[@Jobjoossen]

it is al so easy noooot

[@EVLanche]

Am I tripping or have I seen this video before?🤔

[@kamannmusic]

i always think sus chords are out of key 😅

[@Stadsjaap]

Yeah, they sound pretty sus, man.

[@labworx]

Hmm not my cup of tea, too poppy for me...

[@EDMTips]

Thanks for your feedback!

[@RN-fx4kn]

This is total crap, if you knew the secrets of making hit records everytime you wouldn't have time to sell people empty dreams. 🙄

[@kirillstepanov6551]

I couldn’t disagree more. Nobody’s saying thank knowing these chords progressions will enable you writing hits immediately. It’s the same with any topic Will covers in his tutorials. If you have a dream just work hard enough to make it come true.