Where to Begin? Dominant Chords in Functional Harmony

Hi, it's Chris and I'm back with another installment in our series Where to Begin. And today what I'd like to look at is the dominant chord. The dominant chord. It's a seventh chord, four notes, very special place in the world of harmony. What's the dominant chord? What's the dominant chord? The Where to Begin series has a bunch of bits and pieces now. And I think if you want to get the most out of this video, you will have already taken a look at, say, the note naming and spelling videos about scales and note naming and spelling and maybe the diatonic chords video as well. These are really important ideas because we're going to step forward into kind of the next thing. Before we take a look at it, though, just a little piece of housekeeping. If this is the second or third video of mine you've seen and you're not subscribed, now's a great time to subscribe. You're going to like this video, so go ahead and like it now. And I'm going to advise you to watch all the way through to the end. You may find some things that are really useful. You know, stick with it. I'm going to try to keep it short. I'm planning a Patreon page. I want to know what would be useful to you. Ask Chris anything. MIDI. You know, those kinds of things. Let me know what you think. All right, we're going to jump into this. Let's do a little review first. We're talking about functional harmony as it was basically and continues to be practiced starting around the 17th century. And we're talking about equal-tempered scales. We're using the idea of dividing the octave into 12 equal bits. Those 12 equal bits are half steps. And we make a major scale by using some of those notes. Whole, whole, half, whole, whole, whole, half. It's a formula. And I could start anywhere and use the same formula and get a major scale. We're going to work in the key of C because it's all white keys and it's easier for you at home, if you're just getting started, to work on those white keys. When last we met, we talked about the diatonic triads, the chords that are diatonic, only notes from the major scale. So far, all of these triads have been either major or minor. But when I get up here to the seventh step of the scale, I get to a really important and unique triad. I'll play it again and you can see it says B diminished, D-I-M. A diminished triad has a unique property. There's a minor third here and a minor third on the top. Those create a fascinating sound, a unique sound. It's the only place in the scale where that exists. It's got a tritone built into it. All the other outside voices are perfect fifths. Those perfect fifths are very stable sounding, kind of boring until you get there. And when you get there, you get something spicy, something that's dissonant. And that dissonant interval, I'm going to play a little bit lower, wants to resolve. That tritone is the engine of western functional harmony. How does it relate to dominant chords? A dominant chord is a seventh chord. And we're going to talk about all of the seventh chords. And the seventh chord is simply put a triad with another interval on top, a seventh. There's a seventh from the root to that top note. And the dominant chord is a really special one because now watch the screen. It'll show you that in the diatonic chords, the fifth step of the scale is the only one that's a real dominant chord. Major third, minor seven. You get here, you get the minor seven again, and here is this like wacky thing, B minor seven flat five. This chord here, the one that's built on the fifth step of the scale, G7, has a unique property. It's a major triad down below and a diminished triad up above. There are a couple of notes overlapping. It's got a major third right there, major third in the middle, minor seventh on the top. The V7 chord is unique in the scale. It's the only place that that tritone lives comfortably and it always wants to resolve to C. And because it's unique, we call it the dominant chord. In fact, it dominates the scale. If somebody walks up to me and plays G7, I know I'm in key of C. Any other type of chord could be the one chord, could be the four chord, I don't know, major or minor. Could be the two chord, could be the three chord, could be the six chord, I don't know. Those are all minor triads, right? Even all minor sevenths. I just don't know. But if I hear a dominant chord, I know I'm on the fifth step of the scale. And if that's the fifth step of the scale, I know the scale I'm in is C. Now that's useful for harmony and I'll show you what I mean. So here's my little piece, C, G7, ending on C. But I want to go to the key of G, so I'm going to play a D7 chord and D7 resolves to G. Now I want to go to A minor. E7 goes to A minor and then another D7 and G. G becomes G7 and I'm going to wind up back home on C. Now I just went through a couple, three, four different key levels, didn't I? I began in the key of C. I'm going to play it and we'll talk it through. A C chord, a G7 chord, and a C. I really know comfortably where I am. One, five, one. And then D7 is the five of G. For a moment I'm in the key of G, but I don't stay there. E7 is the five of A minor. D7 is the five of G. There's G7 and I'm taking myself back home again. Back home to C with a little Floyd riff. I have just taken myself around a little circle, a circle that goes like this. E is the five of A, which is the five of D, which is the five of G, which takes me back home again to C. I've gone around the circle of fifths and I've used dominant chords to do it. E is the five of A, which is the five of D, which is the five of G, which is the five of C. That circle of fifths, a really important idea which we'll talk about in the future, is fueled by the dominant chords tension and desire to move forward to resolution. We used it against itself there, didn't we, to create a forward-moving, propulsive, energetic, harmonic progression that uses the dominant chords to kind of roll forward into the next key. We're not alone when we do something like that. Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, they all would have gone, ah yes, I see what you did there. Dominant chords are crucial for functional harmony. Use them, try them out for yourself. There's plenty of examples of using dominant chords in non-functional harmony. For instance, when you're playing the blues, any of those chords can be dominant. Dominant chords pop up just as spicy energies in plenty of music. But for now, and really maybe for the first thing, take a look at how it works in this functional context. They're everywhere. As soon as you start hearing them and understanding them, you'll feel oppressed by them at some level. Listen, I hope this has been useful. I asked you at the beginning of the video to like and subscribe, and I'll ask you again. Do it now. If you're not subscribed, I'd really like you to join the party. Well, where to begin? Right from where you are, I hope. I'll see you next time.