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What is a chord? How do different chords sound?

You can watch this lesson in the video below, or read at your ease under the video.

What is a chord? How do the different chords sound?

So, what is a chord?

A chord is a group of notes (typically 3 or more) played simultaneously. When a sequence of different chords is played, we speak of a chord progression, like for example in a blues chord progression.

Different types of chords

Below, you can find a short description of the most widely used chords in Western music. For a more detailed description of all the types of chords, please refer to the articles about major chords, minor chords and diminished and augmented chords.

Triads

A special type of chords that we often use in Western music is the triad. A triad is simply a chord that consists of 3 notes: the first note (the first note is also called the root), the 3^rd and the 5^th note of a scale. This scale can be a major scale, a minor scale or another sort of scale.

Seventh chords

A seventh chord in its basic form consists of 4 notes:  the root, the 3^rd, the 5^th and the 7^th note of a scale (minor, major , …). So it’s actually a triad with an added 7^th.

How do the chords sound?

It’s important to give you an idea of how chords sound, and to hear the difference between the different sort of chords. Therefore, you can listen to the sound examples below:

The root of all the chords in the sound samples below is a C. Because in this way, it’s easier to compare the different chords.

Triads

• C major triad, notated as: C chord or C triad or mostly just simply as C:
• C minor triad, notated as: Cmin or Cm or C-:
• C diminished triad, notated as Cdim or as C°:
• C augmented triad, notated as: C+:

Seventh chords

• C dominant, or C seventh chord, notated as: C7:
• C minor seventh chord, notated as: Cmin7 or Cm7 or C-7:
• C major seventh chord, notated as: C∆7 or CMaj7 or CM7:
• C minor major seventh chord, notated as: C-∆7:
• C diminished seventh chord, notated as: C^O7 or C^O or Cdim7:
• C half diminished chord, notated as: Cm7b5 or C^ø:

Listen well to the difference of the chords. So, start to listen to the difference between the major, minor, diminished and augmented triads to get a feeling for the major, minor, diminished and augmented sound. Then listen to what the 7^th and the major 7^th do to the sound by:

• comparing a major triad with a dominant (or 7^th) chord and with a major 7^th  chord (so compare C with C7 and C∆7)
• comparing a minor triad with a minor 7^th chord and with a minor major 7^th chord (so compare Cm with Cm7 and C-∆7)

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