1
00:00:00,520 --> 00:00:04,360
Hi, I'm Pedro and in today's 
video I'll be showing you more 

2
00:00:04,360 --> 00:00:06,800
tips for writing ambient chord 
progressions. 

3
00:00:07,160 --> 00:00:09,720
I have approached the creation 
of ambient chords in another 

4
00:00:09,720 --> 00:00:13,080
video, but now I'm going to 
expand on some of those ideas 

5
00:00:13,120 --> 00:00:17,040
and show you other creative ways
for you to explore and try out 

6
00:00:17,040 --> 00:00:19,920
in your music. 
I'll be dividing the content in 

7
00:00:19,920 --> 00:00:23,480
two videos, this and the other 
one, Part 1 and 2, and I'll show

8
00:00:23,480 --> 00:00:27,240
you the emotional impact on slow
changes, how you can use voice 

9
00:00:27,240 --> 00:00:31,080
leading to create new chords, 
and how to make your chords as 

10
00:00:31,080 --> 00:00:33,480
interesting as possible. 
Ready. 

11
00:00:33,960 --> 00:00:39,240
Let's go. 
I'm just going to quickly 

12
00:00:39,240 --> 00:00:41,960
mention some things that you 
should keep in mind while 

13
00:00:41,960 --> 00:00:43,880
creating ambient chord 
progressions. 

14
00:00:44,440 --> 00:00:48,680
Usually ambient music uses a 
slow tempo or has a slow 

15
00:00:48,680 --> 00:00:52,280
harmonic rhythm, which means 
that you are not changing chords

16
00:00:52,280 --> 00:00:55,400
all that fast. 
The idea is to give time to the 

17
00:00:55,400 --> 00:00:59,120
listener to get accustomed and 
feel immersed in the soundscapes

18
00:00:59,120 --> 00:01:03,040
you are creating. 
So slow moving chords can help 

19
00:01:03,040 --> 00:01:06,240
you to create momentum so that 
when the next chord change 

20
00:01:06,240 --> 00:01:10,440
happens, it has more impact. 
I'll show you in the following 

21
00:01:10,440 --> 00:01:14,280
example how important this 
consideration is for any style 

22
00:01:14,280 --> 00:01:30,840
of music really. 
Here we just went from C minor 

23
00:01:30,840 --> 00:01:34,440
to F major. 
It sounds good, feels nice, but 

24
00:01:34,440 --> 00:01:37,920
here the impact you are able to 
make just by delaying the 

25
00:01:37,920 --> 00:02:04,800
harmonic movement. 
It feels more satisfying to me. 

26
00:02:05,320 --> 00:02:09,080
You have more space to create 
momentum and build some tension 

27
00:02:09,080 --> 00:02:12,480
if you like, and when the next 
chord hits, it can make a big 

28
00:02:12,480 --> 00:02:15,600
difference and means so much 
more than if you had just 

29
00:02:15,600 --> 00:02:18,040
changed, as we did in the first 
example. 

30
00:02:18,680 --> 00:02:21,880
But what if you feel like your 
chords still sound bland? 

31
00:02:22,400 --> 00:02:28,720
Let's look into that. 
Chords play a big part in the 

32
00:02:28,720 --> 00:02:32,560
reason why we feel the way we 
feel when we hear music, so it's

33
00:02:32,560 --> 00:02:34,760
no wonder that you may be 
worrying about it. 

34
00:02:35,280 --> 00:02:38,960
With that said, our goal here is
to make chords that sound as 

35
00:02:38,960 --> 00:02:42,280
interesting and colorful as 
possible, and there's a nice 

36
00:02:42,280 --> 00:02:44,560
technique that I will share with
you in a moment. 

37
00:02:44,960 --> 00:02:49,800
Now, a simple triad can feel a 
bit too rooted and definitive as

38
00:02:49,800 --> 00:02:52,720
to the type of vibe it gives 
away, so an interesting 

39
00:02:52,720 --> 00:02:56,160
alternative is to explore 
suspended chords if you wish to 

40
00:02:56,160 --> 00:03:00,640
avoid that major minor vibe. 
Instead of C minor you could use

41
00:03:00,640 --> 00:03:04,840
or try to use a SUS 2 or SUS 4 
chords like in this example. 

42
00:03:17,240 --> 00:03:20,560
Another thing to consider is 
adding chord extensions. 

43
00:03:20,840 --> 00:03:23,760
As you add more notes to the 
chords, that strong chord 

44
00:03:23,760 --> 00:03:28,080
quality starts to dissipate and 
become a bit more vague or 

45
00:03:28,080 --> 00:03:30,600
ambiguous as you add the 
extensions. 

46
00:03:53,080 --> 00:03:55,960
And on top of that, you can 
arrange the notes of these 

47
00:03:55,960 --> 00:03:58,960
chords in other ways. 
One, because you may want to 

48
00:03:58,960 --> 00:04:02,160
avoid the necessary leaps and to
have better voice leading 

49
00:04:02,160 --> 00:04:05,480
between chords. 
And 2nd because if you arrange 

50
00:04:05,480 --> 00:04:07,960
the notes of a chord in 
different ways, you get 

51
00:04:07,960 --> 00:04:11,080
different sounds. 
Now let's stick to this D minor 

52
00:04:11,080 --> 00:04:13,920
11 chords. 
You can either arrange or stack 

53
00:04:13,920 --> 00:04:21,720
its notes in 3rd intervals and 
it sounds nice, but probably to 

54
00:04:21,720 --> 00:04:24,360
normal. 
You can also find a way to voice

55
00:04:24,360 --> 00:04:30,760
your chord in fourths or mostly 
also sounds cool, a bit more 

56
00:04:30,760 --> 00:04:34,680
modern and all. 
And now let's try to use mixed 

57
00:04:34,680 --> 00:04:40,960
intervals. 
If you happen to prefer, let's 

58
00:04:40,960 --> 00:04:44,200
say, the crunchy sound of 
seconds, try to voice your chord

59
00:04:44,200 --> 00:04:47,400
in a way where this interval 
predominates like this. 

60
00:04:52,200 --> 00:04:55,840
So now you went through all this
trouble just to find a good 

61
00:04:55,840 --> 00:04:59,400
voicing for the first chord, and
now you have to do the same for 

62
00:04:59,400 --> 00:05:02,000
the rest of the chords. 
Sounds like a lot of work, 

63
00:05:02,000 --> 00:05:04,360
right? 
And the answer is yes. 

64
00:05:04,560 --> 00:05:07,920
So you are able to have some 
harmonic coherence. 

65
00:05:08,240 --> 00:05:11,400
And the first tip I can give you
at this point is to try and have

66
00:05:11,400 --> 00:05:14,080
the same amount of notes per 
chord throughout. 

67
00:05:14,560 --> 00:05:18,080
This can be especially important
for that technique I mentioned 

68
00:05:18,080 --> 00:05:20,960
before. 
Let's say you have these four 

69
00:05:20,960 --> 00:05:24,600
chords and that you adjusted the
voices in the first chord in a 

70
00:05:24,600 --> 00:05:46,600
way that you like. 
As you could see and hear, there

71
00:05:46,600 --> 00:05:50,520
is incoherence in terms of how 
the voices of the first chord 

72
00:05:50,520 --> 00:05:54,640
move to the next and also in its
quality, which is very different

73
00:05:54,640 --> 00:05:57,560
from the rest. 
And what I'm going to do is to 

74
00:05:57,560 --> 00:06:00,880
adjust the chord voicing so that
we adhere to good voice leading 

75
00:06:00,880 --> 00:06:04,560
practices and try to use the 
same type of intervals that we 

76
00:06:04,560 --> 00:06:06,720
used in the voicing of the first
chord. 

77
00:06:07,280 --> 00:06:10,960
What you'll hear next is the 
same 4 chords voiced in a 

78
00:06:10,960 --> 00:06:14,840
similar way as the first one, 
and the result is this. 

79
00:06:34,840 --> 00:06:38,160
So on one hand, voice leading 
helps you to create smooth 

80
00:06:38,160 --> 00:06:41,920
transitions between chords, but 
on the other, it can also be 

81
00:06:41,920 --> 00:06:45,560
used as a guide to maintain a 
certain harmonic coherence and 

82
00:06:45,560 --> 00:06:48,040
chord voicing arrangement 
throughout the chord 

83
00:06:48,040 --> 00:06:51,400
progression. 
So create your first chord 

84
00:06:51,440 --> 00:06:55,680
sounding as cool as possible and
then apply that voicing formula 

85
00:06:55,680 --> 00:06:58,360
to the following chords using 
voice leading. 

86
00:06:58,760 --> 00:07:01,760
And there is more that you can 
do with voice leading in mind. 

87
00:07:02,120 --> 00:07:08,080
Let's check it out. 
Let's say that you decided the 

88
00:07:08,080 --> 00:07:11,520
first chord you want to start 
with, and further along you also

89
00:07:11,520 --> 00:07:14,680
have an idea of the chord that 
you want to land on. 

90
00:07:15,120 --> 00:07:18,480
But in between you decided that 
you will need another chord that

91
00:07:18,480 --> 00:07:22,360
you didn't quite figure out. 
Again, this is a technique that 

92
00:07:22,360 --> 00:07:25,800
you can use in whatever context 
or musical style. 

93
00:07:26,280 --> 00:07:29,080
What we will be doing is to 
build a chord that serves as a 

94
00:07:29,080 --> 00:07:33,160
bridge between the previous and 
the target chord, and how are we

95
00:07:33,160 --> 00:07:36,000
going to do that voice leading 
of all things? 

96
00:07:36,120 --> 00:07:39,600
The cool thing is that you don't
need to think about what that 

97
00:07:39,600 --> 00:07:42,920
chord will be, just the type of 
voicing arrangement you want to 

98
00:07:42,920 --> 00:07:47,120
favor and focus on how the notes
could move or be maintained. 

99
00:08:01,920 --> 00:08:05,800
Here we have some notes that are
maintained while others move by 

100
00:08:05,800 --> 00:08:09,920
step, half or whole. 
Also, the nice thing about this 

101
00:08:09,920 --> 00:08:13,920
technique is that you don't even
need to think in keys as long as

102
00:08:13,920 --> 00:08:16,760
you are moving according to good
voice leading principles. 

103
00:08:32,049 --> 00:08:34,890
And with all this in mind, it's 
also a good opportunity to 

104
00:08:34,890 --> 00:08:38,210
explore other aspects that 
contribute to the chord color, 

105
00:08:38,530 --> 00:08:43,280
in this case according versions,
but that I leave for Part 2. 

106
00:08:46,640 --> 00:08:49,560
There is more that I'll cover in
the next video, but in the 

107
00:08:49,560 --> 00:08:52,720
meantime, try to explore and 
apply some of these tips in your

108
00:08:52,720 --> 00:08:55,040
music. 
The point of all this is that it

109
00:08:55,040 --> 00:08:59,160
inspires you to create music. 
In the description of this 

110
00:08:59,160 --> 00:09:02,480
video, I've added links to the 
blog, to the Beyond Music Theory

111
00:09:02,480 --> 00:09:04,520
book, online lessons and 
courses. 

112
00:09:04,520 --> 00:09:08,640
So please check them out and as 
always, don't forget to like and

113
00:09:08,640 --> 00:09:12,160
subscribe for more videos like 
this and again so that you can 

114
00:09:12,160 --> 00:09:15,440
make sure not to miss Part 2 
with more tips. 

115
00:09:16,000 --> 00:09:18,240
Thanks for watching and until 
next time.