It seems to me that piano players utilize more interesting chord progressions than guitarists, but guitar players are better than piano players at making simple chord progressions sound cool. Why is that?

I play both piano and guitar, and knowing one instrument helps the other immensely, and vice versa. I find myself a much more versatile player since I picked up piano a couple years ago - anything I can play on one instrument, I try to apply that idea to the other instrument.

It seems also that all guitar players seem to be worried about it speed and scales and soloing. Cmon everyone, take up your axe and work with chords! How many of you could pick up a chart from the RealBook, play through the progression, and make it sound good? There is more to progressions than 1-4-5.

And so that I'm not just ranting, let me post a couple cool chordal ideas.

When playing any major progression, you can borrow a couple chords out of the minor key to spice up your sound. Say you're playing C, Am, F, G, on and on and on. For a quick little bridge, or an ending, you can use the Ab and Bb from C Minor to lead up to the C Major chord. So...
C, Am, F, G, C, Am, F, G, Ab, Ab, Bb, Bb could be a 12 bar form.

Utilize "5 of's" (which I believe are called secondary dominants. For example, when playing I, vi, IV, V progression (C, Am, F, G from the last example), you can use any chords dominant as a leading chord. So, instead of this C, Am, F, G, you can have C, E, Am, F, G (the C and E chords are a half measure, all others a measure). Or use another to lead to the F chord, and C chord. C, E, Am, C7, F, G (every chord a half measure except the F and G). Notice the tension you're getting (G# from the E, Bb from the C7). You can use a 2-5-1 for the ending. C, E, Am, C7, F, Dm, G, C. Now that you have that Dm, you can use it's 5 for even more tension. C, E, Am, C7, F, A, Dm, G, C. Extend those chords! Cmaj7, E7, Am7, C7, Fadd9, A7, Dm7, G7. Now THAT'S a nice sounding progression, that evolved from a simple 1-6-4-5. Then, on the second time through the progression you stick the F and G in the same measure and put Ab and Bb in the last measure.

So (this list without extensions), you went from
I, vi, IV, V, I, vi, IV, V
to
I, III, vi, I, IV, VI, ii, V, I, II, vi, I, IV, V, bVI, bVII

See how much more harmonically interesting that is? That's what a piano player would do. A guitarist would wank over the 1-6-4-5... Let's be musicians instead of guitarists. Feel free to comment, add your ideas, correct me somewhere that I'm wrong (I know I f*cked something up during this long post) or b!tch at me for saying something good about pianists.

P.S. - Note the first paragraph - I think guitarists can make progressions sound better - I can play a simple F#m7, Dmaj7, Bmadd9 on guitar and make some kickass porno music that piano players can't touch!