Music Centre

Compiled By

Tushar Sanphui

colossalmusicschool/akul/Guitar
 Chord Chart I

colossalmusicschool/akul/Guitar
1. Musical alphabet.

The letters in the musical alphabet run from A through G then circle back around to A, where the
cycle begins again. You can start at any letter in the musical alphabet and go around the seven
letters until you arrive back to the letter where you began.

2. Musical scales.

A scale contains the seven notes of the musical alphabet. For simplicity's sake, let's work in the key
of C, which is one of the most common and easiest keys to play in as it uses all natural notes (no
sharps or flats). A C major scale looks like this:

CDEFGABC
3. Name that key.

The first note of any scale not only serves as the name of that scale, but also as the name of a key
and that key's root chord. Key signatures are like a rule book that tell us which notes belong
together and as a result, which chords do as well.

4. Roman numerals.

Now, let's assign a Roman numeral for each letter in the key of C:

CDEFGAB

I ii iii IV V vi viii°

The uppercase numerals represent major chords and the lowercase, minor chords. If there is a
degree symbol after the numeral, it indicates a diminished chord.

5. Identify all the major chords in the key.

Pull out all major chords in the key, which are I (C), IV (F) and V (G) in the above example.

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6. Identify all the minor chords in the key.

Next, pull out your minor chords, which are ii (Dm), iii (Em), and vi (Am). And there you have your
chords for the key of C. (Again, to keep the chord theory to a minimum, we'll leave out the
diminished chord for now.)

7. Apply this method to other keys.

Now that you know the chords that support the key of C, try finding the chord family for other keys
using the scale for that particular key.

8. How many chord families are there?

There is one chord family for each note and there are 12 notes in total (A, Bb, B, C, Db, D, Eb, E, F, F#,
G and Ab). Of those 12, there are 5 that work particularly well on the guitar: C, A, G, E, and D.

9. You can use chords outside the family.

Chord theory for keys holds in most situations. However, rules are made to be broken. Things can
get pretty dull if you use the same chords over and over and over again, like the I-V-vi-IV cycle (C-G-
Am-F in the key of C). An out-of-key chord thrown into an otherwise normal progression can add
interest to a song. Let your melody lead you, and let the chords back them up.

In this lesson we are going to learn two chord families i.e of C major
and D major.

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