Here are some exercises that will help you develop your songwriting technique.

1. Taking one of the chord exercises that you have written in Songwriting Using a Major Key in the Keys, Scales and Chords section, try replacing (substituting) one of the chords in your exercise with a 7th chord.

Here is an example:

Original exercise
C / / / Dm / / / G / / / C / / /

With substituted chords
C / / / Dm7 / / / G / / / Cma7 / / /

2. Select any number of the chords below and arrange them in any order making your own chord progression. Use any of the chords more than once if you like and write them down on a piece of paper so they are easy to read.

C, Cmaj7, C7, Dm, Dm7, Em, Em7, F, Fma7, F7, G, G7, Am, Am7

Be adventurous with your strumming patterns, and try to create:

• A bluesy sounding track.
• A fast rock or metal track.
• A nice slow ballad