Chord & FretBlues · quick-change — Electric guitar
What is the Blues · quick-change progression?
The Blues · quick-change progression is E → A → E → E (I – IV – I – I), in the key of E. Read as harmonic function it moves tonic → subdominant → tonic → tonic, cycling as a vamp with no full cadence. Play one chord per bar and let it loop.
Good music works like a good walk: you leave, get a little lost on purpose, and come back. The map of this one: E (I, home) → A (IV, the stroll) → E (I, home) → E (I, home). Press play and follow along — at the "time to come back" chord, notice the physical urge to hear E again — the home chord.
Electric guitar
On an electric guitar you rarely have to cover the low bass yourself, because in a band the bass player takes that job, so your chords can sit higher and cleaner. This is the electric guitar's home ground: pop, rock, blues, funk and soul were shaped around its sound, whether you strum full chords or play short, tight chord stabs behind the singer. Its home chord E keeps its lowest note on E and rings 3 open strings.
Circle of Fifths — See the key's diatonic chords and its secondary dominants · try it in Chord & Fret
Save this progression in Chord & FretReharmonize — Want richer substitutions? Reharmonize the progression in a tap · see it in Chord & Fret
Learn each chord of the trip
This is one shape of E. In Chord & Fret, you open every position of all 4 chords in this progression along the neck — on any instrument, and hear each one. Open in Chord & Fret →
Metronome — Drill this change in time, with tap tempo and subdivisions · open in Chord & Fret
This chord has a whole family that didn't fit the page. They're all in the Chord & Fret app, pocket-sized, in your phone's store.