Free
Guitar chord progressions
Every progression Adam posts, with the chord shapes, the strum, the groove and what the changes are actually doing. Open any of them for the shapes and the feel. No account, nothing to sign in to.
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G · Em7 · C · D7
The doo-wop changes grown up — sevenths in the bass seats, backbeat on top.
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Gmaj7 · Bm7 · Cmaj7 · D7
Every chord here is a seventh chord. That extra note keeps each one sounding a little unfinished, so the progression flows from one chord to the next without ever fully settling. That’s the smooth, easy sound soul ballads are built on.
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Gm · Bb · C · Eb · Gm · D7
The House of the Rising Sun walk — minor, climbing, inevitable.
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G · B7 · C · Cm
Major three, then the minor four — the borrowed-chord ache from the Beatles to Radiohead.
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G · D · Em · Bm · C · G · C · D
Pachelbel’s eight — three centuries of borrowing and still not worn out.
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Em · D · C · B
The Andalusian walk-down — four chords, each a step lower. Flamenco to Zeppelin.
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E · B · C#m · A
The four chords under half the radio. Starts home, lifts, aches, resolves.
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E · A · B7 · A
The Telecaster answer to Nashville — brighter, harder, straight time.
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E · A7 · E6 · B7
A country shuffle. Long-short, long-short the whole way through, and that uneven bounce is most of what makes it sound country.
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E · A · B · A
Three chords, sixty years of garages. If it feels obvious, it is working.
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D · C · G · D
The classic-rock lift. Dropping a whole step and then climbing back is what makes a chorus sound like it opens up.
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D · G · A · Bm
Four chords you can sing almost anything over. Adam teaches these early, because once they are under your fingers you have a few hundred songs.
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D6 · Bm7 · Em7 · A7 · F#m7 · B7 · Em7 · A7
Gershwin’s eight bars — after the blues, the most-borrowed changes in jazz.
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Em7b5 · A7 · Dm6 · Dm6
The dark sentence — half-diminished in, dominant through, minor six home.
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Em7 · A7 · Dmaj7 · Dmaj7
Jazz’s whole sentence structure, in one line. Loop it in every key.
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Dmaj7 · Bm7 · Em7 · A7
A turnaround. Four chords that lean on each other and hand you back to the start, which is why you hear it at the end of so many jazz tunes.
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Dm7 · Dm7 · Dm7 · Dm7 · Gm7 · Gm7 · Dm7 · Dm7 · A7 · Gm7 · Dm7 · A7
The Thrill Is Gone country — same twelve bars, all the lights turned down.
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Cmaj7 · Fmaj7 · Bm7b5 · Em7 · Am7 · Dm7 · G7
Adam assigns this to his students all the time. Each chord sits four steps up from the last, and every one of them belongs to C major. Watch the move from F to B: every other jump here is a plain perfect fourth, but that one is a half step wider, because the note that would make it plain is not in the key. That is the augmented fourth, and it is the reason this drill is worth doing exactly as written. Try it in every key you play in.
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C · Dm · Em · F · G · Am · Bdim · C · Bdim · Am · G · F · Em · Dm
Going up is the easy half. Coming back down is where you find out which changes you actually know, because the ones your hand has learned in one direction are exactly the ones that catch you in the other.
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C · Dm · Em · F · G · Am · Bdim
Nothing here goes past the third fret. Play them up and back down. Most songs you already know are built from four or five of these seven, so they are worth having under your fingers before anything fancier.
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Cmaj7 · Dm7 · Em7 · Fmaj7 · G7 · Am7 · Bm7b5
These seven are every chord the C major scale gives you without stepping outside it. Play them up and back down, and after a few passes you start to hear where a song in this key is likely to go next.
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C7 · C7 · C7 · C7 · F7 · F7 · C7 · C7 · G7 · F7 · C7 · C7
Four whole bars of home before the IV — the patient version every jam starts on.
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C7 · G7 · F7 · F7 · C7 · G7 · C7 · G7
The eight-bar blues. It comes round sooner than the twelve-bar, which gives it a restless feel, and it is the one to learn second.
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C7 · F7 · C7 · C7 · F7 · F7 · C7 · C7 · G7 · F7 · C7 · G7
Twelve bars and three chords, underneath more songs than anyone can count. The quick change is the early move up to the four chord, right in the second bar.
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A7 · G7
The James Brown move. The whole band drops back a whole step and then lands again, and the groove does the rest of the work.
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A · F#m7 · D · E7
The doo-wop changes grown up — sevenths in the bass seats, backbeat on top.
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Amaj7 · C#m7 · Dmaj7 · E7
Every chord here is a seventh chord. That extra note keeps each one sounding a little unfinished, so the progression flows from one chord to the next without ever fully settling. That’s the smooth, easy sound soul ballads are built on.