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Exercises chord progressions

Every Exercises progression Adam posts, with the chord shapes, the strum, the groove and what the changes are doing. Open any of them for the shapes and the feel. No account, nothing to sign in to.

  1. Cmaj7 · Fmaj7 · Bm7b5 · Em7 · Am7 · Dm7 · G7

    Imaj7 · IVmaj7 · viiø7 · iii7 · vi7 · ii7 · V7 in C · 72 bpm

    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.

  2. C · Dm · Em · F · G · Am · Bdim · C · Bdim · Am · G · F · Em · Dm

    I · ii · iii · IV · V · vi · vii° · I · vii° · vi · V · IV · iii · ii in C · 80 bpm

    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.

  3. C · Dm · Em · F · G · Am · Bdim

    I · ii · iii · IV · V · vi · vii° in C · 80 bpm

    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.

  4. Cmaj7 · Dm7 · Em7 · Fmaj7 · G7 · Am7 · Bm7b5

    Imaj7 · ii7 · iii7 · IVmaj7 · V7 · vi7 · viiø7 in C · 72 bpm

    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.