From: fvr@broom.bae.bellcore.com (Frank Ricciardi)
Subject: Re: Return of More Chord Questions II revisited
Organization: Bell Communications Research
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 92 19:51:34 GMT



In article <1992Aug11.234353.13541@wam.umd.edu>, peugh@wam.umd.edu (General Napolean) writes:
|> 

|>    Sorry, more chord questions for you Theory Masters...
|>
|>   I have some basic understanding, but not much.  Could anyone clairify any
|> mistakes in the following?
|>   A "normal" chord is the root, third, and fifth from the maj scale.
|>   A normal minor chord is the root, third and fifth from the minor scale.
|>   Are there Dorian or Harmonic minor chords??
|>   A seventh chord is the root, third, fifth and seventh.
|>   A ninth chord is the root, third, fifth, seventh and ninth.



	Here is the story


	Major chords, you are correct  Root, third, & fifth

	Minor chords, Root, flat third, and fifth.  (flat is 1/2 step lower)

	Seventh Chords Root, third, fifth, flat seventh 	

	Major seventh chords,  root, third, fifth, seventh.

	Minor seventh chords Root, flat third, fifth, flat seventh

	Ninth chords  root, third, fifth, flat seventh, & ninth

	Eleventh chords root third fifth, flat seventh, ninth, and eleventh

	Thirteenth chords root, third, fifth, flat seventh, ninth, eleventh, and thirteenth.

	Now obviously you don't have enough fingers to play all the notes in
these chords, so here is how to fake it.

	to play a:          

	Ninth:     Play a seventh and move the root note up to the ninth
        Eleventh:  Play a seventh and move the third to the eleventh
        Thirteenth:Play a seventh and move the fifth to the thirteenth.

|>   That's about as far as my "understanding" goes.   I've got a few more 
|>   questions though..
|>   What are suspended chords?

	A suspended chord (commonly called a suspended 4th) is a major chord 
with the third moved up to the 4th. Play a plain old D chord, and put your 
pinky finger on the third fret 1st string, this is a suspended 4th.

	There are also chords called diminished and augmentend  

	Diminished (i think) is root third, flat fifth
	Augmented (i think) root third, sharp fifth





|> Are there Dorian or Harmonic minor chords or
|> chords in any mode other than major and minor for that matter(yeah, i know i
|> wrote the same question up there).


	Dorian and Harmonic minor are terms that refer to scales more than 
chords. There are 7 scales Phrygian, Mixolydian, Lydian, Dorian, etc. They are 
pretty much just variations of the major and blues scales that we use all the 
time.  In instances when you are playing a chord progression that doesn't keep 
true to one major key, you may need to play one of these scales in certain parts
of the progression to avoid sour notes.

	i.e. A progression in the Key of G like G/D/C/F/G  has a problem in it 
if you try to play a G major scale over it. The G major scale has an F# note 
in it which sounds horrible over an F major chord. So you substitute the F for
the F# in the G Major scale. The scale becomes G Mixolydian. 


|> How do you know that E,B,E,G#,B,E is and E maj chord?  Do you have to
|> recognize that G# is the third and B is the fifth of the E maj scale?
|>   thanks.
|>	

	With regard to how to know which chord you are playing	

	Anywhere on the guitar neck that you can cause all the notes you strike 
to be root, third, and fifth of the same major scale, you are playing the 
<root> major chord. 

the Major scale looks like this:

The 1 indicates a full step between notes, and the 1/2 indicates a half step 
between notes. The names of the notes are shown below the step sizes, and I've
used your example of the key of E major.


     1         1         1/2        1          1         1        1/2
 
Root   Maj 2nd   Maj 3rd    Perf 4th   Maj 5th   Maj 6th   Maj 7th  Perf Octave

 E       F#        G#          A          B         C#        D#         E


The chords in every major Key follow the same pattern ALWAYS!! 

Major, Minor, Minor, Major, Major, Minor, Diminished, Major

So the key of E Major is      E F#m G#m A B C#m D#dim E

&  the key of D Major is      D Em  F#m G A Bm  C#dim D

In addition, every major key has an associated key called the relative minor.
The relative minor key is the 6th note in any major key. i.e. the relative minor
of the Key of E major is C#minor. All the chords in both keys are the same. 

The scales are the same too, but the emphasis is placed on different notes.


	Hope this helped.



Frank




________________________________________________________________________________
"If you got to it and didn't do it, may you never get to it, and do it again"


Frank V. Ricciardi

fvr@bae.bellcore.com