Can someone point me to a website or book that contains tables of chord spellings like below?

I’d like to have these tables in my 3-ring music theory binder for fast and easy retrieval when I need them.

I don’t know how many possible chords there are, so if there are zillions (like scales) here is the list that I eventually would like to obtain.

Major
Major 6
Major 7
Suspended 2
Suspended 4
Augmented
Augmented Major 7
Dominant 7
Minor
Minor 6
Minor 7
Minor Major 7
Diminished
Diminished 7
Half Diminished 7

Also, for those chords that contain more than 3 notes, it would be great if the 3 essential notes could be identified. Of course, sharp and flat chords are needed, not just major chords.

I’m thinking somebody must have organized this in an easily digestible format.
Thanks for any pointers.

How about this site: https://www.onlinepianist.com/piano-chords or this: https://www.pianochord.org/f-sharp-m7b5.html

Or are you looking for a pdf to print?

This says "piano", but only the first few have piano keys against them. Most are just listed by note names.
http://www.piano-keyboard-guide.com/piano-chords.html

In many ways though, possibly the best approach is to learn the rules and intervals, because then one can build any chord, from the ground up, from first principles. There are an awful lot if one tries to learn them.

Thanks Student,
Both of these websites should allow me to construct the tables but they don't show the 3 essential notes.
For example CMajor7 is shown as C-E-G-B. What are the 3 essential notes? I'm guessing C-E-B.

And yes, a PDF file to print would be ideal and much faster if that exists.

Thanks Gordon,
I don't need the piano keys per-se but I do need the note names.
This site also looks like I could construct the tables but again it doesn't show the 3 essential notes.

OK, now this changes the question. For a bass player, I would think the three most essential notes of a chord are the root, fifth, and seventh. To look at this another way, a keyboard player or guitarist might choose not to play the root or fifth, thinking the bass has it covered, but they will most certainly play the third to establish whether the chord is major or minor. As the seventh is either major or dominant (minor), that is a nice tone for the bass to hit once in a while. The upper extensions, like 9th, 11ths, 13ths, or flatted versions of same, are usually not played by the bass. Does that help?

Essential Notes is not familar terminology to me. The chord tones (or spelling) of a CMajor7 are the 1st, 3rd, 5th and 7th in the C Major Scale. So that would be a four note chord, as shown C-E-G-B. So while C-E-B is technically a CMaj7 with no 5th, I don't now of any listing which would specify this, in this manner. Maybe something I don't know.

A change of avatar pic Dan, looking well.

Thanks Matt. Don't think bass player only. I have a keyboard and find myself using in more and more. It gives me a musical satisfaction different from what I get from my bass. Here is an example where I'm playing the brass section which I know can be improved.

https://www.pgmusic.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=730758&page=1

Knowing how the chords in my songs are constructed (as opposed to looking at them as black boxes) can only help me on both instruments.

I appologize. I thought "essential notes" is a common concept in music, my bad.

I think what "essential notes" means is those notes that are required in the chord for the chord to maintain its fullness or most of it's fullness. If you ommit non-essential notes, the chord won't completley collapse or be non-recognizable. Think required, fundamental, or necessary.

See the 4th paragraph at this site.

http://www.hakwright.co.uk/music/quick_crd_ref.html

That chart tells you everything you need to know.

What it doesn't tell you and no chart will tell you is what to play. As a guitarist I leave out a lot of notes. What you have to think about is what notes are the entire band going to or are playing. For instance in a C7 to a Cm7 chord progression your horn section might only play the 3rd b7th to the the b3rd and b7th. The bass may play the 1 and 5 while the piano plays the entire chords.

Look carefully at the chard and most chord essentials (I never heard of that terminology either) and you will see that the 1-3 and the chord extensions (7,9,11,or 13) are labeled as essentials. Other chord essentials according to the chart are #5, sus2, sus 4, etc. What the chart doesn't include are added extensions like C7#13, or Cm7#11.

Don't forget as a bassist you can play any note in the chord and use passing notes to go either the another chord note or a different chord note. If it sounds good it is good.

I hope this helps and good luck.

I’ve never really thought about any notes not being essential to a chord. Even if no one is playing them, I hear all the notes of the chord in my head.

I studied a thing called Shell Chords which is much like "essential Chords". However, it is bit of a Jazz Guitar 101 concept. But unlike "essential chords", you can google "shell chords".

Shell Chords (aka guide tone chords) are basic jazz guitar chords and are essential knowledge for every jazz guitarist. Having a good understanding of shell chords will make it easier for you to learn more complex chords later on.

Shell chords only contain 3 notes:

The 1, also known as the root.
The third: 3 in major and dominant chords, b3 in minor chords.
The seventh: 7 in major chords, b7 in dominant and minor chords.
The third and seventh are the most important notes of a chord because they define if a chord is major, dominant or minor.

It sounds to me like you are attempting think of everything as a form of triad. This all depends on inversions, the emphasis on 7th's etc relative to the music, and chord progressions, etc. One persons suggestion of the three 'essential' notes will likely not always agree with another's.


Hmmm. Does not compute . You mean like an F Major chord and also an F# Major Chord? Or an A Major chord and an Ab Major chord? They are all Major chords. Perhaps you meant minor chords as well as major chords?

Duly noted, but apparently the guitar chord website talks about essential chords which to me indicates a simplification. And having no formal (and little informal) music training, I'm thinking simplification is a good thing.

Yes, per the table I posted the F Major chord is F-A-C.
I don't know what the F# Major chord is. It isn't in the table and I don't know how to derive it.

If I need to memorize each and every scale in order to derive the chord spellings, that seems like a huge effort. Or is the solution to use one of the websites MusicStudent provided above and mouse-click to produce the spellings?

Thanks Mario, some of this is starting to sink in.

Part of why I'm asking this is what you are saying. "As a bassist you can play any note in the chord".

The problem is, I don't yet know the notes that make up all the chords I'm likely to encounter . . . hence the need for the tables.

C Major thru B Major (naturals only) I have covered; See the table above. But
C# Major ??
D# Major ??
Gb Major ??

Then we have minor chords and the rest shown on the list in original post.

First, the major triad for a F# would be F#,A#,C#. And while it may seem like a huge effort it is really just a matter of putting in the time to understand basic theory. So, yes you could just use the websites I pointed to or get a book/cheat sheet and look up what and when you need to. But the more you use this stuff the more it starts to sink in. There really is a means to the madness.

You are asking the right questions. Just keep at it.

And if I may...

Every Major Chord is built from the Major Scale no matter what key you start from. The formular for a Major Scale is: (I) whole step (ii) whole step (iii) half step (IV) whole step (V) whole step (vi) whole step (VII) half step (I)

Every scale (Minor, Augmented, Diminished) has a different and unique formular

I think a light bulb went off.
If F Major is F-A-C and F# Major is F#-A#-C#
Then is C# Major C#-E#-G# = C#-F-G#?

And D# Major D#-F##-A# = D#-G-A#?

If so, does the same work Xb Major? Just flatten the notes of the natural major chord notes?

Yes, by George I think you've got it. You had my head spinning since there are so many ways to think about this stuff.

To move a major scale up a half step (C to C#) every note in the triad moves up a half step and likewise to move the scale down a half step every note in the scale goes down a half step (C - Cb). Then, just like you did you have to clean up the accidentals. for example. (F## = G).

I just have 1 bone to pick.
We need to change your name from MusicStudent to MusicTeacher !
The mark of a good teacher is to recognize what his students don't know and you have that skill my friend!

Here are the major chord spellings with sharp root notes.
I think I can produce the corresponding table for the flat root notes.

So for the rest of the list in my original post should I use one of the websites you provided?

Yes, it works exactly like that.
What's important is the intervals between the notes .. the intervals are always the same on and same type of chord, no matter on what note they start. It's true of all the notes in a chord, including the various 9ths and so on. Notes may sometimes be moved to the same note in a different octave.
Learning how to find them quickly and easily is part of the challenge.

Actually, technically, there is no key of D#. It'd be Eb. Comprised of Eb, G, Bb. (The 1-3-5 of the Eb scale. Reference back to the "counting" method and the 'wwhwwwh' scale structure I shared in that PM.)

Familiarize yourself with this.



C is "neutral". As you move left, you add a flat. As you move right, you add a sharp.

Also note that as you move left you move from the root note to the 4th of that scale. As you move right you move from the root note to the 5th of that scale.

When you hear that the progression is "1-4-5" from whatever your start key is, 4 is one to the left, 5 is one to the right.

The green letters in the inner circle are the 6th step of the scale, called the relative minor. The famous "Don't Stop Believing" chord riff is 1-5-6m-4, lifted from Pachelbel's Canon in D. Using that Circle of 5ths chart you can wing that song in any key. Or play at any blues jam, which are mostly going to be some variation of 1-4-5 with that occasional 6m tossed in.

It's all about repetitions. The more golf balls you hit or rounds you fire, the better you become at whatever the skill is. If you want it, you'll get there.

Thanks to all for helping me. Especially MusicStudent (aka MusicTeacher).
Going back to my original post, here is the 1st of 15 tables I was hoping to find in a book or website. Clearly it took some effort to build this table but I find this table very easy and fast to read.

At some point, I'd like to build the other 14.

Some of the motivation behind this endeavor is that the currency that BiaB uses is the chord. So I'm thinking that it might pay dividends for me to know how these chords are constructed and spelled. This table does exactly that and it was fun to build.

Am I barking up a wrong tree here?
Is this table useless for the theory newbie?

AudioTrack, hopefully you see now what I was trying to say in my original post regarding sharps and flats. I apologize for not having the necessary music vocabulary to express all my thoughts crystal clearly.

Unless I have a typo, I think you can confirm in this table that the 4 enharmonics are maintained at the chord level.
FbMaj = EMaj
E#Maj = FMaj
CbMaj = BMaj
B#Maj = CMaj

I realize that all of these chords (and others) may not be used in making music, but as an educational exercise I wanted to be complete and understand how note and chord names work. Eddie points out that technically the key of D# doesn't exist. OK, but I'm interested in chords because BiaB uses chords. The relationship between chords and keys will be a subject in the future. I'm just trying to understand chords at this time.

I really appreciate all your help. And I know I need a Music Theory course at a local Community College but that's not possible at this time.

Though this is an old video it may be useful to you



Here’s a newer Backing track creation video


You would mute the bass track and any others that you didn’t want

You may also want to become familiar with band in the box’s Guitar window options

https://www.pgmusic.com/manuals/bbw2022full/index.htm 2022 online manual

You already acknowledged "it was fun". Can't ask for anything more. An by the way, making this table is essential for a theory newbie!

So now keep moving forward. You will discover that after a while you will not need this table since you will now understand how the table is made. I suggest you now pick up your instrument (Bass?) and find all these notes (apreggios) on the neck. You will discover these all have the same pattern up and down and across the neck (major triads). This will provide a new reference point for you in identifying the intervals which will reinforce what the tables have told you. Then yes, Scales next!

Thanks "Teacher"

Just Google "Piano chord charts". Lots of charts available.

Drowning in information but starving for knowledge. The yin and the yang of Google.

FWIW, I searched for "bass guitar chords", rather than piano.
Much of the time a bass player will play arpeggios, rather than chords, but as arpeggios comprise the notes from the chords, that's fine. It also fives the opportunity to see helpful fingerings/voicings.

This seemed to me to be quite useful: https://ebassguitar.com/chords-on-the-bass-guitar/
YMMV.

Incidentally, I note he refers to the 10th. That's a little unconventional, at least when referring to piano chords, but it's just another way of describing the 3rd and octave up.

FYI - Around here the 10th is quite common among pianists.

Oh, OK. Unknown to me. Nothing really wrong with it, anyhow, I guess.

Does it follow the other usual convention and imply also the dominant-7th and 9th, or is it just a voicing guide?

The old conventions are less important to the younger newer musicians who never learned them. In this information society, anyone can setup a website or contribute to a forum and then pass on information which is limited to the knowledge they possess. Kinda what I do....

As far as I know it is just a voicing guide. JonD's father was a music professor at a local university and he always talked about the 10th. JonD also talked about the 10th as well as the guy whom tunes our piano. I take to mean any chord that has the third an octave over the last note of the chord. As a guitarist I don't worry about those kind of things.

Martin Taylor teaches finding the 10th when he teaches fingerstyle jazz guitar.

Get to Know Mel Bay. He is your friend. I learned an awful lot of theory from those Mel Bay Modern Guitar method book. As well as how to read music.

Interesting. Thanx for the info.

The Mel Bay guitar method was how I started learning guitar some 62 years ago!

From what I remember from college, the 10th falls in a symmetrical line of semitones. Don't quote me though. College was almost 50 years ago and I am having more and more days when I don't remember where my car is when I come out of Walmart.

My BRIGHT ORANGE car!!

Parked right by the door in a handicapped space!!

Yet I remember the house phone number from when I was a little kid. And that was back when there were "word" exchanges rather than all numbers. Our area had EXpress, ENdicott, GArfield and many more.

Mel Bay 60 years ago, +1

For any interval more than an octave, just subtract 7. A 10th is a 3rd up an octave.

I completely misunderstood the original purpose of this thread, and read too much into the question. It was simply about spelling the types of three or four note chords in each key. Sorry; I thought it was about what notes in complex chords could be omitted. Different topic.