Music Theory Lecture: How To Use Modulations Part 1 

For the level of education i am receiving through the internet.. Some pay 1000's ... This man is doing the world such a service i wish there was some way he could receive more recognition for it

This channel is a musical gold mine

I started watching this channel after 10 years of playing rock guitar. Each video was exploding my head at first, but after each month I was methodically studying them, I understood more and more. Right now I feel like I'm on a completely different level as a musician, knowing all these concepts is liberating. I cannot thank you enough for that, Rick.

I love it even more because of bloopers)

Rick, watching this video in 2023 is such an amazing experience. Sure, your production value today is much better, along with editing. But there is something so endearing about seeing your mistakes, it humanizes it and I can relate to it. Love the content.

this channel is amazing, the teacher is great, and you HAVE to love the bloopers! hahaha he does an error and he starts talking again about it like he will edit the video later, BUT HE DOESN'T EDIT ALMOS AT ALL! hahahahaha, you sir are a wise musician but also have a great sense of humor and great sense of being fine and relax about yourself! it's always very important for me that a teacher shows this in action, we can't take ourselves too serious all the time! thank you for your gret work.

This is a very common occurrence: Sees Rick Beato video from 1-2 yrs ago, clicks on it, 3 mins in, have learnt something new... pause video, click like button. Video gets it's own tab in my browser until I have thoroughly gone through it and understood everything. There is so much I have missed and so far something to take from every video. Love it!

When I watched Rick's videos, I can't understand anything. I stepped back, learn the basic, back to it, stil don't get it, learn some more, back to it and repeat, and finally I understand what he is talking about. Learning music is one of my goal in life. To all who still doesn't understand Rick's videos, don't give up. Keep on learning. Sorry about the rant.

Dear Rick, you probably do not see this comment, but I want to say thanks. Thanks for all the amazing lessons you have. You are my biggest resource for new things. I can not thank you enough. Please keep doing this.

While the majority of the theory videos I am watching here are vastly over my head I am still able to glean valuable and fascinating insight into the "end goal" of my theory study and practice. I am glad I found your channel. Thank you for the motivating me to keep progressing and studying.

on some levels im sad it took me until a year or two ago to find you. On the other hand, im so grateful that i have your entire catalogue to sift through up until this point. I can't say it enough rick, thank you, you're too good to us!

Rick this is an incredible musical education that you provide us musicians for free it never ceases to amaze me what I learn from your videos you have a true god-given talent to teach What I also really like is when you demonstrate the changes on the piano you sit on the cords for a couple seconds each so that it registers in our minds what the change is most people blow through it and you allow the musician to hear the changes to understand I think that's critical

Simply the best, my brother. For the self-taught players who only know their craft 'by ear' you explain what we hear and feel. That allows us to communicate in our universal language.

This is exactly the material and explanation I have been searching for! Thank you for providing this video Rick that was very well explained

Hey, Rick, when you started talking about Suspensions at around 6:40, the chord series you played (to demonstrate this method) were soooo beautiful! So emotional! So powerful! Amazing!

Oh my! Such good info. What I like best, are the "uncut" scenes. :)

Rick, I want to tell you how much I appreciate your videos. They are helping me tremendously. I've been playing piano for decades mostly by ear. I can read music, but I can't sight read. Your tutorials are filling the wholes of my experience and bringing my musicianship up to a higher level and more marketable. Thanksgiving giving is next week. And I say THANK YOU for sharing your very valuable knowledge. Blessings to you and your family. Cynthia (Cyndi)🍂🎶🍂🎶🍂🎶🍂🎼🍂🎼

This is definitely one of the rougher edits, but the content is still just so damn good.

Mr. Beato, this video is hilarious! Your edits are too funny. Regarding the information it contains, priceless!!! Thank u!

Thank you again for your lessons Rick and for free! Some of these modulations I've never used! Very excited to try them out!

I really love this topic. I applied this and second dominant chords and played for my friends and I noticed their reaction to my playing was alot different. They said the song had more of a journey

Note: at 5:15 Rick erroneously calls Bm the ii chord, he later affirms it as the iii chord in 5:54. Apparently because the 2 commonly shared chords being Bm and Em (where the transition starts happening/the beginning of the modulation), and Em being the ii chord (predominant) of the new key is how he made this simple mixup. He remained correct however in calling Bm the Relative Minor to the new key, the vi of DMaj. Not that Em also being a Relative Minor to GMaj couldn’t have added to the muddle. Just wanted to clear this up for any new viewers because it also threw me for a loop at first. Just shows what a conundrum Modulation is when even the masters make mistakes lol

Rick! I sent this vid to my mom, my bass player, and a couple others! Love this man! It’s like I get to go to music school for free! If I wasn’t a musician I would pay you for this man! 😂 🤭😭🤣

This man is a genius Im learning everything I wanted to learn about music in his channel. THANK YOU!!

This video is fantastic and so simple to understand. Modulation has always puzzled me, but now I think I have a better grasp of it. Time to put this into practice :) Thanks for sharing your knowledge Rick. It's very much appreciated.

Really amazing exposition. This channel helped me improve tremendously as an amateur self-taught musician and I am very grateful. .

Thank you so much, Rick. Your lectures are golden, and a gift to humanity. When I become rich and famous, I will be better able to compensate. My dad was a prof musician w Lawrence Welk years ago, and if I showed him this he would be happy and grateful. Thanks again, and long live music!

You have the best music theory channel on RU-vid, thank you so so much ❤

Thank you so much that helped me a lot to figure out which technique I could put on feelings that I like in certain film scores ! Thank you so much for you work !

The keyboard demonstration sound is incredibly sweet! Thank you!

Rick Awesome this deservers more attention for me you are on of the best music teacher I had and i am not even in classroom.

Thank you Rick! Abundant blessings to you good sir, I appreciate you.

Interesting lesson showing how nicely you can switch keys.Few sus chords and melody becomes so much more interesting.Thank you Rick again.

Thank you so much for this vid, Rick! We owe you so much :D

Thanks for sharing your vast knowledge Rick.

Rick you're an absolute legend. Great lesson

Great! Thank you for solving things out in our heads!

the bloopers are so funny, great video, one of the most useful

You're the best rick !!!! You're something else !!

Brilliant stuff! Thanks Rick.

Just want to say thanks, Rick. Blessings to you in 2019.

Thank you so much Rick as usual! Good night!

Love the education value of this channel thank you 😊

Very good stuff Rick. I have just posted some improvisation where I apply some of the concepts you explain so well. I have a classical background, and i really feel you deliver fantastic value.

rick always made great videos

I actually recently got another one to add to this list (from 12tone). Augmented 7th (ie V+ of harmonic minor) introduces a tritone that leads you to a major/minor key. Since the Aug is isomorphic, you can move to one of three keys off it (similar to the Enharmonic Dim7 trick)

Even though much that Rick speaks about I playing guitar drums guitar mainly last five six years and watched a lot of RU-vid people and learned a lot but Rick's channel and Rick himself is just a music educational goldmine at someone else said pretty much said the same thing somewhere I think it was this one but in any event or anyways just keep on doing what you're doing Rick it's working out great for me I'm sure for many other people as well peace

Once again a lovely lesson !

Great teaching AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN THANK YOU

Thank you Rick

I have found it very helpful in the past to use all the described modulations and just create exercises where I would repeat the modulation in the new key. IE if I did the G to D major, I would continue the exact structure restarting on D major and go toward A major. than E, B, etc etc till you eventually get back to G. Obviously some of the types of modulations would require an addition in order to repeat it as a sequence in the same fashion. Thanks for your channel btw. I have been looking to escape tonal music for a little over a year now as almost everything tonal has become too predictable to my ears and has created a musical "rut" for me! I am very thankful on your videos on modern techniques as that is what I really crave now.

Thank u só Very much! Obrigado!

Excellent lecture on modulations.

At each chord change I "hear" and feel the marvellous Parsifal ...

Wow! What a good video!!!

I love you man! Thank you so much 😊

Lots of perfect 4th and Maj. 2nd root movement, though not exclusively. Vocabulary is the key to knowledge in most any field of study.

Dang just the demonstration on the keyboard of modulating between G and D sounds great

love this!!!

Somehow I feel I need to thank you in advance....At times in the past even being complimented for wroks I have produced or composed theorictically I was a little in the dark and couldn't explain what was going on in the composition...I think your videos will help with that... again thanks...!!

Love those modulations

In Norway we call the "deceptive cadence" a "disappointing cadence" :0)

The best channel of youtube !!!!!

Thank you, once again.

If you turn subtitles on, it announces Rick's name at the beginning of the video as Rigby Otto haha Great video. Finally clears up all the questions I've been having.

5:17 is confusing me. B minor is the iii chord of the key of G, and the vi chord of the key of D, but Rick calls it the ii chord. At 5:55 Rick calls B minor the iii chord, maybe I should watch it all before I comment. I have now watched it all. As with many of Rick's videos the length of play is between a 1/4 and 1/3 of the amount of time that it takes to watch and understand, then there is all the note-taking to do as well. This one pushed me a bit, and I feel better for that. At one point in my struggles I even felt a tiny bit guilty about some of the 'I don't need to know theory man' guitar players who have been pinned against a wall and screamed at by me as I try to teach them some very basic theory, but that feeling of guilt soon passed. Thanks for all that you do for us Rick, it is much appreciated, I wish you all the best and long may you continue.

More enlightening demos thanks

Incredible!

"Rigby Otto" Closed captions are amazing

I had beginning theory (circle of 5ths) along with my early piano lessions, but never advanced far beyond that. I've heard these chord progressions in classical music and never knew they were modulations. I thought a modulation was just going a half step up or down as in pop music. LOL. This is fascinating--it really gives me a new appreciation of musicianship. My only regret is that I'll never have enough time in my life to watch all your videos.

Good video, keep it up!

yelling over the strings “SUS 4 WITH A THIRD”

can i double like..... This is probably one of the key lectures for me.

thank you for this video Rigby Otto

Great lesson Mr. B. My closed captions call you Rigby Otto. lol

I would love to see this tutorial in different genres, such as Bossa Nova, Smooth Jazz, Neo Soul or Pop.

Thanks Rick

I loved the song you played around 7:30. It was heavenly. And I'm high, lol.

I'd love to see you break down some modern songs in these terms to show what kind of modulation technique they are using and the effect it has. I'm thinking primarily of songs like "You're the Inspiration" by Chicago... Where they modulate from Ab major in the intro, to B major in the verse... Then it's like they mod back through Ab on the way to Eb in the chorus, which then changes to Gb before returning to B for the next verse! Modulations everywhere! ... And my mind wants to understand why it works so well, but I feel like I need your genius to help me with that.

Hello Rick, great video. But one thing i noticed that would be very helpful to us ( viewers). if we somehow could see what you are playing from your point of view, it would be so much easier to understand what are you playing and how are you playing. Some kind of camera or something, i dont know, but thanks for your videos, they are very helpful :)

Rick the Deceptive cadence modulation is not really a deceptive cadence modulation, it is just a deceptive cadence then the confirmation of new modulation, but it did not came from the deceptive cadence at all. it could have come from IIImin to VImin then Bmin7(b5) E7 Amin. I respect you a lot Rick, you are the man, you have an amazing vibe and share so much with every body, we have a lot in common, when I see you is like a mirror, is a strange feeling. BUT a true DECEPTIVE CADENCE MODULATION (if you want to call it that way) would be the concept of a SECONDARY DOMINANT resolving a Whole Step or a Half Step UP resembling the deceptive in major or minor key. Because the way you are presenting it only applies to the VI chord in a key center. If we stick to the model you have been teaching in this video, one can modulate to a diatonic region like modulating from C mayor to; Dmin or Emin or Fmaj or G major or Amin, or can modulate to a chromatic region like you have just presented Dbmajor. So taking the liberty of your own examples we can NOW Modulate from C Major to all this regions just using Diatonic Secondary Dominants: modulate to Db from(C7) or modulate to Dmin from (C7) because it is a true V7 bVI, or V7 VImin. Same with all other diatonic regions. Emi from D7, Emaj from D7 (explained ahead), Fmaj from E7. Gmin or Gmaj from F7 (oh yes it is correct because deceptive cadence to Major chords a whole step above comes from modal mixture (the backdoor progression bVII7 Imaj) so possibilities are endless. I have would love to share at your program if you like how to categorize all regions, there are 4 categories, with 7 modulations on each category. Category 1 being the most light in effect. category 4 the most distant and edgy. what do you think? all the best Rick, thank you for doing all this possible to all people!

Interesting subject Rick! I think though that you forgot to edit the video. Seeing you talking about this makes me wish I was back at the conservatory again and finishing my degree to be a music theory teacher.

Thank you Sir.

a camera above the keyboard would be great ;-)

You're teaching what I learned in 2nd year university theory...this is awesome!

Mr Beato I find your videos really helpful in expanding my musical knowledge. Could you do a video making an arrangement of a popular song that is somewhat complicated so you can teach us certain ways to make a good arrangement. I am still very new to the idea as I am studying music in Berklee. Thank you!

In the Enharmonic Dominant example at around 17:00 I was immediately reminded of Because by The Beatles when the German 6th chord comes in.

Regarding the Enharmonic Dominant explanation, the Augmented 6 chords are built off the #4, not flat 6, and it is always in the first inversion, so the flat 6 is in the bass.

Fantastic

Great stuff and the mistakes left in are a hoot 👍🏻👍🏻

Love it when he gets the whiteboard out. F yeah

Thanks for sharing the knowledge! The only advice I have Is for you to use a simple piano tone. The strings make it harder to hear the differences, for me at least.

I love how he makes a mistake, then starts over again like its going to get edited out, then it doesn't.

Thanks!!!!!!!!!!!!

Many thanks indeed Rick...I will now go and lie down in a darkened room.

I just thought of something cool. So in my homework before I did a modulation from the relative minor back to the same major key by doing a V/vi and VI/vi which is a IV in the major key which I followed with like a ii7 V7 I. I could follow up that VI chord from the deceptive progression in a minor key treating that as a neapolitan 6th chord in the key of the dominant. If you follow the typical baroque thing turning a minor root into its own dominant 7th chord (say A minor to A 7) you can follow that after with Bb/D (the deceptive progression and neapolitan 6th back in the home key), Am/E (i 6 4), and E7 right back in home key of A minor. I'm gonna have to explore a lot more options to figure out interesting ways of modulating.

I love the George Harrison My Sweet Lord modulation, it is so simple yet so very effective and so sweet. Please explain it through Rick?

I appreciate this so much. Can I borrow to teach my students, Rick?

Does Rainbow's "Since You've Been Gone" have modulations? It sounds like the keyboardist is doing something very interesting, or perhaps the keyboardist and guitarist are purposely "clashing" (about halfway through the song, and then again) in order to give the impression that the mood of the song has changed?

Rick why is the II and V chords in the key of Am a dominant ones? The B should be a major chord, right? By the way, congratulations for you work. I founded your chanel some days ago and I'm loving it! Cheers!