Talk:'50s progression

Donald Duck changes

The Finnish name "Donald Duck" (Aku Ankka) changes (Akuankkakierto) appear to be a corruption of Paul Anka's name and refers to the progression in his song "Diana". Hyacinth (talk) 23:01, 13 July 2008 (UTC) modified by —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.114.198.65 (talk) 09:04, 4 April 2011

Variations / Last Sentence: Maybe here is a mistake made using the term parallel minor and how it is displayed in the roman number term: the parallel minor chord of IV is surely ii: f.e. F is the major "partner" of d minor. Bat "Varioations" says: the parallel minor of IV is iv. To F major, f minor isn´t the parallel minor. Here Fmajor was "made-minor". -> Parallel minor-major pairs do never have the same roman number.

Muzio Clementi?

If I am not mistaken, this refers the section near the end of the third movement. The chord progression here is not

I vi IV V

but rather

I vi ii V7

I am not sure about the actual history, but this difference should be noted, as the similarities, particularly in the bass, are notable enough to consider. MamaWaluigi (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 08:01, 7 July 2009 (UTC).

---

The passage the article is referring to occurs in the middle of the third movement, and is

I vi IV V 

You can hear it at about 0:58 in this video.

Alexanderkominek (talk) 19:09, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I was mistaken of where said passage the article is referring to, then. However, actual harmonies in the arpeggio appears to be of that which I said, which would be

I vi ii V7

Although it is a variation, it is not the same. If you will find the passage in the score, you can see this for yourself.

MamaWaluigi (talk) 09:18, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Well known songs that use the 50s progression

I believe that the chord progression in The Lion Sleeps Tonight is actually

I IV I V 

and not the 50s progression.

Alexanderkominek (talk) 18:43, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Illustration

It's unfortunate that the progression in the illustration uses open spacing for the IV and V chords. I believe the whole point to the progression is the parallelism as you go from one chord to the next, and the illustration might be better if it had used the "block" spelling in the IV and V that it did in the I and vi. Dr-t —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dr-t (talk • contribs) 17:23, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Origin Section

This is ridiculous. The entirety of the origin section has one citation, and it's to an album that only verifies the date of the composition being referred to, not the facts the author claims.

I'll edit it to say something that's not idiotic. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.194.78.88 (talk) 21:52, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Knowledge Nazis

Well done! I hope you're proud of yourselves! You've taken yet another insightful and incredibly useful music theory page and sucked it dry of any kind of relationship with the real world, by removing all but THREE examples!

And I know you're going to argue tooth-and-nail that you're right and that I cannot win! But shame on you all. Tell you what, unless you can convincingly argue that I'm wrong, the following will be going on this page 16:00 Monday afternoon BST:

• Unchained Melody - Righteous Brothers
• Love Hurts - Roy Orbison
• If I Could Turn Back The Hands Of Time - R Kelly
• Earth Angel
• Lollipop - The Chordettes
• When I Grow Up - Garbage (the fourth chord is missing I think, but otherwise it's very similar)
• Runaround Sue - Dion
• The Happy Days theme

And if you delete them, they will simply be put back on. Then I will move onto the Modes pages you've systematically destroyed. And I will put them up again and again and AGAIN (from different IPs) until you are forced to lock the page (and, hopefully, rethink your policy). I realise you have standards to uphold, but this is just stupid.

Of couse, you will probably lock all the pages in question anyhow, so I will have to join - no big deal. I'd rather it didn't come to this, though, I'd much rather some sensible debate and a little leeway.

If you are such experts then why not verify/refute all such examples yourselves? Don't wait for some snot-nosed article in Music Theory Wanker Periodical, you claim to know your stuff - PROVE it! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.5.12.52 (talk) 09:27, 18 April 2010

You're the one throwing around insults, demanding that things be your way, unable to engage in sensible debate and deal with simple policies, failing to spell course ("couse"), and asking us to prove an endless stream of negatives.

Think about it. You yourself could spend your entire life proving or disproving some random prince or pauper you met on the street's claims regarding any subject: That there is MSG in Torino spaghetti, that the Petrushka chord is in "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun", that your mother never really loved you...

But why would you? You only have so much time, you already have friends, you already have sources you trust, and just because some guy on a street corner is holding a sign saying the end of the world is coming doesn't mean that you change your plans for the day. Hyacinth (talk) 23:34, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Citing sources and Wikipedia:Verifiability. Hyacinth (talk) 23:46, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Knowledge Nazis? Here they come! Love Hurts is by the Bryant duo. There are more examples of the 50s progression than there are stars in the heavens. No point in enumerating more, just point out that it's obsequious. Should people not be able to hear it, it won't matter much to them. Thanks otherwise for a pleasant treatment.

I kind of agree with him on that more examples wouldn't be a bad thing, though. Just my 2 cents.. Agilo (talk) 02:45, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

I think this would be a great opportunity to make a List of songs using the I-VI-IV-V progression. (Then I'd turn it into a really silly medley.) --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 18:04, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Ha ha! Whatever happened to that guy; is he still haunting Wikipedia?? That was fun. Anyway, I wonder if anyone has thought of just making a category for this. That might be a better way to organize it. I don't think verifiability or citations should be an issue here, since the songs themselves are published sources. Anyway, it would keep this article from getting cluttered maybe. Pigby (talk) 23:04, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

So what would the rules be for the category? Pure I-VI-IV-V progressions only? Are bridges allowed? Turnarounds? Modulations? I do like the idea, though. --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 00:37, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Hank Green

I'm not sure if this would fit into the page at all but Hank green did a fairly decent medley/description of the 50s progression in This video and it may be worth a note or reference. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.142.170.20 (talk) 14:16, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Video links. Hyacinth (talk) 20:03, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

See Talk:Hank Green/Archives/2015#COI-check. Hyacinth (talk) 09:42, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Removed

• Songwriter Hank Green nicknamed the progression "The Ice Cream Changes," citing [1] in a video about them that the progression is often used in music not exclusive to the 1950s.

I removed the above given that Wikipedia:Video links recommendation to stick to reliable video sources (it gives as example the Associated Press), the assertion is likely from Wikipedia in the first place as it is already in the lead, and that the reasoning fails. For example, a perfect authentic cadence isn't actually perfect or more truthful than a half cadence and vienna sausages are eaten outside of Vienna. Hyacinth (talk) 09:11, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

• "Crocodile Rock" by Elton John in 1972, "Baby" performed by Justin Bieber in 2010 and most recently "Friday" by Rebecca Black.

I removed the above as they lack sources. Hyacinth (talk) 02:59, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

• "I'm Not Edward Cullen" by Hank Green

Hyacinth (talk) 06:20, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Examples

• "D'yer Mak'er" by Led Zeppelin (verse), "Baby, I'm an Anarchist!" by Against Me!, "She Has a Girlfriend Now" by Reel Big Fish, and "Every Breath You Take" by The Police. Other examples include the verse to "Stay", "If I Had a Hammer", "Keep on Dancing", chorus to "Eve of Destruction", "Real Love", (all two beats per chord) the verse to "Poor Little Fool", "Teenager in Love", "Wonderful World", "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?", bridge to "I Can't Explain", verse to "Love Hurts", "Do That to Me One More Time", chorus to "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us", "Last Kiss", "This Magic Moment", (all four beats per chord) verse and chorus to "Runaround Sue", verse to "Please, Mr. Postman", "Let's Twist Again", chorus to "Monster Mash", verse to "Just One Look", "Octopus's Garden", (all eight beats per chord) main verse "Stand By Me", and chorus to "It's Cold Outside" (eight and four beats per chord).

The above where removed as "potentially infinite and utterly random list, per talk" [below] Hyacinth (talk) 10:31, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

I commented out the inline citations which were showing up at the bottom of the talk page. Here is the previous revision: [2]. Radiodef (talk) 02:22, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Donald Duck Progression

• Aku Ankka-kierto (Donald Duck progression) in Finnish.

Was removed on the basis that there is no reason to include it. I have readded it since this is no reason to remove it. Hyacinth (talk) 01:11, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Of course "there's no reason to include it" is a reason to remove it. It's called, "editing". It's also called being consistent -- why don't we include the German, French, Arabic, Hebrew, and Swahili names for "elephant" in the lede to the elephant article? People curious about such things might follow the link to the Suomi wiki article (which doesn't seem to explain the name at all). --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 16:28, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Agree again. I'm removing it on this basis - if you really want it to stay I'd suggest including its translations in every language.

Mato (talk) 23:59, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

Why? Hyacinth (talk) 02:25, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Examples

This list of examples is quite silly; it's mostly a random selection of songs random people have noticed use this awesomely common progression. Such a list provides no value; a shorter more definitive list, if possible gleaned from a reliable source, would be far more educational. I propose a dramatic reduction, even if someone will come and call me a Knowledge Nazi (see above.) --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 16:32, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

First of all, perhaps you should settle down. No one here has called you anything. Hyacinth (talk) 10:28, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Have to agree with Jpgordon's outlook (although I might not have used the word 'silly'). It is a common progression and therefore the song choices are either random choices (if added by many editors) or the favourites of a major contributor. I'm not sure which and it's not really important which - it needs a clean up IMO.

For the time being, I'm removing Ritchie Valens' "Donna - it does have a supporting source but it's clearly a I-IV-V-I progression, so I'm presuming a mistake has been made somewhere along the line. Mato (talk) 23:30, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

I see now the content Jpgordon removed - in which case I agree with the word 'silly'. The examples left still seem a bit weak - I'm going to check the Sam Cooke reference when I can, it seems to me the progression here is I-III-IV...Mato (talk) 23:47, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

1-6-4-5 are not called Ice Cream Changes.

I am a professional blues musician, from my experience and 1-6-4-5 (or 1-6-2-5 more often) are not referred to as "ice cream changes" although they are part of a turnaround used as part of the whole progression. What we refer to as "ice cream changes" are the changes behind the songs "Steal Away" "Don't Touch Me" (with a variation) and others. 12/8 feel, 8 bar form, the changes are I | I7 | IV | IVmi | I VImi | II V | I IV | I V | and often with a bridge that goes IV | IVmi | I | I7 | IV | IVmi | II7 | V | My only caveat is that I work on the West Coast and this could be a regional thing. (ex, box shuffle is referred to as lumpty dumpty on west coast) Lisa Mann50.53.104.21 (talk) 00:38, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Citing sources. Hyacinth (talk) 04:24, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes they were

When I was in my twenties, around 1981-1986, I played as a side man for Sam & Dave, the Del Vikings, the Drifters, Mary Wells, the Dovells, Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley and a bunch of others I'm forgetting. I know for a fact that some artists (mostly older, mostly black) in those days called I-vi-IV-V the ice cream changes. Absolutely. So much so that, at that time, some of the older artists would simply say "ice cream changes in G" and off we go. So this was definitely the right terminology for the artists who loved and recorded these changes in so many songs in the 50s and 60s.

Obviously, no one from that community would call them the "50's progression". (Which, by the way, has a really sterile and judgmental Junior-College-Music-Department / YouTube-guitar-lesson sound to it. It's just not the kind of language that the old downtown, chess records crowd would use.)

I don't dispute what Lisa Mann says -- it's very possible that, in her community, the changes she describes above are the ice cream changes. There is not a ton of communication between different communities of musicians. For example, no one I have ever played with in my current genre (see Charlie Gillingham) has ever heard of the "ice cream changes".

The latino musicians I grew up with in South Central LA called them the "Hang on Sloopy" changes for obvious reasons, so go figure.

Sadly, none of this can go in the article, of course. This is exactly the kind of thing that Wikipedia simply can't cover -- to far under academia's radar to give us anything like a reliable source here. We need some bright young anthropologist to go out and interview all the old musicians and ask everybody what they call various chords, changes, instruments, feels, and so on. He needs to publish a paper and a book, and then we would have something to cite here. ---- CharlesGillingham (talk) 13:15, 6 April 2013 (UTC)

I'm not really sure why the article is titled "50s progression" either since there are refs for the other two names cited in the article. Radiodef (talk) 21:30, 6 April 2013 (UTC)

"Four Chord Song"

• The Axis of Awesome's "Four Chord Song" is a humorous take on the use of this progression in pop music, piecing together lyrics from various different songs using the progression.

I removed the above as Pop-punk chord progression claims it uses that progression. Hyacinth (talk) 01:35, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Naming conventions

In the second paragraph the chord progression is labelled "I vi IV V". As a guitar teacher I have a fair knowledge of this. My understanding was that all references to chord numbers were in capitals, and references to the chord type were in small letters. For example, in the key of C, the standard chord progression is C - A minor - F - G. This should be written I VIm IV V. Peterkp (talk) 09:26, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

Uppercase numerals denote major, lowercase numerals denote minor. Radiodef (talk) 21:30, 6 April 2013 (UTC)

"Four Chord Song"

• The Axis of Awesome's "Four Chord Song" is a humorous take on the use of this progression in pop music, piecing together lyrics from various different songs using the progression.

I removed the above as Pop-punk chord progression claims it uses that progression. Hyacinth (talk) 01:35, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Naming conventions

In the second paragraph the chord progression is labelled "I vi IV V". As a guitar teacher I have a fair knowledge of this. My understanding was that all references to chord numbers were in capitals, and references to the chord type were in small letters. For example, in the key of C, the standard chord progression is C - A minor - F - G. This should be written I VIm IV V. Peterkp (talk) 09:26, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

Uppercase numerals denote major, lowercase numerals denote minor. Radiodef (talk) 21:30, 6 April 2013 (UTC)

it is frightening to think that a "guitar teacher" doesn't know this! really basic stuff!! 209.172.23.114 (talk) 04:37, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Title (naming conventions)

Should the title not be '50s progression (with apostrophe) per WP:DECADE.- Gilliam (talk) 07:25, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

4/4

All the examples seem to be in 4/4 time. Is this inherent in '50s progression?Kdammers (talk) 07:42, 1 March 2014 (UTC)

Five months later, and no answer.Kdammers (talk) 14:13, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

What it sounds like

Maybe I'm hopeless, but the chord progression that sounds on the sample doesn't sound at all like the songs mentioned. How can I hear the similarity? Kdammers (talk) 14:22, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

Heart and Soul!

I think the vast majority of musicians -- esp pianists -- ref to this as the "Heart & Soul" progression (technically I-vi-ii-V, but generally played as IV these days).

All those other names are fine and dandy, but they are surely in the minority (i wasn't aware offhand that Stand by Me used it, and i for one have never even HEARD of "Ice Cream"...). At the very least, H&S should be atop the list of alt names, no? It's not just "one more song" using the progression; it's the very song most people use to DEFINE it, i believe.

Not to mention TEACH it to others -- piano 4-hands, anyone? 209.172.23.147 (talk) 01:13, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

We generally go by whatever name(s) the sources use, this is the reason for the existing names given in the article. 'Heart and Soul progression' may very well be a name which is in use, but content on WP must have a reliable source backing up the claim, otherwise it is original research which we cannot include. Radiodef (talk) 02:08, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

then get better sources. "heart and soul progression" outgoogles "ice cream progression" by about 3:1.

i am still not even clear what the "ice cream" song is. if the article insists on using this minority term (i'd say "obscure", myself), then at least have a better explanation of the source. are we talking about some song in use on the TRUCKS? (usually turkey in the straw in the US...NOT a song using the progression!) 209.172.23.104 (talk) 06:54, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

many thanks to whoever dug up the heart & soul sources and reworded things -- much better now!

but i still have one quibble: who the heck is MIKE AQUINO?! if he's some famous composer or music critic, it should be stated as such. and hotlinked, preferably.

the way it sits now, it sounds like some random nobody. why are we including his input?

i have no objection to listing ice cream changes (despite never having heard it), but only with a solid source. does he rise to this? 209.172.23.114 (talk) 04:30, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

First used extensively in Blue Moon?

I think somebody has forgotten 'Ten Cents a Dance', also written by Richard Rodgers, but about four years earlier in 1930 (as sung by Ruth Etting). Rodgers himself just might also have heard Borodin's Overture to Prince Igor which goes back to the 1870s or 1880s (pinning dates on Borodin is not easy). When the main theme comes in after about three and a half minutes the first statement of that theme is in the I VImi IImi V sequence. It then gets restated as I VI IImi V (with VI as a major chord), but the progression is essentially the same. One way or the other the sequence occurs ten times in the piece (if I have counted correctly).

Even earlier - Schubert's Impromptu op. 90 no. 3 in G flat major starts straight off with I VImi IV V, and half repeats that before going off in a slightly different direction. Perhaps this piece could have been Rodgers' springboard in the direction of this chord sequence since he studied classical music at the Institute of Musical Art (later the Juillard School) and could either have heard it there or even played it himself.

If others agree with me then perhaps someone will edit in my suggestions. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.175.9.208 (talk) 11:52, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

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Poor Classical Examples

Most of the classical examples cited use ii7 in first inversion rather than IV. In common practice analysis IV6 does not indicate a subdominant chord with a sixth added, and the perceived root of these chords for a classical musician is the 2nd degree, not the 4th. 2601:181:C381:8180:5DB3:A02F:6BE:EC0B (talk) 03:13, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Agreed. There are plenty of classical musical examples that actually use the progression (Beethoven, Quartet op. 130, movement IV, opening) but these examples definitely use ii65 not IV. IV6 is absolutely a wrong label. -- Michael Scott Asato Cuthbert (talk) 10:55, 8 December 2024 (UTC)

How do we know?

How do we know any of these songs use the subject progression, in the absence of sources? This list is almost completely unverifiable. Larry Koenigsberg (talk) 15:31, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Missing audio

That audio file of the at the beginning of the article doesn't exist. I tried uploading an audio file I made to Wikimedia Commons to take its place, but it isn't worth the hassle of getting approval to upload a single file to edit a single article. MrPersonMan69 (talk) 12:24, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

That audio file is (or at least should be) automatically generated from the music score by an Extension and doesn't correspond to an uploaded file. Copying the exact wikitext into my sandbox worked fine, so I couldn't comment as to why playback isn't working on this page. TollyH (talk) 12:48, 30 May 2024 (UTC)