SONGCRAFT TOOLBOX

Stop guessing which chords come next—and start building progressions that inspire songs.

The Songcraft Toolbox: Creating Chord Progressions for Your Songs is a practical songwriting reference designed to help you understand, build, modify, and expand chord progressions without getting buried in unnecessary music theory.

Whether you’re starting a new song from scratch, stuck using the same familiar chords, or simply looking for new harmonic ideas, The Songcraft Toolbox gives you a collection of charts, guides, and proven techniques you can actually use while writing.

Inside, you’ll learn how chords work together within a key, how the Roman numeral system makes progressions transferable to any key, and how some of the most commonly used major and minor chord progressions are constructed.

But the book doesn’t stop at memorizing progressions.

You’ll learn how to change them, rearrange them, build your own, and move beyond the diatonic chords by experimenting with borrowed chords, alternatives, substitutions, and added chord color.

You’ll also explore how chord progressions interact with song structure—from verses and pre-choruses to choruses, bridges, breakdowns, and outros—and why the same four chords can become completely different songs once rhythm, timing, melody, dynamics, and arrangement enter the picture.

Inside The Songcraft Toolbox:

• Major and minor diatonic chord reference charts
• Commonly used major and minor chord progressions
• The Roman numeral system explained practically
• Song structure and common section arrangements
• Borrowed chords and ways to expand beyond the key
• Major and relative-minor Songcraft charts
• A Common Chord Movement Guide for building your own progressions
• Ways to add color with 7ths, 9ths, suspended chords, add9s, and more
• A practical system for turning all of these tools into original song ideas
• Free printable versions of the charts and guides

This isn’t a book of rules telling you what you must play.

It’s a toolbox designed to answer one of the most useful questions a songwriter can ask:

“What could I try next?”

Pick a key. Pick a chord. Follow an idea. Change something. Listen.

And when something sounds good—keep going.

Every song starts somewhere. This book gives you a better place to start.