A common method for encoding musical data is with the chord progression. Consider the following chord progression for “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star”:
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- C F C
- Twinkle, twinkle little star
- F C G C
- How I wonder what you are.
- C F C G
- Up above the world so high,
- C F C G
- Like a diamond in the sky,
- C F C
- Twinkle, twinkle little star,
- F C G C
- How I wonder what you are.
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A trained musician who is already somewhat familiar with the tune should be able to extract the entire song as shown in Figure 3.37 from this chord progression. You may have witnessed an example of this if you’ve ever seen a live band that seemed able to play anything requested on the spur of the moment. Most good “gigging bands” can do this. Certainly, their ability to do this in part comes from a good familiarity with popular music, but that doesn’t mean they’ve memorized all those songs ahead of time. Musicians call this approach “faking it” and at most bookstores you can purchase “Fake Books” that contain hundreds of chord progressions for songs. With the musical data so highly compressed, it is not unheard of for a fake book to have well over 1000 songs in a size that can fit quite comfortably in a small backpack.
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In Section 3.1.6.2 we learned about intervals and in Section 3.1.6.3 we learned about chords. A chord progressions is a series of chords that underlie and support the melody of a song. Music is built with chord progressions. If you know what chord is being used at any given time in the song, you should also know which notes you could play for that part of the song. In the case of the chord progression for “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star,” we begin with the tonic C major chord. Then we move to an F major chord. Occasionally, we use the G major chord. This is called a I-IV-V chord progression. Many popular songs are built from this chord progression. In the simplest form, you could play these chords on the keyboard as you sing the melody and you should have something that sounds familiar and harmonically satisfying. From there you could compose bass lines, solos, and arrangements by playing notes that fit with the key signature and chord currently in use. In addition to fake books, you can train your ears to recognize chord progressions and then fake the songs by ear. See the learning supplements for this section to start training your ears and try experimenting with improvising along with a chord progression.