This video is the 3rd in a series about how to create your own unique chord substitutions for most any song. By creating a chord sub, you automatically put your own spin on a tune, as your listeners are used to hearing the same chord progressions in a given song, but you surprise them with a new and different chord.

Watch this short video, then toggle down on this blog to review the first two videos in this series.

For a complete course in Chord Substitutions, please click on “Chord Substitutions”

Among the various ways to reharmonize a tune are three specific but easy methods. This is part one of a three part series, and deals with a simple question you can ask at any point in a song to come up with new and fresh chords: “Into What Other Chord Does This Note Fit?”

Watch this short video and you’ll understand:

Then come back here tomorrow and we’ll take up part two of the series.

Using original chord substitutions in your piano playing puts your own stamp of originality on the music, so your song doesn’t sound like everyone else’s song. There are some basic principles of chord substitution which you can use right away, and this short video covers those methods.

For a complete course on Chord Substitutions click here: Chord Substitutions

Among the ways to reharmonize a melody is a technique I call the “half-step slide”. As you progress from one chord to another, look for a way to “slide in” to the target chord — like a runner stealing 2nd base and sliding into the bag. Watch this short video and you’ll understand:

I used the tri-tone substitution for years before I knew the name of it, and perhaps you do also. It makes sense, because it allows you to “slide in” to the target chord for a smoother transition. In fact, I always refered to it as a half-step slide from above when moving from a V7 chord to a I chord.

A tri-tone substitution is the use in a chord progression of a 7th chord that is three whole steps (in other words, a tri-tone) away from the original 7th chord. For example, if you were moving from G7 to C, you would substitute a Db7 for the G7 chord before you land on the target chord C.

The reason these chords may be substituted for each other is that they have two notes in common — and the two notes are always a tri-tone (3 whole steps) away from each other. In a G7 chord, the third is B and the seventh is F. In the Db7 chord, the third is an F and the seventh is Cb (same sound as B, but written enharmonically).
Watch the short video, and I think you will understand.

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