Music theory Archives - Page 4 of 7

How to Play and Apply Dominant 7th Chords

The dominant 7th chord is a chord that you will find in a lot of popular songs and many styles of music. In fact it’s the most essential chord type in blues music and one of the defining characteristics that defines the blues sound. But even if you’re not into blues, you want to make this chord part of your guitar vocabulary.

The dom7 chord comes in various shapes and sizes. We start with the “open” dom7 chords which are great for beginners and work our way up to more intermediate level dom7 chords: “The moveable chords”.

We’ll first take you through some basic dominant 7th music theory, we’ll show you the different types of dom7 chords and shapes, and then apply the chords to the song.

Let’s dive in!

Chord Analysis

The Dom7 chord is simply a major triad with a flatted seventh (b7).
The major triad consists of the root (1), the major third (3) and the perfect fifth (5).
So the Dom7 chord formula = 1 3 5 b7

Let’s take a Cdom7 (also called “C7”) chord as an example.
We look at the C major scale: C D E F G A B C and we take the root (1st), 3rd, 5th and b7th note of that scale and you get the notes: C-E-G-Bb. So a Cdom7 (C7) chord consists of the notes: C E G Bb

How to Play and Apply Add9 Chords

By Klaus Crow 8 Comments

To make chords, chord progressions and songs more colorful guitar players use chord embellishments.

Chords like sus2, sus4, maj6, maj7 and add9 can all be used to spice up your playing and create more interesting sounds.

The add9 chord is a big favorite in pop and acoustic rock music.

Chord Analysis

The add9 chord is simply a major triad with an added ninth (9).
The major triad consists of the root (1), the major third (3) and the perfect fifth (5).
So the add9 chord formula = 1 3 5 9

Let’s take Cadd9 chord as an example.
We look at the C major scale: C D E F G A B C and we take the root (1st), 3rd, 5th and 9th note of that scale and you get the notes: C-E-G-D. So Cadd9 = C E G D

6 Reasons You Want to Learn the Notes on The Fretboard and How

By Klaus Crow 11 Comments

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It may seem obvious that when you learn to play guitar you also need to learn the notes on the fretboard. How can you play music without knowing the note names? Well believe it or not, there are a lot of guitar players out there who don’t have the slightest clue what they are playing and they do just fine.

I didn’t know all the notes on the fretboard for a long time either. And yes I could still play all my favorite tunes and improvise over chord progressions. But there were limitations that I wasn’t aware of at the time. Huge limitations!

Once I started learning the notes on the strings and figuring out what the notes of chords, scales and licks were, things started to change. One discovery let to another and a lot of things suddenly made sense and became clearer. My knowledge expanded and my playing improved. I learned all this in small steps. Continue Reading

Building Scales Using The Whole Half Step Formula

By Klaus Crow 17 Comments

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guitar laugh Knowing how to build a scale is essential for understanding music theory, learning how the guitar works, to able to communicate with other musicians and to grow towards becoming an accomplished guitar player.

Every piece of musical knowledge adds to your musicianship and makes you become a better guitar player. Applied knowledge is power.

The whole-half Step formula is the perfect way to build and recognize the pattern of any scale. The scales you need for soloing, chord construction, chord progressions, arpeggios and a dozen of other things. It gives you insight in the whole matter.

So let’s see how this baby works.

The whole-half step formula is similar to the scale formulas only it uses whole and half steps to explain the construction of a scale.

A half step = one fret. A whole step = two frets. So going one fret up or down the neck is a half step. Going up or down two frets equals a whole step.

Let’s take the major scale as an example:

Major scale = Whole step – Whole step – Half step – Whole step – Whole step – Whole step – Half step
or simplified: W-W-H-W-W-W-H (W = Whole, H = Half)
You can also notate the fret intervals: 2-2-1-2-2-2-1 (W = 2, H = 1)Continue Reading

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