C Major Chord

Intro to Chords

Let's talk about chords. A chord is three or more notes simultaneously. Chords are based around a root note. Other notes are classified in terms of the intervals they create with the root note.

Triads are chords composed of a root note and its third and fifth. There are 4 main types of triads:

Chord Type	1st Interval	2nd Interval	Written short name for C
Major	Major 3rd	Perfect 5th	C
Minor	Minor 3rd	Perfect 5th	Cm
Diminished	Minor 3rd	Diminished 5th	Cdim or C°
Augmented	Major 3rd	Augmented 5th	C+

A basic major chord is root, major third, and perfect fifth. For a C Major chord, that's C - E and C - G. The C Major chord is spelled CEG or C E G or C-E-G.

Often, a chord spans more than one octave, reusing the same set of notes in a higher octave. For example, C2 E2 G2 C3 E3 is 5 notes, but all 5 notes are found in the C major triad. This is still a C Major chord.

Notice a triad is basically every other note from the root. A C Major triad is CEG. We skip the D and F - C (D) E (F) G. This is helpful to quickly get the notes for a particular chord in the key of C Major. As we learn more about other keys and get more accustomed to the intervalic relationship between each pair of notes in the chromatic scale, we will be able to derive the member notes for any particular chord quickly.

Writing Conventions

Usually the short name in the far right column in the table above is used to denote a chord. Chord symbols typically appear above sheet music or tab as follows:

  C     Am    F     C
e-0----|0----|1----|0----|
b-1----|1----|1----|1----|
g-0----|2----|2----|0----|
d-2----|2----|3----|2----|
a-3----|0----|-----|3----|
e------|-----|-----|-----|

Here the tab shows how to play each chord. Sometimes tab or sheet music will give chord charts for all of the chord shapes used in the song before the song starts. For the above example, you'd see:

 C            Am           F
|o|-|-|-|    |o|-|-|-|    |-|i|-|-|   
|-|i|-|-|    |-|i|-|-|    |-|i|-|-|   
|o|-|-|-|    |-|-|r|-|    |-|-|m|-|   
|-|-|m|-|    |-|-|m|-|    |-|-|-|r|   
|-|-|-|r|    |o|-|-|-|    |-|-|-|-|   
|-|-|-|-|    |-|-|-|-|    |-|-|-|-|
 0 1 2 3      0 1 2 3      0 1 2 3

This tells us the position of the chords, and the fingering to use. These are often very helpful, as every chord has a large variety of voicings on guitar.

Sometimes, the tab/sheet music will not have numbers or notes as we typically see but a strumming pattern. This may be above the tab/sheet music, with the actual tab being reserved for a melody line. It contains markings that look similar to notes, indicating the duration of each strum (quarter note, eighth note, etc.).

Inversions

Usually, the root note of the chord is also the lowest-pitched note, or bass note. This gives a strong harmonic foundation where the intervals created by the other notes can be clearly heard and felt. However, the third or fifth can also be the bass note. This is called an inversion. Inversions are numbered by the bass note's occurrence in the chord.

Inversion	Lowest Note
Root Position	Root
1st Inversion	Third
2nd Inversion	Fifth

2nd inversion doesn't sound/feel terribly different from root position, while 1st inversion is clearly different but still retains much of the feel of root position. Really, we classify them as the same chord - whether its C E G, E G C, or G C E, it's a C Major chord.

Why Invert?

So what's the point of using an inverted chord vs. root position? This mainly deals with voice leading, which can get a little advanced. Basically, even if an instrument is used in a strictly harmonic function, each note of a chord being played should be treated as an individual voice, as though it were one person in a chorus. When changing chords, each voice can keep the same pitch, move higher, or move lower. Classical voice leading has a number of guidelines to make transitions smooth, natural, and pleasant. They highlight the harmonic content of the change moreso than the pitch changes. Let's look at some chord changes, trying to use as little movement as possible for each voice.

Root Position Chord 1	Chord 1 Member Notes	Chord 2	Chord 2 Member Notes	Notes Movement	Inversion of Chord 2	Total movement in semitones
C	CEG	Em	BEG	C moves 1 half step to B	2nd Inversion	1
C	CEG	Am	CEA	G moves 1 whole step to A	1st Inversion	2
C	CEG	F	CFA	E moves 1 half step to F, G moves 1 whole step to A	2nd Inversion	3
C	CEG	G	BDG	C moves 1 half step to B, E moves 1 whole step to D	1st Inversion	3

So we've got only 1 or 2 voices of the chord changing pitch at all, and they are only moving 1 or 2 semitones. Compare this to using root position:

Root Position Chord 1	Chord 1 Member Notes	Chord 2	Chord 2 Member Notes	Notes Movement	Total movement in semitones
C	CEG	Em	EGB	C and G move up 4 semitones, E moves up 3	11
C	CEG	Am	ACE	C and G move down 3 semitones, E moves down 4 semitones	10
C	CEG	F	FAC	All notes move up 5 semitones	15
C	CEG	G	GBD	All notes move down 5 semitones	15

Whoa! That's a huge difference in the total amount of pitch movement, and all that movement is a distraction to the harmonic change. Voice leading has many more rules, which we will cover later on.

Another reason to use inversions is if you want your bass line to consistently ascend or descend or have a melody you want it to follow. If you stick to making the bass note the root note of the chord, many chord progressions will not allow the bass line to do so.

Writing Inversions

The most common way to see inversions written for guitar is the name of the chord, then "/bass note". So for example, C Major 1st Inversion is written C/E. A Minor 2nd Inversion is written Am/E.

Open Position C Major Chord

fig 1
|o|-|-|p|-| E and G
|-|i|-|-|-| C
|o|-|-|-|-| G
|-|-|m|-|-| E
|-|-|-|r|-| C
|o|-|-|p|-| E and G*
 0 1 2 3 4