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Secondary Dominants and How to Use Them Video Lecture - Guitar Become a
Text Transcript from Video
if you're not first you're last unless
you're second very dominant so today we
learn about secondary dominance because
it's a pretty cool sounding thing
that'll make you sound smart if you know
you're talking about and we're going to
use this as an example
[Music]
so what is a secondary dominant first we
have to know what a dominant chord is
and I will link you to a video that goes
more in-depth for that but basically
this is all about creating tension and
release okay so what a dominant seven
chord does is it kind of takes you in a
direction that makes you want to resolve
on the one chord so we're using the key
C everybody's favorite key and the one
chord is C so you just count through the
alphabet to find where the dominant
chord is it is always on the five so
cdefg
alright so if we have a G down to seven
chord
that's gonna just sit out in space to
make everybody uncomfortable until we
released that tension was the with the
one chord okay so really important
distinction you make from that five
chord to the one chord down to seven to
the root key chord or the tonic as
you'll sometimes hear called alright but
what if I told you there was a secondary
dominant and it's a really versatile
kind of thing that you can use if maybe
you want to take a composition or an
arrangement somewhere like if you're
having trouble writing a progression
that always wants to come back to see it
in the key of C you can't avoid this
this is a really good thing to learn
because you can actually go outside of a
Kia grab someone else's dominant a
secondary dominant to kind of move a
piece somewhere all right so a secondary
dominant is any dominant seven chord
that is taking you somewhere that is not
the root chord all right not the one
chord so if we're driving this chord
progression somewhere and what a tasty
chord progression indeed they were
driving it it isn't a g7 to a Cu
we can start incorporating these
secondary dominance right one of the
most common ones that you will see is
the secondary dominant of the sixth
chord so again come through that
alphabet c d e f g a a minor it's a very
important chord in the key of c so we
might have a use in taking a progression
to in a minor so the way we find out a
minor is dominant is just to count
through a ABCDE
okay so ii would be the dominant chord
for a minor now ii seven is like that
okay
2nd fret a string 1st fret on the g
string
thing else is open now the reason this
doesn't actually belong in the key of C
is because if you look at my pointer
finger is right here that's that a G
sharp that G sharp isn't in the key of C
so technically it doesn't belong there
but there's not the technical about how
tasty this Jam is of event this East
seven is leading us to a minor okay you
can hear a little bit of tension a
little bit of release so you can kind of
start driving a progression in a certain
direction and it's all about finding the
dominant chord for any of these other
chords in a key so like you've said
before in other videos every key has six
main chords one two three four five six
the one four and five chords are major
chords is two three and six chords or
minor chords alright so the chords in
the key of C are C major D minor E minor
F major G major a minor I don't want to
hear anything about this B minor 7 flat
5 chord because I'm not talking about it
so any of those other chords as other
main chords in the key can have a
secondary dominant it kind of leaves you
that direction because sometimes it's
hard to maybe hone in on a certain chord
other than the one chord or maybe even
like the sixth chord in a chord
progression so this is a really cool way
that you can maybe go outside of a key
just maybe in passing and grab a
different chord that'll lead you there
and it's all about counting to five from
whichever chord you're looking at and
then throwing a dominant seven chord
voicing on that to lead you to the
chords you're looking at alright so back
to that original chord progression that
we had we started and just a really
average way going to the five chord in
the key of C which is g7 this is right
here it's just a G major Barre chord
with your pinkie up it gives you a G
seven and that's going to lead us to a
CD I played a C major seven because I'm
og so we've got g7 to see you let me go
Esau a minor alright so in between
tension release a different type of
tension and release now the next part I
want to go to I want to go to the four
chord all right so c d e f we said that
was major
so f major is gonna be the next chord
we're going to go to you now we want to
find the dominant chord
that'll point us to F sometimes you'll
hear this referred to as a target chord
F being our target chord how do we hit
that target and kind of drive it towards
that it's count five F G a B C okay now
again I'm just kind of like coming
through as letters in the key of F
there'd be B flat but essentially you
can just use this almost as a shortcut
right so c7 would be the chord that
leads us to F as a target all right now
I'm gonna choose to play this c7 right
here all right I've got routing on the
eighth fret the C on the low E string
middle finger seven a with my index
finger
eight D with my ring finger and 9 G with
my pinkie really cool dominant seven
chord voicing so we're also using
different board voices to kind of jump
around here now after this I can go to
an F chord and I'm gonna go to the F
major seven which is rooted on the
eighth fret of a string you could easily
take this to a different type of that
board you used every type of c7 for
doesn't matter which voicing you use I'm
just kind of using these as an example
you can really use whatever you want
alright so again start from the top we
got g7 to c e7
see seven death now we're gonna go right
here
d7 right but see this chord voicing
before again does not belong in the key
of C yeah but where does D lead you to
what is D a fifth of you can kind of
fill in some blanks count backwards but
again we're going to a G so G ABCD a lot
of times it can be confusing when you're
first trying to pair these chords
together once you start doing it a few
times it'll just become second nature
kind of seeing the v away from a chord
because again once you kind of get this
down you can almost start guessing where
chord progressions are going in
different songs all right
so we really have four courts you know
we can even think of this as like a four
chord progression C major a minor F
major G major really a super basic key
of C chord progression it would be a one
six four five chord progression but we
can really kind of just mess it up and
get nasty with it
by adding those secondary dominance
again the first one is just the regular
Dominator primary dominant but once you
start adding those secondary diamond is
he really gives it a lot of a lot of
flavor which is what makes it such a
tasty tasty groove so we've got the g7
to c g7 to a c7 c7 to G we can even play
around with different board voicings
however you want to do it this is kind
of rolling around grabbing these seven
cords from different keys and then just
using them temporarily yeah because
again you know now all of these cars are
always gonna fit together so it's kind
of a really creative exercises you can
do to start kind of sewing them together
patching together your own cool chord
progressions and I think using secondary
dominance is a really cool way to do it
and there's kind of a side note from
that is maybe you want maybe if you
really like the sound of one secondary
dominant you can almost think of just
using it as a bio record again a really
popular wanna is using the secondary
dominant for the six chord so an a minor
said that was seven maybe we don't even
want to take it to the to the a minor
afterwards maybe we don't want to
resolve it right away maybe we just want
to introduce this chord into a chord
progression to kind of find something
cool like maybe like I don't like e
seven
[Music]
and it'll just kind of fit but maybe
sound a little bit different so this is
also a really great way to just explore
chords from other keys and maybe
introduce them into chord progressions
that you're maybe get a little bit bored
with so secondary dominance big fan
really start kind of just seeing how
things move a fifth away I'll actually
link you to a video I did in the circle
of fifths which i think is really good
companion video to using this because
unless you just see the fifth of every
chord or every note it really opens up a
lot of just a lot of different
possibilities that you might want to add
to your playing even if it's chords if
it's some peji O's and it's lead stuff
down to seven chords really do have an
awesome tension and release thing that
you can use in your own songwriting
compositions so hopefully you learned a
little bit and if you have any questions
hit me up in the comment section
Instagram Twitter or the website and
I'll talk to y'all see you - thanks a
lot
you're second very dominant so today we
learn about secondary dominance because
it's a pretty cool sounding thing
that'll make you sound smart if you know
you're talking about and we're going to
use this as an example
[Music]
so what is a secondary dominant first we
have to know what a dominant chord is
and I will link you to a video that goes
more in-depth for that but basically
this is all about creating tension and
release okay so what a dominant seven
chord does is it kind of takes you in a
direction that makes you want to resolve
on the one chord so we're using the key
C everybody's favorite key and the one
chord is C so you just count through the
alphabet to find where the dominant
chord is it is always on the five so
cdefg
alright so if we have a G down to seven
chord
that's gonna just sit out in space to
make everybody uncomfortable until we
released that tension was the with the
one chord okay so really important
distinction you make from that five
chord to the one chord down to seven to
the root key chord or the tonic as
you'll sometimes hear called alright but
what if I told you there was a secondary
dominant and it's a really versatile
kind of thing that you can use if maybe
you want to take a composition or an
arrangement somewhere like if you're
having trouble writing a progression
that always wants to come back to see it
in the key of C you can't avoid this
this is a really good thing to learn
because you can actually go outside of a
Kia grab someone else's dominant a
secondary dominant to kind of move a
piece somewhere all right so a secondary
dominant is any dominant seven chord
that is taking you somewhere that is not
the root chord all right not the one
chord so if we're driving this chord
progression somewhere and what a tasty
chord progression indeed they were
driving it it isn't a g7 to a Cu
we can start incorporating these
secondary dominance right one of the
most common ones that you will see is
the secondary dominant of the sixth
chord so again come through that
alphabet c d e f g a a minor it's a very
important chord in the key of c so we
might have a use in taking a progression
to in a minor so the way we find out a
minor is dominant is just to count
through a ABCDE
okay so ii would be the dominant chord
for a minor now ii seven is like that
okay
2nd fret a string 1st fret on the g
string
thing else is open now the reason this
doesn't actually belong in the key of C
is because if you look at my pointer
finger is right here that's that a G
sharp that G sharp isn't in the key of C
so technically it doesn't belong there
but there's not the technical about how
tasty this Jam is of event this East
seven is leading us to a minor okay you
can hear a little bit of tension a
little bit of release so you can kind of
start driving a progression in a certain
direction and it's all about finding the
dominant chord for any of these other
chords in a key so like you've said
before in other videos every key has six
main chords one two three four five six
the one four and five chords are major
chords is two three and six chords or
minor chords alright so the chords in
the key of C are C major D minor E minor
F major G major a minor I don't want to
hear anything about this B minor 7 flat
5 chord because I'm not talking about it
so any of those other chords as other
main chords in the key can have a
secondary dominant it kind of leaves you
that direction because sometimes it's
hard to maybe hone in on a certain chord
other than the one chord or maybe even
like the sixth chord in a chord
progression so this is a really cool way
that you can maybe go outside of a key
just maybe in passing and grab a
different chord that'll lead you there
and it's all about counting to five from
whichever chord you're looking at and
then throwing a dominant seven chord
voicing on that to lead you to the
chords you're looking at alright so back
to that original chord progression that
we had we started and just a really
average way going to the five chord in
the key of C which is g7 this is right
here it's just a G major Barre chord
with your pinkie up it gives you a G
seven and that's going to lead us to a
CD I played a C major seven because I'm
og so we've got g7 to see you let me go
Esau a minor alright so in between
tension release a different type of
tension and release now the next part I
want to go to I want to go to the four
chord all right so c d e f we said that
was major
so f major is gonna be the next chord
we're going to go to you now we want to
find the dominant chord
that'll point us to F sometimes you'll
hear this referred to as a target chord
F being our target chord how do we hit
that target and kind of drive it towards
that it's count five F G a B C okay now
again I'm just kind of like coming
through as letters in the key of F
there'd be B flat but essentially you
can just use this almost as a shortcut
right so c7 would be the chord that
leads us to F as a target all right now
I'm gonna choose to play this c7 right
here all right I've got routing on the
eighth fret the C on the low E string
middle finger seven a with my index
finger
eight D with my ring finger and 9 G with
my pinkie really cool dominant seven
chord voicing so we're also using
different board voices to kind of jump
around here now after this I can go to
an F chord and I'm gonna go to the F
major seven which is rooted on the
eighth fret of a string you could easily
take this to a different type of that
board you used every type of c7 for
doesn't matter which voicing you use I'm
just kind of using these as an example
you can really use whatever you want
alright so again start from the top we
got g7 to c e7
see seven death now we're gonna go right
here
d7 right but see this chord voicing
before again does not belong in the key
of C yeah but where does D lead you to
what is D a fifth of you can kind of
fill in some blanks count backwards but
again we're going to a G so G ABCD a lot
of times it can be confusing when you're
first trying to pair these chords
together once you start doing it a few
times it'll just become second nature
kind of seeing the v away from a chord
because again once you kind of get this
down you can almost start guessing where
chord progressions are going in
different songs all right
so we really have four courts you know
we can even think of this as like a four
chord progression C major a minor F
major G major really a super basic key
of C chord progression it would be a one
six four five chord progression but we
can really kind of just mess it up and
get nasty with it
by adding those secondary dominance
again the first one is just the regular
Dominator primary dominant but once you
start adding those secondary diamond is
he really gives it a lot of a lot of
flavor which is what makes it such a
tasty tasty groove so we've got the g7
to c g7 to a c7 c7 to G we can even play
around with different board voicings
however you want to do it this is kind
of rolling around grabbing these seven
cords from different keys and then just
using them temporarily yeah because
again you know now all of these cars are
always gonna fit together so it's kind
of a really creative exercises you can
do to start kind of sewing them together
patching together your own cool chord
progressions and I think using secondary
dominance is a really cool way to do it
and there's kind of a side note from
that is maybe you want maybe if you
really like the sound of one secondary
dominant you can almost think of just
using it as a bio record again a really
popular wanna is using the secondary
dominant for the six chord so an a minor
said that was seven maybe we don't even
want to take it to the to the a minor
afterwards maybe we don't want to
resolve it right away maybe we just want
to introduce this chord into a chord
progression to kind of find something
cool like maybe like I don't like e
seven
[Music]
and it'll just kind of fit but maybe
sound a little bit different so this is
also a really great way to just explore
chords from other keys and maybe
introduce them into chord progressions
that you're maybe get a little bit bored
with so secondary dominance big fan
really start kind of just seeing how
things move a fifth away I'll actually
link you to a video I did in the circle
of fifths which i think is really good
companion video to using this because
unless you just see the fifth of every
chord or every note it really opens up a
lot of just a lot of different
possibilities that you might want to add
to your playing even if it's chords if
it's some peji O's and it's lead stuff
down to seven chords really do have an
awesome tension and release thing that
you can use in your own songwriting
compositions so hopefully you learned a
little bit and if you have any questions
hit me up in the comment section
Instagram Twitter or the website and
I'll talk to y'all see you - thanks a
lot
About this Video
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Apr 21, 2026 Last updated
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