Austin Guitar School

Quality Check

Here's a quick way to check for the quality of chords when trying to learn a song by ear. Suppose, for example, that the tune seems to be on A at a particular point, but you're having a tough time hearing if it's A major or A minor. You know the A minor should have a C natural for it's 3rd, and the A major should have a C#, but at times it can be tough to hear which of those two notes is working best. One way of making it easier to hear is to put the third up an octave. This puts it much closer to the rest of the band, and should make it easier to hear how well you're harmonizing. For this example, you'd play C on the G string 5th fret instead of the A string 3rd fret. C# would be on the G string 6th fret instead of the A string 4th fret.

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A minor, A major, A minor, A major,

A, C and E A, C#, and E C moved up one C# moved up one

octave. octave.

Try this the next time you run into one of those ambiguous sounding chords; if only the root note sounds right, moving the third an octave can really help. Of course, what seems to be the root can actually be a different chord tone if the chord is inverted, but that's a topic for our next issue.

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	Quality Check by Rob Roeder copyright 1999 Here's a quick way to check for the quality of chords when trying to learn a song by ear. Suppose, for example, that the tune seems to be on A at a particular point, but you're having a tough time hearing if it's A major or A minor. You know the A minor should have a C natural for it's 3rd, and the A major should have a C#, but at times it can be tough to hear which of those two notes is working best. One way of making it easier to hear is to put the third up an octave. This puts it much closer to the rest of the band, and should make it easier to hear how well you're harmonizing. For this example, you'd play C on the G string 5th fret instead of the A string 3rd fret. C# would be on the G string 6th fret instead of the A string 4th fret. A minor, A major, A minor, A major, A, C and E A, C#, and E C moved up one C# moved up one octave. octave. Try this the next time you run into one of those ambiguous sounding chords; if only the root note sounds right, moving the third an octave can really help. Of course, what seems to be the root can actually be a different chord tone if the chord is inverted, but that's a topic for our next issue.