Hey Friend,

There are all sorts of things we can do with the chords from the key of A minor/C major, and there are plenty of songs that will attest to that fact.

Remember House of the Rising Sun (The Animals)?  How about Stairway to Heaven (Led Zeppelin)? Wild World (Cat Stevens)?

All these were written in the key of A minor, and they all start out using an A minor chord. 

Now even though they are in a particular key, that doesn't mean you are limited to only the chords that fit within that key. Many interesting progressions are created by altering one of the chords from the key, changing it from minor to major.

For example, in "House of the Rising Sun," the chord progression starts like this:

Do you notice something? The D chord is not from the key of A minor. Here are our standard chords:

Dm has been altered to D to allow the progression to create the feel they were going after.

I'd like to go into this a bit more, but unfortunately, I've got to get myself to work. Sorry for the short one... it's been a bit of a crazy morning! 

Until tomorrow...

Peace~

Dave