Advice on soloing in a progression. B Major

Harmony & Theory
#1

This is the track I’ve been practicing over. And on the E Major chord I’ve tried using the E major scale. Yet the A note sounds very off.

What I just did before posting this is ask chatgpt and it responded with this:

In the key of B major, the E chord (E major) is a diatonic chord, meaning it naturally occurs within the key. However, the note A (which is not part of the E major chord) may sound out of place because it creates a dissonance or clashes with the other notes in the chord progression.

When you play the E major chord (E G# B), the note A conflicts with the G# in the chord. The clash between these two notes creates a dissonant interval called a major seventh, which can sound dissonant or unresolved depending on the context.

In traditional harmony, the major seventh is generally considered dissonant and requires resolution to a more stable interval. It tends to create tension that seeks resolution to a more consonant interval, such as a major or minor third.

If you want to avoid the dissonance caused by the A note in the E major chord, you could consider using an E dominant seventh chord (E7). This chord includes the notes E, G#, B, and D, where the D acts as a more consonant seventh instead of the A. This change would create a stronger resolution and better fit within the B major key.

Is this correct? It makes sense but I’m not great at theory. If it is correct pretty interesting how I got such a fast answer. I asked it this : lets say you have a chord progression in b major, progression is: B E c# minor E. Why on the E chord does the note A sound out of place?

#2

A perfect 4th over a major chord (like A over an E) and a minor 6th over a minor chord are sometimes referred to as “avoid notes”. Basically, landing on notes that are a half-step above a chord tone sounds kind of blah - neither melodic, nor dissonant in a cool way.

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#3

So its it correct to say that dispite the music being in E in that moment, because the key is B major, it clashes?

#4

I mean, I actually hear this more as E major - V I vi I. You could, of course, treat it as B major, I IV ii IV, too. These basic chords exist in both keys.

If you treat it as B major and are just blowing over the scale, there are no avoid notes over E, since B major is acting as E lydian over the E chord (the note A is sharp). There won’t be any over the C#m chord, either, since the 6th will be sharp as well (dorian). Over the B chord the note E will sound kinda wack.

I think a good way to go about this sort of thing is to learn where the basic triads are for all three of these chords, maybe just on the G B and high E strings at first, and then try to make those notes the stressed ones in your ideas. Like, do a big run and end it on one of those chord tones.

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#5

Can you explain why it sound more E Major to you? I’ve had this issue before hearing something in a different key than what the backing track claims.

Different octaves perhaps?

#6

When there’s a short simple progression like this, I look for the most commonly occurring chord (E here), and then see how the other chords act in relation to it: B is a V chord of E, C#m a vi chord. But B major isn’t wrong: B is the I chord, E the IV chord, C#m the ii chord. You’d get a different flavor treating it as one key or the other. If the chords were fleshed out with extensions, then it would more definitively be in a single key - B7 Emaj7 C#m7 is now definitely E, whereas Bmaj7 Emaj7 C#m7 is now B.

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#7

A good thing to commit to memory is the order of triads in a major key. It is… drum roll

Major Minor Minor Major Major Minor Diminished

Usually we use Roman numerals for them - upper case for major, lower case for minor/diminished. So…

I ii iii IV V vi vii

In that track’s progression, we have 2 major chords, which is a big clue. The notes of the key of B are:

B C# D# E F# G# A#

The first and fourth chords are B and E, which fits. C#m fits in as the second chord. Buuuuut…

The key of E is E F# G# A B C# D#.

And those chords fit there as well - E is now the one chord, B the five, and C#m the six.

Long story short - either way is good, and the best way is to just learn the triads everywhere.

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#8

I think thats one of the most confusing aspects of music theory to me, it overlaps itself, and on the guitar that’s really hard to visualize, for me anyway.

This is what I mean about octaves

I’m trying to do moveable solfege, so 1 4 2 4 1 is different depending on the octave. Or at least sounds different. Because I’ve not go perfect pitch.

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#9

Guitar is a very difficult instrument to get a handle on in this regard - everything is pattern-based, and it’s unfortunately simple to learn patterns while not having any real understanding of their musical use. This isn’t the case for, say, piano. So we just have to be smarter. :wink:

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#10

lol I understand, I wish I started with piano, Curse that Eddie van Halen lol

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#11

Thats something I’ve heard from people with perfect pitch btw, they don’t view it as up n down in pitch. As I think most of us do, like the vibration can go up and down, or down and up, yet playing the same notes/progression.

If you do this progression on different parts of the neck it sounds very different, yet they are the same chords. If I play B E C# E on just one string, it’s your basic left right/down up pattern, but if you do it on different parts of the neck it can acually invert that up down pitch. And I think thats one of my main issues in learning theory on the guitar, it sounds totally different in terms of pitch range, dispite being the same chords.

I’m trying to do solfage in my head, and ofcourse you’ve got the up n down pitch, but I think to really get a grip on it I need to do at least two octaves at a time, And it becomes really stressful juggling multiple octaves yet doing the same notes, I think this is what people with perfect pitch have a natural grasp on.

#12

Can you say more about what you mean? What are 1, 4, 2, 4, 1?

#13

The numbers of the major scale, Nashville numbers right? It’s the same as do re me etc… but i’d rather practice numbers, just easier in my head, I know solfege has names for all twelve notes but tbh in my intuition it’ll be better to use numbers, I’ve already got numbers down so why not use them instead of tripping up over solfege.

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#14

this is an I, IV, ii, IV progression
all the chords are diatonic to B major.
A is not in the key of B major it is a b7 to B and a 4th to E major and will sound like a turd if you stay on it.
A# is the 7th in B major.
You could Do B pentatonic on the B and E pentatonic on the other chords if you wanted and skip A altogether

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#15

It’s typical ChatGPT where there is good info mixed in with nonsense. I’d discard (in a contextual sense) everything other than the opening paragraph. The final suggestion about just using a dominant 7th on the E is sure to give you strange sounding results. Even more strange than playing a “A” note while the E chord is happening.

The main point is that in any key, it doesn’t make sense to play the major (or minor) scale that corresponds to the chord that’s currently being played. The exceptions being if the chord happens to be the same chord as the key we’re in (B in your example), OR the chord happens to be the relative minor of the key (G# minor in your example, which doesn’t occur in this particular progression). Otherwise, you’ll get it wrong more often then you get it right; or at best, you’ll make it seem like the tune is modulating where it’s not appropriate.

If you want nice “safe” sounding lines, you should just stick to notes in the key. “A” is not in the key of B major, “A#” is.

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#16

lol! I’d like to vote for this as the accepted answer. Well said :slight_smile: You have the gift of saying more in a sentence than I can in 5 paragraphs. I’m seriously jealous!!!

#17

I only play other people’s music but the key of B major has

B, C#, D#, E, F#, G#, A#.

So A isn’t in the key. (Not that you shouldn’t use it when you want, of course.)

The “4” chord (to use your notation) is {E, G#, B}, and it seems that you’re effectively adding an A to it, e.g., the notes would be {E, G#, A, B}. This doesn’t sound that good to my ear, but I don’t like Jazz, for example, and am not really qualified to judge.

I think that @Judmeister and @joebegly are saying something more advanced, but I guess that the fundamental issue is that A isn’t in the key?

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#18

I think it means change the chord progression instead of the melody lines?

Would it make sense in that context?

#19

@WhammyStarScream - Okay my man, first put down the guitar. Then ditch every pre-concieved notion of what you are “supposed” to do and then press play on the backtrack and spend the next half hour just singing over it. You know, pretend to be a little kid and just sort of hum stuff and yes it will be embarrassing and ridiculous but if you can sing even just a bit in tune you will be able to come up with all kinds of extremely cool and very melodic stuff that could transfer back to guitar (maybe hit record while you sing)

And it’s at this point that good harmony/theory skills and knowledge are really just a naming convention for what you already know sounds good. Have fun!

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#20

PS B major, because you already dislike that natural ‘A’ over this progression…

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