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This could be viewed as a II major chord, or you could prefer to see it from the perspective of the C# bass note, which creates a #4, or b5 interval, before moving down to chord IV, which is Cmaj7. It then moves to a non diatonic chord in Aadd9/C#. It actually starts out with the same chords as the verse, before moving to the relative minor of the key signature (Em.) The m11 chords built on the root notes of A and E are still diatonic to G Major, as they do not contain any notes from outside of the scale.

The chorus to “Peg” begins with a really nice diatonic IV I II VI chord progression in the tonic key of G. Secondly, each chord in the traditional blues sequence is prefaced by a Major 7 chord a perfect fourth away in “Peg” – creating a plagal cadence in every bar. Fagan and Becker refer to this specific chord voicing as the mu chord, often signified by μ. The first thing to note is that Fagan & Becker have opted to replace the traditional dominant 7 chords featured above with add9 chords, placing the 3rd in the bass. If we looked at a standard blues progression in the key of G Major, it would look like this:

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This gives us a pattern of the tonic chord, and then a series of strong sounding V-I cadences, a common jazz songwriting technique.Īs stated by Donald Fagan, the verse to “Peg” is fundamentally a blues progression with a couple of twists. If we look at the first instance, the F#7#9 is actually the tritone substitute of the Fmaj9 chord in the next bar, since the V chord of Fmaj9 should be C7. This is then followed by the same maj9 – 7#9 sequence a tone lower (Fmaj9 – E7#9) and then the same chord progression another tone lower (Ebmaj9 – D7#9.) Essentially, what we have here is a series of maj9 descending a tone at a time, connected by altered dominant chords in between. The intro starts on the tonic chord of Gmaj9, before moving to a rather unusual F#7#9 chord.

Here is the scale of G major, harmonised into 3, 4 and 5 note chords: “Peg” is in the key of G major, although it features a number of chords that are non diatonic. First, let’s take a look at the chords that are played in the introduction, which support the brass lines: The easiest way to learn this song is to break it up into sections, and that’s exactly what we’ll do here. Not your standard 4 chord pop song, “Peg” features a number of unusual jazz chords thanks to Fagan and Becker’s shared jazz backgrounds. In today’s online guitar lesson, we will be looking at the chords, guitar solo tab and music theory analysis of this piece. Completing the all star lineup is the one and only Michael McDonald on backing vocals, so it’s no wonder this song performed so well on commercial radio. “Peg” is an excellent tune to learn for anyone who wants to expand their knowledge of chords, and it also features a classic guitar solo from LA session legend Jay Graydon. The song was a big hit in the US when it was first released, peaking at number 11 on the Billboard Hot 100 and remaining a staple in Steely Dan’s live set for many years after. A classic song from a classic record, “Peg” by Steely Dan is taken from the band’s classic 1977 album “Aja” and is written by core members Donald Fagen and Walter Becker.

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