Only Time by Enya

Overview

Key: E♭ major · Chords used: 10 · Sections: 10

Where these chords come from: an expert transcription of the original recording made for the Uspop2002 chord annotations (Music and Audio Research Lab, New York University). This page shows that transcription as-is: the analysis below is generated directly from it by code, not written by AI. Consecutive repeats of a chord are shown once, and the piano voicings are our playable arrangement of each chord symbol, not a note-for-note transcription.

Section by section

Part 1 (0:00)

• E♭ – Cm – A♭ – E♭
  I – vi – IV – I

Part 2 (0:23)

• Cm – A♭ – E♭ – Cm – A♭ – B♭add9
  vi – IV – I – vi – IV – Vadd9

Part 3 (0:46)

• E♭ – B♭/D – Cm – A♭ – B♭ – E♭ – Cm – A♭
  I – V⁶ – vi – IV – V – I – vi – IV

Part 4 (1:08)

• E♭ – Cm – A♭ (×2)
  I – vi – IV

Part 5 (1:31)

• B♭add9 – E♭ – B♭/D – Cm – A♭ – B♭ – E♭ – Cm
  Vadd9 – I – V⁶ – vi – IV – V – I – vi

Part 6 (1:54)

• A♭ – E♭ – Cm
  IV – I – vi
• A♭ – E♭ (×2)
  IV – I

Part 7 (2:18)

• F♯ – C♯ – B (×3)
  #II – #VI – #V
• F♯
  #II

Part 8 (2:36)

• C♯ – B – B♭ – E♭ – E♭maj7 – E♭ – Cm – A♭ – E♭
  #VI – #V – V – I – Imaj7 – I – vi – IV – I

Part 9 (2:57)

• Cm
  vi
• A♭ – E♭ (×3)
  IV – I

Part 10 (3:20)

• E♭
  I

Chord vocabulary

Harmonic highlights

• F♯ (#II) is borrowed from the parallel key, E♭ minor.
• C♯ (#VI) is borrowed from the parallel key, E♭ minor.
• B (#V) is borrowed from the parallel key, E♭ minor.

Sources & accuracy

• Chords: the Uspop2002 chord annotations (Music and Audio Research Lab, New York University). Chord annotation of the original recording (A Day Without Rain), time-stamped by researchers; CC BY 4.0 via ChoCo.
• Section names: this annotation doesn't name verses or choruses, so they aren't guessed. Instead, code used the chord timings to find the bars and cut the song into 8-bar parts. Each part is labelled with the time it starts in the annotated recording (A Day Without Rain), and a part with exactly the same chords as an earlier one says so.
• The key was estimated by code from the chords; this annotation doesn't state it.
• Not verified: only one expert transcription of this song is available so far.
• Rhythm and chord durations aren't shown; each step is one chord change.