Emotional Piano Chord Progressions

Emotional piano chord progressions let one voice move while the others hold: the canon with a falling bass, a minor staircase, the suspended cadence, the major line cliché and a two-chord float. Free and with nothing to install, Veena's CoProducer, a personal music producer in your browser, plays them on a sampled grand piano.

Piano and keys are among the instruments new users name most often in their first request to CoProducer, in Veena's own data. These five progressions are where a solo piano piece starts.

Five emotional piano chord progressions, hand by hand

Remembering: the canon with a falling bass (Eb major, 66 BPM)

Eb – Bb/D – Cm – Gm/Bb – Ab – Eb/G – Ab – Bb, one chord per bar

I – V/7 – vi – iii/5 – IV – I/3 – IV – V, where the number after a slash is the bass note's scale degree

• Left hand: Eb2, D2, C2, Bb1, Ab1, G1, then back up to Ab1 and Bb1, as broken octaves.
• Right hand: G3–Bb3–Eb4, F3–Bb3–D4, G3–C4–Eb4, G3–Bb3–D4, Ab3–C4–Eb4, G3–Bb3–Eb4, Ab3–C4–Eb4, F3–Bb3–D4, rolled slowly from the bottom.

The chords are the ones everybody knows, but the inversions turn the bass into a scale walking down, one step per bar. Your ear follows that line like a memory unspooling. The last two chords turn round and climb, Ab to Bb, to set up the next pass.

Grief: the minor staircase (A minor, 60 BPM)

Am – Em/G – F – C/E – Dm – Am/C – Bm7b5 – E

i – v/b7 – bVI – bIII/5 – iv – i/b3 – iiø7 – V

• Left hand: A2, G2, F2, E2, D2, C2, B1, then E2, a stepwise descent of nearly an octave.
• Right hand: C4–E4–A4, B3–E4–G4, A3–C4–F4, G3–C4–E4, F3–A3–D4, E3–A3–C4, F3–A3–D4, E3–G#3–B3.

This is the canon's minor mirror. Each chord sinks a step, and the half-diminished Bm7b5 darkens the bottom of the stairs before E major, with its G#, pulls you back up to Am to start again.

Longing: the suspended cadence (D major, 72 BPM)

Bm7 – Gadd9 – D/F# – Asus4 – A

vi7 – IVadd9 – I/3 – Vsus4 – V

• Left hand: B2, G2, F#2, then A2 for the last two chords.
• Right hand: D4–F#4–A4, B3–D4–G4–A4, D4–F#4–A4, D4–E4–A4, C#4–E4–A4.

A stays on top of every chord: the seventh of Bm7, the ninth of Gadd9, the fifth of D/F#, the root of A. Beneath it, D holds through four chords and only falls to C# at the very end, when the sus4 finally resolves. That long wait is the longing.

Nostalgia: the major line cliché (C major, 70 BPM)

C – Cmaj7 – C7 – F – Fm – C

I – Imaj7 – I7 – IV – iv – I

• Left hand: C3 for the first three chords, F2 for the next two, then C3.
• Right hand: E4–G4–C5, E4–G4–B4, E4–G4–Bb4, C4–F4–A4, C4–F4–Ab4, C4–E4–G4.

The top voice falls a half step at a time, C, B, Bb, A, Ab, G, while everything else barely moves. The Ab in Fm is borrowed from C minor, and it's the moment the memory turns bittersweet.

Stillness: the two-chord float (E major, 80 BPM)

Emaj7 – Amaj7, two bars each

Imaj7 – IVmaj7

• Left hand: E2–B2 as an open fifth, then A2–E3.
• Right hand: G#3–B3–D#4, then G#3–C#4–E4, arpeggiated in slow 8ths.

G# rings through both chords, and the other two notes move up a step and back down. Nothing resolves, nothing hurries, and that's the point: a bed for a melody, a voice or a long reverb tail.

Play them in Veena

Open daw.veena.studio, sign in with Google and paste the first progression as a whole piece:

Make an emotional solo piano piece in Eb major at 66 BPM, 16 bars, Acoustic Grand Piano only. One chord per bar: Eb – Bb/D – Cm – Gm/Bb – Ab – Eb/G – Ab – Bb, played twice. The left hand walks down Eb–D–C–Bb–Ab–G, then climbs Ab–Bb, in broken octaves; the right hand plays slow arpeggios, with a simple melody that rises the second time through. Start soft, build to the loudest chord in bar 13, then fall away, and end on Eb instead of Bb in the last bar.

CoProducer returns three performances of the part. Choose the one whose left hand walks most smoothly, then double-click the clip to open the piano roll and play pianist:

• Pedal it by hand. Stretch the right-hand notes until each one overlaps the next chord, which rings like a held sustain pedal.
• Shape the phrase. In the velocity editor, draw a slow rise to bar 13 and a fall afterwards.
• Open the voicing. Select a chord's top note and press Ctrl/Cmd+↑ to lift it an octave for the climax.

Want a melody over it? The melody generator writes one against the chords you kept. For a pianist who plays the whole part from a sentence, see the AI pianist.

What drains the emotion out

• Block chords on every beat. Emotional piano breathes in arpeggios and held notes, not pounding triads.
• Both hands in the middle. Chords crowded around middle C blur. Low, open left hand; right hand above it.
• Flat dynamics. One loud chord per phrase matters more than any voicing.
• Rushing the changes. A chord per bar at 60 to 80 BPM gives each harmony time to land.

For heavier, more hopeless harmony, go to sad chord progressions; to take the same shapes to a full orchestra, try epic chord progressions, and find more in the chord progression generator.