The Good Musician

Music Theory 101: The Basic Major Triad

by Arjun Muralidharan on August 29th, 2007

What is a chord?

A chord is the simultaneous resounding of multiple notes. Now that we know about Major and Minor scales, we can build chords, picking out the right notes from that scale.

Basically, you could pick any two notes out of the scale and you’d already have a chord if you play them at the same time.

Let’s go back to our major scale that we can apply anywhere (and is thus also called “relative scale”).

Do Re Mi Fa So La Ti Do

The first chord I want to show you is a triad - three notes at once. Triads are the most common chord, so the terms are interchangeable. The major chord picks out the first note, then the first major third (the 3rd note of the scale) and the first major fifth (the 5th note of the scale).

Do Re Mi Fa So La Ti Do

Our major triad: Do Mi So.

Yay. Our first chord.

Applied to real notes, again let’s pick C:

C D E F G A B C

A major C chord comprises the three notes C, E and G. Many people know how to strum some basic chords on the guitar, but they oftne don’t really know what they’re playing. When you strike a C-Major chord on the guitar (find a guitarist friend to show you), you’re essentially only pressing the three notes C, E and G (though you’re probably pressing the same note multiple times or in different octaves - but it’s still C, E, G).

Got that? Good.

POSTED IN: Music Theory