When we play three different notes simultaneously, we produce a chord. Our 12 note musical alphabet can yield lots of possible chords, but many combinations are unpleasant and cacophonous.
A handful of basic chords will get us off to a nice start. The easiest type of chords to learn are called open chords. We call them open because we use one or more open strings as part of the chord.
You might of heard the term “caged” chords before. It just refers to the open major chords C, A, G, E and D.
After beginners learn a few chords, their next question is:
Q:”What do I do with them?”
A: Practice switching between them.
Chords are strung together to form the “backdrop” of a song. Single-note melodies are laid on top to produce a finished piece of music. Try playing 2 chords from the BASIC OPEN CHORDS page. Strum one four times and switch to the next. Strum this new chord four times and switch back again. Here’s an example using A Major and D Major.
AAAADDDDAAAADDDD etc.
For now, let’s use all downstrokes.
*Downstroke means that you strum DOWN from Low strings to higher strings.
Downstroke four times on A, then four downstrokes on D. Repeat.
After awhile, you’ll notice that using downstrokes exclusively tends to make a chord progression sound “robotic” or “souless”. Think of it this way, if you only use downstrokes, its kind of like using only one leg to get around. Sure, you can hop from point A to B, but wouldn’t it be easier if you just walked to your destination? It’s much easier and smoother going. Allow me to introduce you to your other leg…
Upstrokes are the opposite of downstrokes- meaning strumming from high strings to lower ones.
The walking analogy will help us understand quite a bit about rhythm. A song starts and walks to the end in a simple fluid motion.
Let’s stop and take a look at Time Signatures.
We know that we can write down any song using TAB and standard notation. But to play it correctly, we need to understand its rhythm.
Music is written in increments known as measures.Think of these measures as train cars passing by, with the engine being the beginning and the caboose being the end.
Each of these cars carries a specific amount of beats. It’s common for each measure/car to carry four beats. So common in fact, that counting in groups of four is known as Common Time. Common time is indicated at the beginning of a piece of music by the symbol(s)
or
The earlier example of playing AAAA DDDDAAAADDDD is a good way to explain it. Each measure/car carries exactly four beats.
In common time (4/4) we string together four beats by counting: 1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4,etc.
There are other time signatures that you should know about, but you’ll be fine if you start with one more. 3/4 Time
Regardless of what time signature you are in, each measure/car has to have a certain number of notes (or rests) to fill it. We call these complete measures.
explain 4/4 & 3/4. empty milk jug analogy. car, pickup, SUV, motorcycle. down & up strokes like walking. choking chords with the left hand. xxxxxxxxxxxxx
When I was teaching myself about music theory, it always seemed disjointed and confusing. No textbooks I read clearly showed me how chords, scales and arpeggios worked together. They were spending so much time showing me every individual branch of every tree that I never understood thatthey were all part of the same forest.
This little system of mine works like a charm to demystify quite a bit of theory while also making several important theoretical connections.
Now if you have read up to this point you understand that there are only 12 different notes in music. We can apply any formula (scale shape, chord shape, etc.) to any one of the 12 notes.
Imagine a row of 12 buckets.
Now let’s pretend that each bucket represents one of the 12 Major scales. Each bucket contains an infinite supply of notes from it’s Major scale.
This C Major bucket contains an infinite amount of notes only from the C Major scale ( C D E F G A B C).
A G Major bucket contains an infinite amount of notes only from the G Major scale ( G A B C D E F# G).
NEARLY EVERY SONG USES ONE BUCKET TO CREATE IT’S SCALES, CHORDS AND ARPEGGIOS!!!*
The bucket that we choose for a song is often called the KEYorKey Signature.
Let’s say we want to write a song. The first thing we have to decide is which of the 12 buckets we want to use. Let’s assume we chose C.
You can reach into the bucket and pull out any note in any order to make a melody. (Remember that there is an infinite amount of C Major notes in the C Major bucket).This melody may be your vocal line, guitar solo or whatever.
I can reach into the same bucket and pull handfulls of notes at a time. This produces chords.
Q:Will your melody line work with my chords?
A: Of course! We are drawing from the same source or collective of notes.
We should stop for a moment, let this sink in and learn a new vocabulary word: diatonic.
Diatonic means coming from the same source. The chords and melody we produced came from the same bucket/source so they have to work together. If for some reason I add an errant note to the mix(Example= I add a G# note to a chord), the chord is no longer diatonic because I have added a new element that contradicts the notes you are playing.
If the melody and chords stay true to the original bucket/source, we are staying diatonic.
This is a very “safe” way to play-meaning that if you stay within the bucket you won’t hit any ugly notes.
*Because it is so commonly heard, some styles of music (namely Jazz and Classical) might dip into several different buckets over the course of one song. The trick is to have the melody and chords switch buckets at the same time.
We’ll refer back to this concept often so please make sure you understand it before moving on.
