Learning To Jam - Page 6

by Jesse Engel Alright! So we've got Roots and we've got Octaves, but what if we want more...?

We'll if we're feeling the urge, the chords that the band plays are made of more notes than the root and we can play those notes too!

Someone once said that chords are frozen arrpegios and arrpegios are melted chords. Most chords you will run into are major or minor. This means that they are composed of the root, (1), a third (3), and a fifth, (5).

1,3,5 {maj} or a 1,3b,5 {min} ex. C maj (C,E,G), Cmin (C,Eb,G)

Along with octaves they have easy to remember shapes to use when jamming:

seq|4_5|3_4|3_7|A major|seq seq|4_5|3_3|3_7|A minor|seq

Here's an example to get you started on the major shapes. This example is an ultra common progression called the "1,4,5" progression. These three chords are in countless songs and are even the foundation of the 12-Bar Blues.

This example is in the key of A, and all the chords are major. (A,D,E)