‘I Can’t Tell You Why’ is a classic song written by Timothy B. Schmit, Glenn Frey, and Don Henley, and recorded in 1979 by their band, The Eagles. (Vince Gill, one of the greatest singers ever, and now in The Eagles, has also done a notable cover.)
It’s a good song. Soulful, Musically, what always struck me about it is its clever but natural-sounding use of modulations (changing keys).
Was I surprised when I took a closer look and found that there were no real modulations…. only harmonic moves that sounded like modulations. That’s the clever part.
Here are the chords for the Verse, Pre-Chorus, and Chorus:
|| D | D | G | G | D | D | G | F#sus4 F# |
|| Bminor | A/B | G | F#minor F# |
|| Bminor | F# minor | G | F#minor F# | G | F#minor ||
Whenever there’s an F# chord something surprising happens. Two out of three times they go out of the key for that one chord or one bar, leading the ear to expect that they’re about to modulate… but they never do.
Each section ends with a different F# variation, keeping the chord progression constantly refreshed.
The first one is | F#sus4 F# |. Definitely not in the key of ‘D’ (which has an F#minor chord). But all the F# does is take us back to Bminor (which is still in the key of ‘D’).
The end of the next section is | F#minor F# |. Since we hear the in-key F#minor first, the F# again leads our ears to expect ‘new key’. And, as in the previous transition, we’re back at Bminor.
The surprise at the end of the Chorus is that there’s no surprise – it’s a simple in-key F#minor, which leads us back to – you guessed it – Bminor again (for the repeated Intro riff of | Bminor A/B | A/B |).
Play and sing it through; it’s a simple chord progression. But with the crafty use of a ‘fake’ V chord – the F# major – instead of the IIIminor chord (F#minor), the writers keep our ears on their toes (sorry) and renew the tonality of the progression every few bars.
It’s clever, but what counts is that the chords connect with and advance the emotion of the song, the melody and lyric.
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