I write a lot of music.  Seriously… A LOT.  Riffs, chord progressions, instrumentals, songs, lyrics, rhythms, mixes of loops and samples… I have hundreds (if not THOUSANDS) of pieces that I’ve created in the last 10 years or so.

When you combine that with the several dozen or more songs I’ve learned over the years playing along with my favorite bands, the multitude of songs that my dad has written that I’ve played along with him, the dozens of songs that former bandmates of mine have written that I’ve learned, and the hundreds of different songs that I’ve played in my church over the years, you can say that I’ve played a lot of different music in my life.

Because of all of that, sometimes I get in ruts when it comes to playing music.   I fall into traps of playing very similar riffs or patterns or progressions when I’m trying to create something new.

So, I enjoy spending time finding ways to break those ruts and traps.

I’m going to share with you guys an idea that I came up with turns writing a chord progression into a card game of sorts.  This isn’t a solution for ALL of your writing (well, it could be, I guess, but I wouldn’t recommend it), but when you’re feeling like you need something that doesn’t sound very much like you usually do, this can be a fun way to discover a new style of chords.

Songwriting: The Card Game

Get a regular deck of 52 cards.  Shuffle the deck and deal out how ever many cards you want in your progression. For the example, I’m going to deal 4 cards.

Use the chart below (or make up your own chart) to figure out which chords are going to be in your progression.  I decided to make any black cards (spades or clubs) that I dealt represent a major chord, any red cards (hearts or diamonds) represent a minor chord.

Here is the chart that I made:

CARD	CHORD
Ace	A
2	A# / Bb
3	B
4	C
5	C# / Db
6	D
7	D# / Eb
8	E
9	F
10	F# / Gb
Jack	G
Queen	G# / Ab
King	Repeat first dealt card

I shuffled my deck and dealt 4 cards.  Here is the hand I got:

• 4 of Diaminds
• Queen of Spades
• 4 of Hearts
• 2 of Spades

So according to my chart,  my chord progression would be:

Cm (the 4 making it a C, the red making it minor)
G# (the Queen making it a G#, the black making it major)
Cm (the 4 making it a C, the red making it minor)
A# (the 2 making it a A#, the black making it major)

I recorded a very simple version of that progression so I could show you guys what it sounds like:

you can click here to download the progression if you don’t want to use the play button above

Not bad for my first try, eh?  I tried the same trick a few times after I recorded it, and I got several progressions that sounded awful, but I got a couple of other good ones, too.

Like I said, it’s not a cure-all easy way to always write songs, but it can provide a little randomness to get you out of your “comfort zone” when it comes to writing.

You can either use my idea and my chart as is, or you can get creative with it.  Maybe you play jazz music, and you’d like to expand the chord selection a bit… you could make each suit a different variation… Diamonds could be major, Hearts minor, Clubs major 7th, and Spades minor 7th… you can get as creative or as simple as you want with a trick like this.  You could even come up with several different charts, and compare each dealt hand to all of them.

If you ever use this trick, I’d like to hear what you come up with!

Related posts:

1. Write Your Own Backing Music Online
2. Link: How to Add Interest to Your Chord Progressions
3. Practice Practice Practice: A Chord Progression (06-17-10)
4. Writing Practice: Write A Short Story To Inspire Music
5. Why do we try to be musically creative?