Making Sense of Chords - Blah!

Thank you Redpaul1 and Ubulele for your wonderful work explaining, your persistence and patience.

I take the time to read your work carefully, and to sit down with my uke and play through what you present and then try to put what I have learned into use in my own songwriting and my analysis of others' songs.

It takes work but certainly pays off in the long run.

It certainly would be worthwhile for all players to learn the dominant chords in all keys, which is where the circle of fifths comes in. Learning these dominants will help in recognizing ii-V7 and ii-V7-I patterns that occur so often in jazz.

As Ubulele as said elsewhere, he thinks in terms of shapes in patterns. Glen Rose's brilliant jazz lessons help us learn these shapes in many inversions, thereby making playing "funny,i.e. More complicated, but beautiful" jazz chords that much simpler. The shapes give you the movement from V7 to I. Glen teaches in his Advanced Jazz chord lessons how substitutions can be made for the dominant 7, that is other types of dominants that replace the simpler 7th. The important thing is to understand the basic movement from V to I. Redpaul1 has explained it very well.

Even though I am becoming more advance in my understanding of music theory, a well-presented refresher course is always edifying.

Uncle Rod Higuchi said:

we either play and pass along what was given to us or we make adjustments, but those
are done because it seems better to us to do so. Ie, it sounds better to us.

I find myself substituting Dm7 for F many times, because I like the mellower, less harsh
sound of the m7 vs the Major chords... at times. Again, it's what sounds good to me in
that particular song... the way I remember hearing it, and the way I intend to present it.

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Since a Dm7 is also an inversion of a F6, it is often a very useful substitution for an F.
Dm7 = DFAC
F6 = FACD
Same notes, different order.

Well, over a month and a half has gone by, and now I'm having a good time with my music. I suffered a plateau with my banjos for a bit, but I'm back in the saddle again. It's triplets in my Irish music this week and picking up speed with clawhammer banjo last week.

This evening I played the chords that I know on my 8 string uke and sang my old heart out. Music is good again. ld:

And to simplify things, moving from the minor seventh flat five to a flat 9 is a very common movement in jazz, a ii-5 movement, in a minor key, a basis of jazz progressions.

And to top it off the chord shapes are very easy and can be moved all around the neck. You can play doo wop progressions that are harder to finger than jazz progressions. Nothing wrong with doo wop but think about getting a 64 crayon box instead of the simple 8 colors.

Once again, I recommend my friend, Glen Rose's, jazz lessons. He starts off just showing you the shapes,no names involved. Use your ear and play the shapes.

Down Up Dick said:

So one can just stick a chord or two onto any measure that it fits? So, in a C tune, any measure that has a Bb or a D could have a Bb or a D chord added to it? Well, I guess I can understand that.

Thanks, Gary52, I'll have to study my theory books and music some more. I appreciate your help. ld:

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There are certain sequences of chords (they call them progressions) that make more sense (sound better) so if you start just stringing together random chords they might end up sounding not so hot, pretty far away from the original tune or even the genre of music. I'm pretty new to music theory so that's just my take on what you just said.

-- Gary

Sculptor,

You're absolutely right. A chord by itself means very little until it is placed next to other chords. Yes, chords have flavors, major, minor, diminished, etc., but music is rhythm and the movement of chords.

Try this:

0111 0101 1313


You just did a nice little jazz progression: m7b5 to 7b9 to m7 A two-five-one progression.


The chords alone mean very little. The progression means a lot. You can feel it move. Accentuate that movement with rhythm. Listen to what you have. Move that progression down the neck until you find something that works with the first position.

Maybe:

6777 6767 6868

What do you think? It has a different feel from C Am F G

0003 2000 2010 0232 A one-six-four-five progression

C Dm Em F G Am Bdim. C

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Thanks for proof reading

Yes, thanks for the keen eye and correction, and yes, there are only four strings on a uke and advanced chords have more than four notes, and therefore what notes are left out make a difference. And, I always learn from your more sophisticated knowledge. I, too, am a relative beginner, and one willing to try to understand and progress.

I corrected my error above. Isn't a flat 5 also know as a sharp 11th, a name no longer in vogue?

Thank you, Ubulele. You have convinced me that the gods punish you by giving you what you wish for. I would love to hear Bach explain what he hears in A Love Supreme. Coltrane said you don't have to understand it, just feel it. I wouldn't expect Bach to like A Love Supreme but he probably could have understood it, what was happening musically, even if it was new to him and based on premises he didn't recognize or wish to ever accept. Perhaps Mozart would have liked it more, at least not have hated it. And then what would they both have thought of the more accessible Ellington?

Unbelievably complex. I stand more and more in awe of the complexity of jazz improvisation. I will continue to try to learn but I feel limits. I am, however, happy with where Glen Rose's lessons have brought me. There are more colors on my palette. I use them in my song writing. Thank you for your efforts.

The book Ukulele Aerobics has given me insight into where less familiar, to me, chords can be used. Calvin Chinn's book is also a great if funnily titled resource, Ukulele Breakthrough: Helping you go from lonely strummer to life-of-the-party!

I know most of the standard chords and a load
of the rarer (or rarely used) ones. I have a pretty
good sense of rhythm/timing and apparently I can
sing (more or less!) in tune.
But music theory just zooms through my head and
out the other side. Many kind and patient folk have
tried to teach me over the years, but you know what?
I just enjoy doing what I do, without understanding all
the technical aspects of it! That's what it's all about!

I like to dabble a little in music theory. I'm of those people who subscribes to the notion that learning music theory as it relates to what I'm doing is time well spent. I do have to sometimes stop myself from going down the rabbit hole and abandoning my ukulele playing to study theory, but it is interesting to me. Ubulele is always kind enough to explain things when my eyes glaze over, as he says. One thing I often wonder, when it comes to musicians, and I mean like musicians that go around playing for people. Not classical composers. I'm talking Jazz musicians, pop musicians, country musicians, Bob Dylan, Kris Kristofferson, Bruce, those types. Do they use music theory to create their sound, or do they create their sound and we use music theory then to explain what they did? I ask this, because a lot of times I learn some music theory and I realize that I've been doing and playing something for a long time, but I just didn't know what it was that I was doing. So that is just something to throw out there.

I am sorry to see that Ubulele pulled his very interesting if daunting comments. I was only joking when I stated that the gods punish us by giving us what we wish for. Things always seem difficult at first. It takes work to learn, to understand. Work is sometimes tedious and painful but that's life, that's growth.

Rllink's above comment is also good food for thought.

ahoy

believe will need
time slowly
reading and re reading
before understanding

thank you

Kimosabe said:

I am sorry to see that Ubulele pulled his very interesting if daunting comments. I was only joking when I stated that the gods punish us by giving us what we wish for. Things always seem difficult at first. It takes work to learn, to understand. Work is sometimes tedious and painful but that's life, that's growth.

Rllink's above comment is also good food for thought.

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I agree that one must work hard, tedious and painful or not, if his/her goals call for it, but we're not all the same. When I first started the uke, I just wanted to accompany my singing with my uke. Well, I've done that and somewhat more, and I'm happy with the progress I've made. However, reading the melody and the words and, especially all the chords at once was just a bigger battle than I wanted to fight.

Now I've moved on to something else more interesting and fitting to the music that I like to play. It's still a struggle, but one that I'm slowly but surely overcoming inspite of the lack of a memory.

I guess my point in this post is that not everyone wants the same growth from their music.
ld:

TopDog said:

I know most of the standard chords and a load
of the rarer (or rarely used) ones. I have a pretty
good sense of rhythm/timing and apparently I can
sing (more or less!) in tune.
But music theory just zooms through my head and
out the other side. Many kind and patient folk have
tried to teach me over the years, but you know what?
I just enjoy doing what I do, without understanding all
the technical aspects of it! That's what it's all about!

Click to expand...

Understanding a bit of theory makes finding "a load of the rarer (or rarely used)" chords a lot easier.
Knowing how chords are formed makes it possible to figure out your own chords.
If you know how to make an A chord, the finding an Ami is easy. (Just flat the third note, C#, in the A scale.)
If you know an Ami, then finding an Amib5 is easy. (Just find the fifth note in the A scale, E, and flat it.)
If you know an Amib5, then finding a Bmib5 is easy as well. (Just move the Ami7b5 up a step or 2 frets.)

Good point, Jim Yates. Another interesting thing that I know but don't know why is that chords are built of thirds.

Start with C: C D E; C is one E is three.

E F G E is one G is three.

A major chord is built from the starting note and adding two thirds

I am using the key of C. You have to count the notes in the key.

A minor is A C E Two thirds but what makes it minor is the space between the A and the C. That's only three steps

A A# B C

With the major chord the steps between C and E were four steps

C C# D D# E


I don't want to get into A# Bb being the same note. Get a basic theory book.

But back to figuring out chords. Build them by adding thirds and then alter them by sharping or flatting those thirds.

1 3 5 7 9 11 13 all a third apart C E G B D F A

I'm a basic beginner or a little higher compared to someone like Ubulele but this knowledge has helped me.

Knowing the notes on the fretboard and being able to count out the thirds on my fingers helps me figure out chords.

You learn what chords are made of like a major seventh has the normal seventh note and a regular seventh has a flatted seventh.

A minor seventh has a flatted third and a flatted seventh.

C major seventh has a B and a C 7 has a Bb. Guess where the Bb is. First string first fret. What are the other strings:

G C E

Remember that a C chord is CEG. You can put those notes on different order. Those orders are called voicings. They produce different effects and can be used to emphasize different notes, usually on the high string where the melody often lies.