Secondary Dominant Chords - Music Theory Lesson

My video on Functional Harmony: https://youtu.be/D2ltRa2BosE

Orcastra Studio video on Secondary Dominant Chords: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKvWCk9oNkU&t=21s

Okay, what are Secondary Dominants? Basically we’re using chords from an other key to kinda “Spice Up” our chord progressions.

Check out this diagram. I ii iii IV V vi viio I. Here we can see all the chords in a major key. As you may or may not know, the V chord (This guy right here) has a strong pull to the I chord. We call this V chord the “Dominant” chord. (If you want to know more about this, check out my video on functional harmony)

Now let’s add in some lead sheet symbols. We know this G wants to go to C. Now forget that. Let’s plug the key go G into this diagram. Here we can see that the V chord is a D. So the D chord is the dominant chord int he key of G and there for wants to go to the I chord, G.

Now back to the key of C major. Let’s make a chord progression in this key. We’ll go C, F, G C. I IV V I Check it out.

How let’s take that G chord and put the V chord in the key of G before the G chord. Now we have C, F, D, G, C. So this is kinda crazy because now we are playing a D major chord in the key of C, and there’s no D major in C. But, D is the V chord in the key of G. And in our progression that D chord is going straight to the G. So listen to how it sounds now.

Pretty cool right. That’s basically what a secondary dominant is. We put a dominant chord from an other key , or a secondary key, into our progression. We call this a V of V. Because it’s the V chords of the V chord.

Now let’s take it a step further, you can play a secondary dominant before any chord. Let’s make a new chord progressions just using chords in the key of C. C, Am, G, C. Or I vi V I Now, let’s look at that Am, the minor vi. In the key of Am the V chord is E. So we can put that E amor chord int he progression right before the Am. Now we have C, E, Am, G, C.

Seeing as how Am is the minor vi in the key of C we would call E V of vi. So you can have a V of whatever you want. [Show, V/ii V/IV V/vii] Check this out. C E Am B Em F D G C.

Granted, that’s a bit over the top. But you get the idea of how it works.

Before we go here’s a few more quick notes on secondary dominates, all of these V chords can be V7s. So in out C F D G C example, the D could be a D7, which sounds really cool. Also, the same works in minor keys. {Show i bio bIII iv V bVI bVII i with lead sheets] Like the V/bVII would be F here for example.

Let me know if you have any question about all this. It can be a lot to take in, this had to be explained to be multiple time when I was younger before I was able to fully grasp the concept. That being said, a friend of mine over at Orcastra Studio has a good video on this same topic and so does Signals Music Studio. It’s always good to get multiple views on these concepts, so please go check their videos out too. I have links in the description!

Thanks for watching!!

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Видео Secondary Dominant Chords - Music Theory Lesson канала Ian O'Donnell