How Long Should a Chord Progression Be? Five Tips to Guide You

Written by Gary Ewer, from “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” website. Gary Ewer is the author of “The Essential Secrets of Songwriting” suite of e-books. Those e-books will get you writing the songs you’ve always wanted to write. Click here to improve your songwriting skills.
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Chords form the underlying landscape upon which we construct melodies. That landscape analogy works really well, because we want the chords to be beautiful but mostly unobtrusive, just as we like to build houses on land that is lovely but still mostly uncomplicated. If you think of each individual chord as being a landmark on the landscape, you’ll see that less is often more.

There are some basic guidelines to follow when developing the harmonies for your song. As you can imagine, even songs that begin with a chord progression will almost immediately begin to suggest certain melodic fragments. And I’ve mentioned many times on this site the need to have certain types of progressions for your verses (the so-called “fragile” progressions) while using more “strong” progressions in your choruses. (For a refresher on what we mean by fragile and strong progressions, see here.)

But none of that tells us how long a progression should be. Here are some tips to keep in mind:

1. The faster the tempo, the fewer the chords. This is related to the principle that says that the faster the tempo, the less frequently the chords should change. An up-tempo song, with a long list of chords in the progression, tends to acquire an unpleasant “frantic” feel. So for fast songs, limit your chord choices to four or five per verse and chorus.
2. Long progressions work better in ballads, and songs whose lyrics tell a story. This is because long progressions will often focus at various times on the major side of the key, and then the minor side of the key. For example, consider this long progression: C F Dm G C Dm F E7 |Am Em Dm F C Am G C. Parts of this progression focus on strongly major chords (C F Dm G C…) while the second half starts by emphasizing minor (Am Em Dm F…). This allows for shifting moods and atmosphere, suiting narrative-style texts better than punchier, dance-style music.
3. More songs suffer from progressions that are too long, than progressions that are too short. Long progressions tend to cause listeners to become a bit lost as the chords take them too far away from home.
4. If your song feels lifeless and you suspect that the chord progression needs something more, try using chord inversions (i.e., “slash” chords) to create some variety. Repeating C F G C over and over again might be tedious, but you can offer a sense of variety by using inversions: C  F  G  C  C/E  F/A  G  C.
5. If you fear that your progression is boring, find other ways first to create innovation, and if they don’t work, try spicing up your progression. Those other ways? Try doing something innovative with the instrumentation, speed up the tempo, change the time signature, add a hook, or use pedal point (i.e., keep the same note in the bass).

For me, tip number 3 above is a truism that afflicts many otherwise great songs. Keep in mind that most listeners want something innovative in the songs they listen to, but too many chords just makes a song sound cluttered. When in doubt, go for the shorter progression, and find other ways to increase the interest-level in your song.
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