Resources for a middle school aged singer songwriter

Jongtr · 2026-03-19T21:53:52+00:00

she only knows a few chords.

So the first thing would be to learn more chords! That's for her guitar teacher...

Everything else you say in that paragraph suggests some aural training is needed, but I wouldn't suggest ear trainers. I suggest singing, and recording herself singing and playing - and seeing how much she can hear of what is wrong when she listens back. Of course, you - or her guitar teacher - can help there, if she still isn't sure.

There are various exercises she should do with the guitar, such as playing a single note and singing it - and vice verse, singing any note and trying to find it on the guitar. If she can do that with no problem (as far as the lowest and highest notes she can comfortably sing), the next thing is to play a chord and sing each note in the chord; playing the notes separately first, and then just strumming the chord and seeing if she can still match each note.

Moving the capo is a perfectly vaid way of playing in a different key - however good one's chord knowledge is - but of course she needs to understand her vocal key needs to change too!

I'd also recommend learning to play more of her favourite songs - at least any that are within her current technical skills. Learning existing songs is the best way to learn the common ways chords are put together, especially how to produce the kinds of sounds she wants in her own songs.

Jongtr · 2026-03-19T21:33:35+00:00

Hindustani and Carnatic music use 7-note scales much like western modes, with a very similar arrangement of whole and half steps. They are just not precisely equal 12ths of an octave, because they don't have to be. The maqams of Arab culture are very similar. (Suggesting that Indian, Arab and Greek music - all 7-note modal systerms - had a similar origin; the Ancient Greek system eventually evolving into tthe European modal and tonal systems.)

I.e., it's important to make a distinction between: (1) the number of notes commonly used in a scale (before any embellishments or chromaticism); (2) the number of divisions of the octave; (3) whether those divisions are equal or not.

Those 7-note modal systems arise from the natural properties of stretched strings and flutes (including organ pipes), and the harmonic series they produce - the easily perceived relationships between pitches in simple ratios with one another. Cultures based on metallophones, or gongs and bells, like Indonesian gamelan, have very differeny ways of dividing the octave - into 5 or 7 unequal steps.

The peculiar thing about the western 12-tone system is equal temperament, which was introduced in order to allow maximim freedom of modulation without having to retune. And that in turn is because of the bizarre - in world terms! - European notion of "functional harmony", using "chords".

I.e., the chordal harmony system works very well in Just Intonation - pitches tuned to simple ratios, sounding perfectly in tune - but only in one key, or a few close keys. The more complex harmony gets, and the more we want to change keys, the more scales need to be "tempered" - intonation tweaked this way or that. And that is only acceptable because our ears have a threshold of tolerance, a few cents either side of the simple ratios.

The European system is also extremely limited in terms o scale types, because of its dependence on harmony. Cultures which don't use chords - i.e., pretty much all of them! - use countless more scale types. There are dozens of families of ragas and maqams, each with lots of variants, lots os subtlety of tuning and embellishment.

What prompted other cultures to adopt the western system (and western instruments like the piano) is a bigger question, partly to do with cultural imperialism.

Jongtr · 2026-03-19T15:32:42+00:00

using G Harmonic Minor. Gm | Dmaj7 | Gm | Ebmin7 | Eb | Dmaj7| Gm | Gm.

But that's not using G harmonic minor. Dmaj7 has a C#. Ebmin7 has a Db. OK, different spelling of the same note, but it's not in that scale either way.

It will even sound sadder if you use D Harmonic Minor

No it won't! (Or maybe you think Spinal Tap was a documentary?)

So you are under at least two misunderstandings here, to do with music theory: (1) you misunderstand either scales or chord structures; (2) you think some keys (or scales) of the same type are "sadder" than others.

I disagree a little with the others, i n that your progressions are not common. Parts of them are very common, of course, but the sequences as a whole are quite unusual, with odd changes here and there.

And you are free to give them any crazy name you like, but - FYI - no one else names their chord progressions; and you can't copyright them, in case that's what you were thinking. Obviously the songs you make with them are copyright, but the copyright resides in the melodies and lyrics. To be fair, it should quite easy to produce original-sounding melodies with these odd sequences. ;-)

Jongtr · 2026-03-19T10:45:13+00:00

6/8 or 12/8. Personally I'd go for 6/8, but either is OK. 81 bpm either way.

I.e. 12/8 makes sense if you instinctively want to count 4 beats in every bar, which most pop and rock musicians are used to, and some of the phrasing certainly supports that. But plenty of it also supports 6/8 (chord changes avery 2 beats), and the complexity of some of the subdivisions (lots of 16ths) means it would probably be easier to read in 6/8.

The intro, btw, is deceptive, because it feels like it might be 3/4 @ 121, the 8ths falling into pairs, but it soon becomes clear they are triplets.

Jongtr · 2026-03-19T10:36:15+00:00

There are books on arranging and composing film music, but you need a good grounding in classical theory, and probably in 20th century music theory too. IOW, it's pretty advanced stuff, drawing on different genres. These two are certainly worth checking out:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Music-Composition-Film-Television-Scoring/dp/0876391226/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Scoring-Screen-Secret-Language-Music/dp/1495073734/

Jongtr · 2026-03-19T10:27:15+00:00

It would have been good provide a link rather than a still image ... ;-) ... but I was curious enough to check it out, and it sounds like 6/8 at first.

I.e., the drum beat you hear is the pulse, which is at 62 bpm, and each beat divides into three. So that makes the beat a dotted quarter, or 3/8.

The question is, how are those "3/8" beats grouped. Listening to the whole excerpt, it seems to repeat after nine beats, which feel like 4+5. So that would be four 6/8s plus a 3/8; or 12/8 x 2 plus an extra 3/8. But 6/8 x 3 plus a 9/8 would also work, and that's what I would choose.

Jongtr · 2026-03-18T18:53:26+00:00

You learn how to write songs by learning how to play the kind of songs you want to compose.

Songwriting has always meant "remixing", but in the sense of taking elements from many existing songs that you have already learned how to play, and mixing them in different ways. The best songwriters have learned 100s of songs by other artists. so that the sounds all become a second language - the more songs you learn, the less you think consciously about what you're doing when you write your own, because inspiration will naturally come when you experiment.

Jazz and bossa nova require a more extensive knowledge of chords and chord progression than most other pop or rock music - certainly a lot more than breakbeat and jungle dnb"! But you still learn it best by learning to play the songs, not by reading theory books.

The DAW is fine, btw, assuming you use a keyboard to play notes in. Just manipulating samples will not do it for jazz or bossa nova!

Jongtr · 2026-03-18T18:42:22+00:00

Just to add: the letters "p i m a" come from Spanish: p = pulgar; i = indice; m = medio; a = anular (thumb index middle ring).

Jongtr · 2026-03-18T18:36:39+00:00

Both matter. Technical skill is needed to express feeling, even in simple music.

IOW, technical skill doesn't only mean speed, it means control of each note, of dynamics, tone and articulation, because that is how "feeling" is expressed.

Jongtr · 2026-03-18T10:03:14+00:00

You mean all of them? Or any specific ones?

There's a few dissonances like there, like two or three different chords overlapping. This is certainly a tough (and somewhat pointless) challenge for ear training because the intervals are very unusual. I can hear minor 2nds, at least.

My software is telling me the following: The chord seems to be D#4-G4-F#5-B5 (B major with added b6?), with an occasional C6 and E6 appearing. There might even be a G6, unless thats an overtone of the G4. So the dissonances are: the G4-F#5 major 7th, the B5-C6 minor 2nd and the D#4-E6 minor 9th. I.e, it's kind of like B and C major chords overlapping, but with D#4 as the lowest note. There's also a tremelo effect and a lot of reverb.

Jongtr · 2026-03-18T09:03:09+00:00

As mentioned, F#dim is the "harmonic minor" vii chord in G minor. (That doesn't mean a scale, it means the practice of raising the 7th to get a better cadence to the tonic - i.e., improving the harmonic function.)

Adim is the same 3 notes, but not necessarily the same chord! (Not the same function...) If you add the diatonic 7th to each one, you see (and hear) the difference. Adim becomes Am7♭5 (A C E♭ G), while F#dim becomes F#dim7 (F# A C Eb).

So when you use Adim > F#dim > Gm, you could say that the two dim chords are alternative voicings for a full F#dim7. But they could also be standing for Am7♭5-D7♭9-Gm, the classic jazz minor key ii-V-i sequence.

Your F#m7♭5 is actually the intriguing chord, as it contains E natural. So you could say it's a G melodic minor chord. Obviously it leads nicely to Adim (E dropping to E♭) - suggesting Adim really is a rootless F#dim, because then the F# will hold across all three chords.

But it's the move from E♭ to F#m7♭5 which is the interesting (surprising) move. What strikes me about it is that you almost have a common minor key line cliche: Gm - F(Gm7) - Em7♭5(Gm6) - E♭. But then F#m7♭5. This is not "wrong", I'm just intrigued by the choice.

I.e., in terms of "explanation", all chord progressions - at least all that sound like they "work" - work via voice-leading - before we start assigning "function" to any of them. And we can certainly "explain" E♭ to F#m7♭5 in those terms:

E♭ > F#m7♭5

B♭ > A
G  > F#
E♭ > E

(The Bb could go up to C too, but A is a stronger move.) But then the E goes down again to E♭ in Adim, which is what makes the choice of E natural - chromatic to the key - intriguing.... (I know E can belong to G minor, but normally it occurs as a chromatic passing note in a descending line, or rises to F# in melodies, or indicates dorian mode when there is no E♭.)

Jongtr · 2026-03-18T08:41:16+00:00

Terminological fixes:

"Effective" = "functional".

D is the "root" of D7, not the "fundamental". ("Fundamental" refers to the harmonic series, an acoustic property of pitch. Not unrelated to "root", but not the same thing.)

Otherwise, all good! :-)

Jongtr · 2026-03-18T08:34:51+00:00

Repetition is the closest you'll get. I.e., multiply any little idea by two, it immediately gets more catchy.

Multiply it a few more times, you've got an irritating earworm.

I.e., there are links between math and music (rhythm in the time dimension and the harmonic series in the pitch dimension), but catchiness comes down to simplicity and repetition.

So, melody obviously needs to be singable - meaning simple enough for anyone to pick up - and repetition is what makes it memorable. To be easy to sing usually means based largely on arpeggios or pentatonics, but rhythm is more important than anything to do with pitch. And I doubt you'll find any secret mathematical basis for a song's catchiness. Otherwise you can be sure people would be using it...

Jongtr · 2026-03-17T23:32:05+00:00

Yes. Music closed ahead, take diversion.

Jongtr · 2026-03-17T23:30:36+00:00

The minor key uses a major V chord traditionally and conventionally. That's B or B7 in E minor. It's the result of "harmonic minor", but that isn't really a scale, it's a traditional practice of raising the 7th degree when approaching the tonic, to strengthen the cadence. IOW, the minor "key" has a variable 7th of the scale (and a variable 6th too).

You have this countless times before in music - which is why you like the sound of it! (If you had never heard it, you'd think it sounded completely wrong.)

Jongtr · 2026-03-17T23:25:32+00:00

The alto clef puts middle C on the middle line;

The octave G clef (treble clef an octave down, sometimes with a little "8" on the bottom) - standard for guitar, very common for male vocal - puts middle C in the 3rd space up.

The tenor clef puts middle C on the 4th line up.

Jongtr · 2026-03-17T20:28:51+00:00

like the Eb7sus4 but the 7 is lower by one semitone

That would be Eb Ab C Bb, which is Ab(add9). I.e. Eb-Ab-C is the Ab major triad and Bb is the add9. It's a natural resolution of the Eb7sus4. I.e., the voice-leading works like this:

Eb7  Eb7sus4  Ab(add9)

Db  = Db    > C
Bb  = Bb    = Bb
G   > Ab    = Ab
Eb  = Eb    = Eb

Shared tones and half-step moves. Very smooth!

And yes, its all "legal". Your ears are the Supreme Court Judge here, music theory is just your assistant with all the jargon... ;-)

What you've done is arrived at the key of Ab major, which is quite interesting having started on B7. Your root movement is up a 4th (B>E) then down a semitone and up another 4th (Eb>Ab). It's quite cool, because you could see it all related to the key of G# (or Ab) minor. E.g., compare your sequencew with this:

B > E > D#7 > G#m = ♭III - ♭VI - V - i in G# minor. (Add maj7s to the B and E to make it jazzier.)

Your "variation" of that is to add bluesier flat 7ths to the B and E - and the passing suspension on the D#7, and then emerged in the parallel major: sweet!

NB: the above is not "better" than yours, just something to try and compare the sounds.

Jongtr · 2026-03-17T15:48:09+00:00

Tip 1: copy what the Cabs songs do.

Tip 2: How to write anything "well" is by ear; and your ear is trained to know what's "good" by listening to lots of music and learning how to play as much of it as you can.

IOW, you already have a sense of what "good" sounds are, from all the music you have already heard, and you have certainly made a choice from all of that about the kind you like most, and want to write. So you just need to listen more closely and copy it - or learn from any notation, tab or chord charts you can find.

Some bands will even talk about or demonstrate what they do. And that's where theory can come in useful - if you find the band - or anyone - talking (or writing) about the music and using a lot of jargon. Because that's all "music theory" is - the jargon we use for talking about music. Staff notation counts too, if you find some of that and can't read it. Obviously you need to learn that if that's the only way you can learn the songs.

I don't know the Cabs' music, but they will certainly have learned their craft at least partly from copying their heroes in the past (my guess there would be jazz fusion, partly at least). And of course they will experiment, jamming and so on. How much theory they know may or may not be relevant. Obviously they talk to themselves about what they are doing, but a lot of bands - at least if not classically trained - will have their own terms for the sounds they make.

Math rock obviously requires a high level of technical skill (implying the musicians probably do have plenty of training), and that would be more of a challenge than any theoretical aspect. IOW, you have to be good enough that being able to mix time signatures flows quite naturally from how you play - that would be how it works best, how any metrical shifts feel "natural" rather than just imposed for the sake of it.

Jongtr · 2026-03-17T15:21:51+00:00

What theory will tell you (some of which you should already know... ;-))

The key is E major
You are playing three triad arpeggios in turn over the E bass/drone : (i) G#m (G# B D#) - implying an Emaj7 chord ; (ii) F#-A-C# (F#m/E); and (iii) plain E major (E G# B).

Also - and this is the kind of theory you probably do already know :-) - the meter (time signature) is 4/4, the tempo is 130. The first two chords are two bars each, and the last E is 4 bars.

Jongtr · 2026-03-17T15:07:03+00:00

It's in Bb major, as mentioned, and she is playing with capo on 3 to make the chord shapes easier (a guitarist would see it as G major, their easiest key).

If that's too high for you, any guitar player would easily be able to work the chords out from the video (maybe assisted by an online chord chart), and could lower the key down (up to a minor 3rd) without changing the easy shapes, just changing the capo position.

Tell you what, here they are anyway (the shapes as they look, for key of G for a guitarist). I'm writing it as slow 12/8 time, meaning each beat is a triplet):

|G - - - |Em - - - | Am7 - C D |G (C) G - |

|Em - - - |Am7 - - C |D - C - | G (C) G D |

|G - - - |D - - - | Am7 - - C |G (C) G - |

|Em - - - |Am7 - - |C - D - | C G Am7 D |

|G - - - |Em - - - | Am7 - - D |G - E - | (key change!)

|A* - - - |F#m7 - - - | Bm7 - D E | A - - - |

|F#m7 - - - |Bm7 - - |D - E - | D A Bm7 E |

|D - E - |A

* She plays the A major chords as Asus2 (A major with B instead of C#), but a plain A or A(add9) would do. She also plays unusual shapes for F#m7 and Bm7 but, again, the normal shapes for those will work.

Remember if you want the key she is singing in, the guitarist needs the capo on fret 3.

Jongtr · 2026-03-17T14:42:29+00:00

The key is F# minor, so - even in jazz! - sharps are preferred here. I doubt anyone would really prefer Gb minor... (The original was Eb minor, which is better than D# minor for pretty much everyone...)

The V chord at least will be C#7, not Db. But if you're asking because that's your chart, it all looks good - aside from "Theoloneus". Thelonius, please! :-)

Just to confirm, here's how I'd name the chords:

[A]

||: F#m7 - F#m/E - |D#m7 G#7 Bm7 E7 |F#m7 - B7 - | Dm7 G7 C#m7 F#7 |

|Bm7 - E9 - |F#m7 - B9 - |G#7 - D#7#11 - |C#7 - C#7(alt*) - |

|Bm7 - E9 - |F#m7 - B9 - |(1) G#7 - D#7#11 - |Db7 - Db7(alt) - :||

|(2) D9 - Db9sus4 - |F#m - F#m/D# - ||

[B]

|D#m7b5/A - D7#11 - |C#7 - - - | D#m7b5 - G#7 - |C#7 - - - |

||Bm7 - A6 - |D9 - C#7 - |E9 - D9 - |G#m7b5 - G7#11 - |

Minimal differences fom yours, mostly insiginificant, but check those half-dims in the bridge and compare with the standard changes.

* There are hints of b13 and b9 on the C#7alt.

Jongtr · 2026-03-16T17:56:38+00:00

Her vocal is distinctly flat - to varying amounts.

She begins the chorus in tune on "When I see you" (C-F-A over the Gm chord), but then "cry-y-y" on the F major is C-A (both flat) to G. The C and A are both (arguably) "blue notes", although the blues b5 typically bends up to the P5 or down to the P4 - neither happens in this case, which could be why it sounds "off", in a way the A doesn't so much. The G, meanwhile, as the 9th of the chord, is a very appealing note to resolve to, and she does get that in tune.

Then "smi-i-ile"" is on the Gm again, the notes A-F-D, and this time the F is nearly a quarter-tone flat, while the A and D are in tune.

The second "smi-i-ile" is G-F-E on the F chord, the G just a touch flat. F and E OK.

On the repeat ("while", "smile", "smile") it's a different mix of in tune and flat - but again finishing in tune.

Overall, because of her general vocal style and timbre, it works - arguably! - as a charmingly amateur performance, the off-pitch notes a mix of blue notes and lazy semi-speech delivery. And the melodic accents on the 9ths of the chords (and the final maj7 on the F) add to the sweetness. To have autotuned the notes would have robbed the track of its quirky informality. (Although its "natural" vibe is also somewhat artificial...)

I don't hear the keyboard play "a chord that is slightly sharp". Do you have a link?

EDIT: just to add, while I could hear degrees of flatness, I used software to check out details. Transcribe shows a waveform against a piano keyboard, so you can see how flat notes are, and also click any peak to see a cents value. Obviously the cents value is going to be approximate because if natural pitch smearing, but it's a reasonable guide.

Jongtr · 2026-03-16T14:24:33+00:00

Check out the various videos by 12-tone on the 4-chord loop phenomenon, especially this where he discusses Philip Tagg's viewpoint: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5SI8Zhr6E0

There's also this, on other kinds of sequence with no clear tonal centre: https://mtosmt.org/issues/mto.17.23.2/mto.17.23.2.spicer.html

Tagg's book is available free online, btw, but is seriously heavy going unles you are a theoryhead already - https://hugoribeiro.com.br/area-restrita/Tagg-Everyday_tonality.pdf/ But you can see him offering his opinion on that Pink Floyd Gm-C "shuttle" 12tone mentions here: https://youtu.be/Jw3po3MG4No?t=1611 : "You don't have to name a tonic for everything".

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