Music Theory for Electronic Producers - Chords and the Major Scale

In this video and blog post I'm going to tell you how you can work out any chord in a major scale. 

Remember the rules can always be broken, but if you are new to music theory then this will be a great starting point for learning the basics of major scales and chord types.

I have a few different points for you to remember in this blog, so lets get stuck in!

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Part 1

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1. 5 and 4 for major and 4 and 5 for minor.

To work out a major triad or a 3-note chord, we need to first find the root note, which will be the note name of the chord and then count up 5 semi-tones to find the 3rd of the chord and then count up another 4 semi-tones to find the 5th of the chord.

To find a minor chord, it's similar to finding a major chord, but this time it's 4 semi-tones from the root note to find the 3rd and 5 semi-tones from the 3rd to find the 5th.

These patterns will allow you to work out major and minor chords.

The root and the 5th are the same for major and minor chords, which is really why we call a 5th a perfect 5th. It's the 3rd that makes the major and minor chords sound different.

We just have to remember to drop the 3rd by a semi-tone to turn the major chord into a minor chord and to put the 3rd up a semi-tone in a minor chord to turn it into a major chord.

We also have two other chord types, which are augmented and diminished. Augmented is basically a wider chord or a super major and a diminished chord is a kind of narrower chord or a super minor. This is how I like to remember them.

Then can both sound a bit unusual compared to the major and minor chords, but then can be great for adding tension or suspense.

To work out a augmented chord, just remember the pattern 5 and 5. So 5 semi-tones from the root will get you to the 3rd of an augmented chord and then 5 semi-tones from the 3rd will get you to the 5th of the augmented chord. It's basically a double major chord!

For a diminished chord, it's the pattern 4 and 4. So, 4 semi-tones from the root will get you to the 3rd of the diminished chord. Then 4 semi-tones from the 3rd will get you to the 5th of the diminished chord. So this one is basically a double minor chord!

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Part 2

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Now I have another pattern for you to remember which will allow you to work out all notes in any major scale!! 

And this is....

T T S T T T S 

Which means...

Tone, Tone, Semi-Tones, Tone, Tone, Tone, Semi-Tone.

A tone is basically two notes (including the black notes) and a semi-tone is one note (including the black notes).

So, lets look at C major. Looking at the keyboard in the screenshot above. C, up 2 notes or a TONE gives us D, then up a TONE gives us E, then up a SEMI-TONE gives us F, up a TONE gives us G, then up a TONE gives us A, then up a TONE gives us B, then up a SEMI-TONE gives us B, then up a tone brings us back to the root which is C.

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Part 3

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Now let have a look at the final part of this blog post which is where we are going to work out which types of chords we can use for a Major Scale and what chords we can use for each note of the scale.

For a major scale, there are 3 types of chords we can use, which are Major chords, Minor Chords and there is even one Diminished Chord.

Remember, we looked at earlier how to work out these types of chord and now lets look at which ones we can use in our major scale!

We have one more pattern to learn which is...

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

For this example lets choose C Major as our Major Scale, but we can use any major scale and this pattern will work for this too.

So lets go up the major scale in C major (remember we can do this by using the pattern T, T, S, T, T, T, S).

C major, D minor, E minor, F major, G major, A minor, B diminished and then back to C major

Like I said this pattern will work in any major scale and we can also remember this pattern by using triangles as major, dashes as minor and a circle as diminished or even Roman Numerals. It's up to you as long you remember the pattern!

So, lets recap quickly what I went through in this blog post!!

- The pattern to work out a major chord is 5+4

- The pattern to work out a minor chord is 4+5

- The pattern to work out a diminished chord is 4+4

- The pattern to work out a augmented chord is 5+5

- To work out any major scale use the patter T T S T T T S

- To work out which type of chord to play in this major scale use the patter major, minor, minor, major, major, minor, diminished, major

Remember these are the rules to start with, but you can also bend and break the rules!

You can't however bent or break the rules if you don't know what the rules are though!

I hope you found this post useful and remember if you'd like to get access to my Complete Music Theory Course, which is over 8+ hours long then just click the link below where you can get this course for only $10 (full price $180).

http://www.tomasgeorge.com/youtubeoffer

Thank you for reading this and please upvote this post if you've found it useful.

Tomas.