Hey Friend,
Now that we've reached G major, all three of the major chords in the key of C major have been accounted for. We now have the I chord, C major, the IV chord, F major and the V chord, G major. Countless Rock songs have been created using just these three chords.
For clarification, I don't necessarily mean the C, F and G major chords. What I'm talking about are the I, IV and V chords. When you can pick these chords out from any key, you're able to reproduce any progression using these chords that you'll encounter.
The great thing about chords is you can use them in any order you want when creating progressions. While there are plenty of formulas you can follow, you don't have to when you're coming up with your own stuff.
With that said, formulas that have stood the test of time tend to be more pleasing to humans in general, so if you want your stuff to be aesthetically pleasing and heard, sticking to a general formula isn't such a bad idea. You can always experiment once you have a foundation in place (your basic song structure).
Our ears are tuned really well to hear things that our brains expect to happen. Ever notice when you're listening to some new music that you can anticipate what the next note might be? Part of this is because these patterns have been ingrained in our brains over time.
The other part is that our brains are wired to expect certain combinations of pitches when they're heard together. When something different happens, it's either a pleasant surprise, or our brain immediately knows something went sour in the note selection.
Kinda like that, but in a song, we know when a wrong note is played. On the other hand, if the note belongs in the key or there's a modulation (a key change) to another key and the note fits, our brains are not only cool with it, they enjoy the surprise.
I've taken all the chords we've learned so far and put them together in some simple progressions. I'd like you to pay particular attention to each chord fingering. Notice how easy it is to move your middle and ring fingers between the C, F and G chords. Also notice that your index finger is ready when needed - there's no mass fingering change to get to the next chord in most cases.
Being efficient in your chord changes enables you to make cleaner, faster shifts, and frees you up for other creative flourishes if you're into that. Efficiency is also good when you are working on complicated fingerpicking music.
Work on the exercises, get your fingers comfortable with the chord changes. See you tomorrow.
Peace~
Dave
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