Hot answers tagged chords
39
There are a ton of easy and great-sounding substitutions, and you can use them in the turnaround or anywhere else you want. Here are a few of the most common:
ii-V sub: Substitute ii for IV, so that you have a ii-V turnaround. For example, if you're playing in the key of C, the V chord is G7 and the ii chord is Dm7. So instead of C-F-G7, play C-Dm7-G7. ...
23
I was struggling witch my barre chords, but then my teacher showed me two great exercises. I've been doing them for a week or two and - it's a miracle - barre chords started sounding!
1. Pure barre practicing
Just hold all the strings on fret 7 with you first finder and nothing else and check if all the strings sound clear. You can help with your second ...
22
I think the only answer to this one is...keep doing it.
The reason you're struggling is because your hand and fingers aren't strong enough yet to do it easily. It's like weight lifting, the more you do it, the stronger you'll get.
Try playing barre chords further up the neck, around the 5th fret. You might find it a little easier than F on the 1st, then ...
21
The basic chords that todd suggested are very good as a basic for barre chord:
Example E major - note that the B chord is basically A using barre at 2nd fret.
E A B
Note: If you have problems with barre, you can often cheat with the B and use B7 instead without sounding too wrong (see below in the septim section)
Another set of chords that is easy ...
21
To understand the answer to this question you need and understanding of these concepts:
Key center
Tonality
Chord progressions in functional harmony
A song is regarded as being in the key of C major if the pitch C is its key center, if the notes in the song chiefly fall in the C-major scale (as opposed to the C-minor scale, or one of the other ...
18
One of the best ways is to play scales using chords. Set up a metronome, and change a chord on every forth beat. Choose a slower tempo if you can't do it on time. When you get comfortable, try more complex rhythm or a finger picking pattern. Here is an example of the F scale with jazz chords:
Fmaj7
Gm7
Am7
Bbmaj7
C7
Dm7
Ehalfdim
Fmaj7
Here are the ...
18
A guitarist has exactly the same problem as you do. If you just strum the chord on the downbeat, or on every beat, it sounds boring. You have to play more interesting patterns.
The guitarist does have a couple of advantages over a pianist in this respect. Early on, a guitarist learns to get more rhythmic interest out of a basic chord, by varying the rhythm ...
17
Yes. It has to do with the ratio of their frequencies. Essentially, the smaller the numbers involved the better.
The perfect unison, with a 1:1 ratio (e.g., C played with the same C), has perfect consonance. C to the next G has a 2:3 ratio; the perfect fifth is the next most consonant. The minor second (e.g., C to C#) is the most dissonant in Western ...
16
It really depends on context. It could be an Am6, but this is an unlikely inversion, so probably not. It could be an F#m7b5, especially if followed by some form of B7, where it would serve as a II in E, probably E minor. For other functions of half-diminished chords, see Wikipedia: Half-diminished Seventh Chord. It could also be a rootless D9 voicing with ...
16
Context is important -- what else happens around the chord.
Let's just take the C major chord for starters. Listen to these examples:
The first two measures of Mozart's sonata "for beginners" in C major. A nice, pleasant chord. Happy music.
The opening of Mozart's Jupiter Symphony. This has a much more energetic and heroic sound.
The opening of the ...
16
Pursuant to Mark Lutton's excellent answer, I'd like to make the point that Chords don't give us feelings, we give chords feelings.
The feeling you get after hearing a chord is not inherent in that chord--the only thing inherent in any chord is the physics of the harmonic series. (There is something to be said for consonance vs. dissonance within the ...
15
The 'sus' is short for 'suspended'.
The term comes from traditional music theory, and it refers to that the chord has a note that was suspended, or 'delayed', or 'carried over', from the previous chord. Traditionally the suspended fourth note in the sus4-chord should also be resolved to the third before any further chord action.
Example chord progression ...
15
Could it be Power Chords you're after? If you add just a fifth and an octave, it gives you a beefier incarnation of the root note.
e ----------------------------
B ----------------------------
G --------2-----------3---2---
D 2---5---2---2---5---3---2---
A 2---5---0---2---5---1---0---
E 0---3-------0---3-----------
The third (missing here) is called the ...
14
There are, of course, an enormous variety of chord progressions used in jazz. That said, here are three you should know:
12-bar Blues
The basic 12-bar blues as played in jazz (not as played in blues) usually goes something like:
I-IV-I-I-IV-IV-I-vi-ii-v-i-turnaround
In blues, all these chords would be dominant sevenths. Jazz players, however, ...
13
Some of the most popular chords in funk include E9, E7, and E7+9 (also widely known as the so-called "Hendrix Chord", since Jimi used it in "Purple Haze" and other songs), transposed as necessary. Here are their canonical voicings:
E9 and E13 (Often, players will play these without the bass note):
$A.7.$D.6.$G.7.$B.7.$e.7 | $A.7.$D.6.$G.7.$B.7.$e.9
...
13
In classical theory, the necessity or lack thereof of a particular chord member is generally determined by the note's tendency to lead to another note. That tendency comes most often from the interval of an augmented fourth or diminished fifth. Enharmonically, those intervals are the same, but in context, they are not, and they resolve differently. In a ...
13
You're right that the same melody can be played over a variety of different chord sequences, and that the choice of chords will have a marked effect on how the piece sounds.
One of the modern jazz performers' favourite tricks is to take a well known melody and accompany it with unexpected (yet still musically pleasing) chords.
Note that the key signature ...
13
The root note is always the note that is the basis for the chord, regardless of its inversion. In root posiition the lowest note is the root (hence the name), but other notes are the lowest in other inversions of the chord.
For example, take a C Major chord. In every position, the root note is C. Whether it is voiced as C-E-G (root position), E-G-C ...
12
Learn to recognize intervals between notes quickly. For example, notes that skip a line or space are a third apart. Notes that skip seven are an octave apart. When reading a chord quickly, read the root/lowest note and then the intervals above it and place them in the key. With experience you will be able to recognize common voicings by shape alone.
12
Basically, neither fingers nor your wrist should hurt. Tension is your enemy, you have to become aware of tension before it becomes pain. In the words of Joe Satriani : No pain, no pain.
If it's the thumb, chances are you're grabbing the neck as if you were falling and needed to hold onto it, that's not the way it should be : the thumb is an anchor for the ...
12
It all depends on which chord you want it to be. With GBD, you have a strong G tendency, and with the Es, that leans E minor. With the A, That's an added 4. So EminAdd4 (not suspended, because you still have the G).
But if you want to think of it as an A, With the A and E, you have the root and the fifth. The G is a dominant 7. The B is a 9th away from that ...
12
Here are some classic combinations for you to play around with. I've supplied each progression with an example of chords in one key and an explanation of the positional formulas that will allow it to be transposed to all other keys - simply choose a position for the first chord and follow the instructions. I've also added some brief comments about the theory ...
12
Hand size is of of key criteria when choosing a guitar you want to play. You did not specify guitar type, but I can guess, that you have a classical acoustic guitar (with nylon strings and a large distance between strings), am I right? One of the people I know have the opposite problem - he has a very big hands and could not literally take any chord on a ...
12
When you play in D minor, the scale -- that is your "palette" of notes -- is: D, E, F, G, A, B♭, and C
You'll find it's not possible to play a D major chord using those notes. D major contains an F♯.
The simplest way to find the chord you want is to identify its root note, then play a triad starting on that note, using only the notes in the scale.
So
...
11
Your fingers don't have to be perfectly aligned to the frets/fingerboard when playing chords, or any thing else really.
The important thing is that you can hear all the notes clearly when you strum, no 'dead' notes or buzzing.
Even if your fingers were longer/stronger, there are some chords where it would be physically impossible to align your fingers as ...
11
The stuff you are finding on the internet looks like chords. It sounds like you are learning single notes in your guitar lessons. If you want to play some songs you will need to learn some chords. A chord is a group of notes ( more than two to be precise) strummed or played together where as a single note is, well, a single note. I have a page of ...
11
Sure is! These are called Intervals. It has to do with the number of "Scale Degrees" that separate two notes - basically, the number of notes you have to move through the scale from the first note to reach the second note (including the note you started on). These are worded "Second", "Third", "Fourth", "Fifth", "Sixth", "Seventh", "Octave" (Octave ...
11
Yes, there are ways to measure it, though there are many different algorithms claiming to be more accurate than the others. This formula by Vassilakis is recent (2007).
These measure "roughness", which is similar to dissonance. (Dissonance is basically roughness, but weighted towards certain intervals due to cultural conditioning, which is obviously hard ...
11
The art of Counterpoint, as studied by composers for centuries, gives exact details on how to correctly ornament any melody. The lists of ornaments cited as point 4 in the question is only a subset of the possibilities given to us by counterpoint.
There are five main species of counterpoint. The treatise by Johann Joseph Fux is today the most common source ...
11
The answer to your question (as expressed in the title) is "No".
Any melody can be harmonized with a wide variety of chord progressions. You can use this to achieve a variety of sophisticated musical effects. One simple example would be using either a minor chord progression or a major chord progression to harmonize the same melody.
That's what makes music ...
Only top voted, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible
