Bridge over Troubled Water – Intro
Bridge over Troubled Water – Verse
Bridge over Troubled Water – Pre-Chorus
Bridge over Troubled Water – Chorus
Related Music Concepts
Inverted Chords
Using a different bass note to change a chord's sound
Diminished Chords
A chord built from stacked minor thirds — dark and unstable
Half-Diminished Chords
A diminished triad with a minor seventh on top — softer than fully diminished
Seventh Chords
Adding one more note to the basic chords
Secondary Chords
Chords that temporarily shift the harmonic center
Altered Chords
Altered (raised or lowered) notes create tension and complexity in chords
Borrowed Chords
Using chords from parallel modes for contrast and emotion
Bassline Motion
How much the bass moves stepwise between chord roots
Suspended Chords
A chord with built in tension and release
Song Stats
●
Key
E♭ Major
Tempo
83 BPM
Meter
4/4
Genre
Rock, Pop, Folk
Melody Range
Eb3 – G5
Mood
Smooth, Complex, Unexpected, Bright
Most Used Chord
I
Chord Complexity
75
Chord Complexity: Tracks when a song goes beyond simple three-note chords—either by adding extra tones (like 7ths or add9s) or by borrowing notes from outside the key—creating richer, more sophisticated harmonies.
Melodic Complexity
38
Melodic Complexity: Reflects two factors: the use of notes outside the key and rhythmic syncopation, together capturing how intricate or surprising a melody feels.
Chord-Melody Tension
10
Chord-Melody Tension: Quantifies how often melody notes fall outside the current chord, producing dissonance that creates a sense of instability.
Chord Prog. Novelty
83
Chord Prog. Novelty: Measures how uncommon a song's chord changes are compared to others in the Hooktheory database, highlighting progressions that deviate from typical patterns.
Song Stats
●
Key
E♭ Major
Tempo
82 BPM
Meter
4/4
Genre
Rock, Pop, Folk
Melody Range
Eb3 – Eb4
Mood
Smooth, Bright
Most Used Chord
I
Chord Complexity
40
Chord Complexity: Tracks when a song goes beyond simple three-note chords—either by adding extra tones (like 7ths or add9s) or by borrowing notes from outside the key—creating richer, more sophisticated harmonies.
Melodic Complexity
55
Melodic Complexity: Reflects two factors: the use of notes outside the key and rhythmic syncopation, together capturing how intricate or surprising a melody feels.
Chord-Melody Tension
10
Chord-Melody Tension: Quantifies how often melody notes fall outside the current chord, producing dissonance that creates a sense of instability.
Chord Prog. Novelty
38
Chord Prog. Novelty: Measures how uncommon a song's chord changes are compared to others in the Hooktheory database, highlighting progressions that deviate from typical patterns.
Concepts
Song Stats
●
Key
E♭ Major
Tempo
83 BPM
Meter
4/4
Genre
Rock, Pop, Folk
Melody Range
Eb3 – G4
Mood
Smooth, Unexpected, Bright
Most Used Chord
V
Chord Complexity
60
Chord Complexity: Tracks when a song goes beyond simple three-note chords—either by adding extra tones (like 7ths or add9s) or by borrowing notes from outside the key—creating richer, more sophisticated harmonies.
Melodic Complexity
7
Melodic Complexity: Reflects two factors: the use of notes outside the key and rhythmic syncopation, together capturing how intricate or surprising a melody feels.
Chord-Melody Tension
18
Chord-Melody Tension: Quantifies how often melody notes fall outside the current chord, producing dissonance that creates a sense of instability.
Chord Prog. Novelty
64
Chord Prog. Novelty: Measures how uncommon a song's chord changes are compared to others in the Hooktheory database, highlighting progressions that deviate from typical patterns.
Song Stats
●
Key
E♭ Major
Tempo
84 BPM
Meter
4/4
Genre
Rock, Pop, Folk
Melody Range
G3 – G4
Mood
Smooth, Unexpected, Bright
Most Used Chord
IV
Chord Complexity
69
Chord Complexity: Tracks when a song goes beyond simple three-note chords—either by adding extra tones (like 7ths or add9s) or by borrowing notes from outside the key—creating richer, more sophisticated harmonies.
Melodic Complexity
41
Melodic Complexity: Reflects two factors: the use of notes outside the key and rhythmic syncopation, together capturing how intricate or surprising a melody feels.
Chord-Melody Tension
11
Chord-Melody Tension: Quantifies how often melody notes fall outside the current chord, producing dissonance that creates a sense of instability.
Chord Prog. Novelty
77
Chord Prog. Novelty: Measures how uncommon a song's chord changes are compared to others in the Hooktheory database, highlighting progressions that deviate from typical patterns.
Song Stats
●
Key
E♭ Major
Tempo
83 BPM
Meter
4/4
Genre
Rock, Pop, Folk
Melody Range
Eb3 – G5
Mood
Smooth, Unexpected, Bright
Most Used Chord
I
Chord Complexity
62
Chord Complexity: Tracks when a song goes beyond simple three-note chords—either by adding extra tones (like 7ths or add9s) or by borrowing notes from outside the key—creating richer, more sophisticated harmonies.
Melodic Complexity
28
Melodic Complexity: Reflects two factors: the use of notes outside the key and rhythmic syncopation, together capturing how intricate or surprising a melody feels.
Chord-Melody Tension
10
Chord-Melody Tension: Quantifies how often melody notes fall outside the current chord, producing dissonance that creates a sense of instability.
Chord Prog. Novelty
68
Chord Prog. Novelty: Measures how uncommon a song's chord changes are compared to others in the Hooktheory database, highlighting progressions that deviate from typical patterns.
About Bridge over Troubled Water
About the Key
E♭ Major
It is the 7th most popular key among Major keys and the 11st most popular among all keys. Major keys, along with minor keys, are a common choice for popular songs.
I IV V
Most Important Chords
The three most important chords, built off the 1st, 4th and 5th scale degrees are all major chords (E♭ Major, A♭ Major, and B♭ Major).
E♭ Major Cheat Sheet
Popular chords, progressions, downloadable MIDI files and more
About the Chord Progressions
| Section | Progression | Songs with this progression |
|---|---|---|
| Intro |
I64
V
IV
V42
vii°/V
vi42
I64
|
No other theorytabs with this progression |
| Verse |
I
IV64
|
|
| Pre-Chorus |
I
V6
vi7
V7
I
iii64
vii°64/IV
|
No other theorytabs with this progression |
| Chorus |
IV
V42
vii°/V
vi42
I64
V7sus4/ii
IV
|
No other theorytabs with this progression |
About the Melody
Melody data is compiled from all analyzed melody sections, so depending on how a user analyzed a song, "melody" might include instrumental notes.
Eb3 – G5
Melody range across 28 semitones
1.20 beats/note
Across 128.0 beats of melody
Stepwise Motion
Jumpiness
Repeaty
99%
Diatonic
Percentage of notes within the song's key.
75%
Chord Tones
Percentage of notes that fall on a chord tone of the underlying harmony.
Edgy
Consonance
How smoothly the melody blends with the harmony (0 = dissonant, 1 = consonant).
Loose
Syncopation
How often the melody emphasizes off-beats. Higher = more syncopated.
About the Metrics
Chord Complexity
Chord Complexity tracks when a song goes beyond simple three-note chords—either by adding extra tones (like 7ths or add9s) or by borrowing notes from outside the key—creating richer, more sophisticated harmonies.
Melodic Complexity
Melodic Complexity reflects two factors: the use of notes outside the key and rhythmic syncopation, together capturing how intricate or surprising a melody feels.
Chord-Melody Tension
Chord-Melody Tension quantifies how often melody notes fall outside the current chord, producing dissonance that creates a sense of instability.
Chord Progression Novelty
Chord Progression Novelty measures how uncommon a song's chord changes are compared to others in the Hooktheory database, highlighting progressions that deviate from typical patterns.
Chord-Bass Melody
Chord–Bass Melody evaluates how smoothly the bass moves between chords, scoring higher when it travels step-wise, ascending or descending, instead of jumping directly between root position chords.
Hooktheory's metrics are calculated against the entire database of analyzed songs, where 50 is the "average song." Learn more about each of these metrics here.
Chord Complexity
62
Measures how diverse and sophisticated the chord vocabulary is in this song.
Percentile: 62/100 — above average
Melodic Complexity
28
Measures the range, intervallic variety, and rhythmic complexity of the melody.
Percentile: 28/100 — below average
Chord-Melody Tension
10
Measures how much the melody notes clash or harmonize with the underlying chords.
Percentile: 10/100 — below average
Chord Prog. Novelty
68
Measures how unusual or unexpected the chord progressions are compared to common patterns.
Percentile: 68/100 — above average
Chord-Bass Melody
82
Measures the melodic movement of the bass notes across chord changes.
Percentile: 82/100 — above average
Song Data
Metrics Radar Chart
Bridge over Troubled WaterAverage Song
BPM Comparison
Melody Distribution
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Melodic Intervals
Distribution of note-to-note jumps in semitones (negative = downward, positive = upward)
Note Durations
How long each note is held (in beats)
Syncopation
How many notes fall on each level of metric strength (0 = on-beat, higher = increasingly off-beat)
Level 0
Notes that fall on the downbeat — the strongest metric position in the measure.
Level 1
Notes on a secondary strong beat (e.g. beat 3 in 4/4) — still firmly on the grid.
Level 2
Notes on the remaining primary beats (2 and 4 in 4/4) — moderate metric weight.
Level 3
Notes on eighth-note offbeats — between the primary beats. Audibly syncopated.
