Hello everyone, I was wondering a few things.

[tonistringz]

Hello everyone.

I was wondering a few things and I also have a few questions.

I want to start off by letting me break down my musical history; so everyone on piano forums can help me and understand where I am coming from.

I was in orchestra for 4yrs, piano and keyboarding 2yrs, music appreciation & theory 2yrs in highschool back in 1996-2000, I am 26 now.

After highschool, I didnt think I was going to use my musical knowledge.

But I am a producer, I have been producing since I was 18 and everyone loves my tracks/beats because I combine my classical elements & a genre of hiphop and I am glad that everyone enjoys my music, but I am also struggling on chord progressions jumping from one chord to another chord, I know there is a billion and one forums in here. I can't seem to find what I am looking for or maybe I'm not looking correctly.

I can produce melodies in minutes but when it comes to jumping from chord to chord I feel that I get stuck maybe there is somethig I am overlooking or not doing, =[.

And if anyone can be so generous and helping a fellow pianist/producer out on hiphop & rnb chord progressions, I'd greatly appreciate it.

[renatog]

Welcome tonistringz,
  I don't think you will find much help here, but I can provide some input.
One thing that you should know - and probably already know - about hip-hop and RnB, is that they don't use too many chords.  Contemporary music has to be simple.  I started down this path of writing contemporary music with a bunch of chords and found that it started getting too complicated and not "catchy" enough.  You should take a look at some RnB songs out there and analyze them.  Most of them are in 4/4, and maybe some 6/4, and rarely in 3/4.
If you know your keys, major/minor scales, you should be OK when constructing a chord progression.  Your music theory background should help you, but if you need to improve your knowledge, check out https://www.musictheory.net and go to Lessons->Common Chord Progressions.
Also look at https://www.learnjazzpiano.com/
You might not be producing Jazz, but you'll find that RnB and most Pop music contains Jazz chord progressions.

Focus on strong progressions, such as I-IV-V-I or V-I or IV-I...
I like using II-V-I (common jazz progression).  I like using seventh chords a lot and some sixth chords, maybe some major 9th too.

Finally, try to do what feels right.  Don't restrict your material to only what you've learned or what is taught.  You won't be the first to use weird chord progressions.  Hell, you can even write a song with only one chord.  It all depends on how you write the song.  I'm glad that you're coming up with your own materials and not sampling like a lot of producers do.

Good Luck

[tonistringz]

Yeah, thanks alot you broke down what I needed in steps which was easy to follow and I like to say thanks on your post because it really help me alot to get me started on the right path of fixing my musical errors.

Lol, I use chord inversions alot on my tracks/beats because I get confused on note matching playing by ear, so I tend to use alot of chord inversions.

Now I just got to freshen up on my roman numerals when it comes to chords.

Yeah, everything I compose and produce I start playing the keys and find my sweet spot and work it from there.

I wrote down your chord progression in my notebook, if you dont mind so I can look over them and practice them and come up with my own variations.

[renatog]

No problem.
As for the roman numerals, I'll give you an example.
Let's take the key of C.  If I were to do a chord progression of ii-V-I, it would be
d minor - G major - C major.
A good thing for you to look at is the chords in a major and minor scale.  Basically you'd be playing the I chord of the key (in this example C major, C-E-G) and go up the scale. (notice that uppercase numerals are Major and lowercase numerals are minor, diminished has a ° symbol next to the lowercase numeral)
The major scale is:
CDEFGABC, so play:
I: CEG (major)
ii: DFA (minor)
iii: EGB (minor)
IV: FAC (major)
V: GBD (major)
vi: ACE (minor)
vii°: BDF (diminished)

You can also try that on a natural minor scale:
F# minor is:
F# G# A B C# D E F#, so play:
i: F#AC# (minor)
ii°: G#BD (diminished)
III: AC#E (major)
iv: BDF# (minor)
v: C#EG# (minor)
VI: DF#A (major)
VII: EG#B (major)

Have fun!

[tonistringz]

Lol, I quickly learned the roman numerals.

And a few major scales at first I was overwhelmed because I was not understanding the roman numerals and I figured out why when I music in class in highschool I was in beginner keyboarding, [LOL].

So, I looked in my piano book from highschool they didnt go over that.

But back to the subject on hand I've been practicing the I, IV, V
on the C scale.

So now the only frustration is jumping from to one chord to another on the keyboard, its like I hesitate, my fingers be like "um' where do I go from here" but practice makes perfect.