Except for the sound mazes that are becoming increasingly popular with the advent of complex composition programs on computers, most songs in Western European Civilization-- a concept that I defend and still consider valid-- with a big future-- are encoded with Roman Numeral chords. Once you understand the secret code, you can do the song and know what you're doing. Knowing what you're doing gives you a big advantage in life because then you can play around the situation and always know how to get back to where you came from. You're grounded. Here is the secret chord code for Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.
I - v - bVII - IV - I
See if you can hear the chord changes and identify when each of the Roman Numeral chords occurs in the song-- they occur repeatedly over and over and over and over and over again. You should be able to get it. This is the longest song ever made.
More discussion of the issue of secret chord codes in
