Spice Up Your Ukulele Chord Progressions with Secondary Dominants

You'll be surprised how easy it is to spice up your chord progressions with Secondary dominants.

It's easy - even a beginner can do it!

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Take a look it this progression...

You may notice some unusual chords here - typically if you see a dominant 7 chord, it's the V chord and in a scale harmonized with chords there is only one dominant chord - so you may ask: "Where are those other dominants coming from?"

Learn more about the function of a dominant here.

About secondary dominants

What we're doing to create this beautiful progression is this simple...

Rules to remember:

1. Any chord may be proceeded by it's dominant 
2. When dominant chords are used in this manner they are called 'Secondary Dominants'

Simply follow rule number 1 and use them wherever you like! It's as easy as that to create great chord progressions with these. Try it! Sneak one into any progression...

Notice in the progression above the Am is preceded by the E7; it's dominant; and the F is preceded by the C7; it's dominant. 

In the progression above the E7 and the C7 are secondary dominants.

We took an everyday C - Am - F - G7 (I - vi - IV - V7 - you've seen it a million times) and spiced it up...

Here's how we'd write the new 'spiced up' progression (C - E7 - Am - C7 - F - G7) using the roman numeral system: I - V7/vi - vi - V7/IV - IV - V7.

Rather than 'V7/IV' you may find it written 'V7 of IV' for notation of the secondary dominant.

How to find secondary dominants

Here's how you can easily find these...

Finding secondary dominants is easy; if you want a secondary dominant for Am, you count up 5 (to find the V or the 5th) A, B, C, D, E; You then build a dominant chord on the E; It would be an E7 Chord. This chord would then go before the Am in the progression...

Lets play a few

You'll notice that when you come to the dominants, when playing the progressions, they create tension and may initially sound out of place (and out of key - because they are) but then they resolve. 

EX: E7 (tension) - Am (resolution); C7 (tension) - F (resolution); G7 (tension) - C (resolution).

Spiced up I - vi  - IV  - V7's

Lets play progression 1 (same as the progression above - the one we've been talking about). 

Two strums per chord - play it slowly; repeat a number of times and listen to where you hear tension and to hear the tension is resolved.

Progression 1:

There is more to this and more you can do with these but that's for another lesson... This is the most popular way to use them and the best way for you to get started with them. 

It's a great effect to add to your songs...

Let's try it with a G - Em - C - D7 (same as above but in the key of G). 

The secondary dominant for Em is B7; and for C, G7. (find the secondary dominant for Em by counting up 5 like so; E, F, G, A, B - so the secondary dominant for Em is B7 - it goes before Em in the progression).

Progression 2:

Sounds great doesn't it...

NOTE: For an easy D  use 2020; easy Em 0X02; easy B7 X320; learn more in my "Ukulele Chord Tricks: Simplify any Chord" book. Also see the easy B7 here along with the easy E major chord.

Let's spice up a I - IV - V

For progression 3, our original progression: C - F - G7; Spiced up with the Secondary dominant: C - C7 - F - G7.  

The new progression would be written like this using the roman numeral system: I - V7/IV - IV - V7.

C - C7 - F will sound very familiar, it appears in many popular songs. The V7/IV is the secondary dominant you most often find in popular music. You should use it in a song...

Progression 3:

For progression 4  we'll do the same thing but in the key of G; our original progression: G - C - D7 (I - IV - V7); with the Secondary dominant: G - G7 - C- D7.

Progression 4: 

Now go create some cool chord progressions...

More help finding them...

And finally a little help finding them for those that may have gotten lost...

Dominant chords for any chord may be found in my all scales harmonized with chords charts... (dominants will be the V chords).

All the chord you'll need can be found in my free chord book

Here's a handy chart for you - The 'target chord' is the chord the progression you'd like to put the secondary dominant before.

Pin this cool stuff and share it - your ukulele friends will love you for it!

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