BK made my morning by calling out the Open Fourth Syndrome.
That's been on my mind for - well, for months, if not longer - but especially since I'd made my li'l historic return to playing a number of auditions this spring, because there's no better way to get exposed to the songs and musicals that are popular with the younger populace. At one point while sightreading yet another cockamamie "power ballad" and trying to quickly get its "groove" into my head and ears so I could send it to my fingers, a lightbulb went on: In a moment of doubt or panic through a busy passage, keep the chord structure to "clean" open fifths and fourths, and you'll have a better than even chance of being correct. And it worked.
Some of these songs weren't even the latest, but from shows like Wicked - which perhaps I should be embarrassed to say I hardly know - so the syndrome goes back farther than I might have suspected. But it's the rule, man. Open fifths and fourths, with a generous sprinkling of sus2 and sus4 chords throughout.
