[MUSIC] Last week we talked about scales. Now, scales are notes that are played consecutively, one after the other. This week we're going to talk about chords. Chords, essentially, are notes that are played together. At the same time, and when we play notes together, we wind up with what's called harmony. Remember last week we spoke about a C Major scale. [MUSIC] That was one of the scales we learned, C Major scale in first position. Now if we take notes from that major scale, we can wind up with chords. What we're going to do is skip over every other note. And we're going to play three notes to play a chord. So we start with the C. [MUSIC] We skip over to D. [MUSIC] We use [MUSIC] the E. Skip over the F, and use the G so we end up with C, E and G. [SOUND] Let's run through that again really quickly. Remember the major scale. [SOUND] We're going to take the first note, [SOUND] skip over the second, [SOUND] play the third note, skip over the fourth, and play the fifth. [SOUND] So we end up with one, [SOUND], three, [SOUND] and five [SOUND]. [SOUND] That chord is called a major triad. And it uses one, three and five of the major scale with the same root. We have C major. And now we have a C major chord. The C major chord essentially captures the essence of the C major scale. [MUSIC] That was a C major chord built from a C major scale and that was in root position. Now root position means that the root is bottom the third is in the middle. [MUSIC] And the five is on top. If we would've changed the order. Like if you were to play three, five and then put one on top an octave higher it would still be a C major chord. However, it would be a different inversion. So here we have a root position chord. [MUSIC] Now we're going to take one which is the C and we're going to play C up an octave and we're going to play the same sequence of three and five but we're going to play C up an octave. [MUSIC] We call that one first inversion. First inversion has three on the bottom, has five in the middle and it has the root on top. It sounds the same, but it sounds slightly different at the same time. So we have root position. Now we have first inversion. [MUSIC] Now, if we were to take the E. [MUSIC] That's now on the bottom, and if we were to put that E on top an octave higher on the open string, first string. And we played, starting with five, and then one, with three on top, we wind up with what we call a second inversion. [MUSIC] So we have root position. First inversion. [SOUND] And now, we have second inversion. [MUSIC] Now they all sound like C chords with a slightly different flavor. [MUSIC] Now, as long as we play those notes, one, three, and five. [MUSIC] In any order. [MUSIC] We are still playing a C major chord. [MUSIC] Fortunately on guitar, we have the ability to double notes. Play a C here. Three. Five. We can double the C and we can still double the E on both the top string, and the bottom string so we wind up with this sound. [MUSIC] Here we have what's called an open position C major cord. [MUSIC] Open position cords allow us to make use of any open strings. They're available to us within that major chord. And there are a few open position chords that we're going to learn this lesson. The first one, of course, is the C major, which we already know now. [MUSIC] Another very popular open position chord is called a G major chord. And it's shaped like this. [MUSIC] Now, if we look at the degrees of the chord, we'll say that's a G on the sixth string, third fret. [SOUND] That's a B. So that's actually the third note in a G major scale. [SOUND] One, two three. [SOUND] That's the fifth note in a G major scale. [MUSIC] Now we have an open G. And we can double notes, triad notes like this. So that would be the root again on the third string open. Here we have the third again. [MUSIC] And then we double the root again on the first string, third fret. So there we have an open position G major chord. [MUSIC] We can do the same thing in the key of A. [MUSIC] A, B, C sharp, D, E, F sharp [MUSIC] G sharp and A. So we start off with the root one. That's five which is the E. We double the root second fret third string with another A. And then we have a C sharp here which is the third. [MUSIC] And then we have the fifth on the open string. [MUSIC] We can also double the open string E down here. [MUSIC] On the sixth string, and so we wound up with an open position. [MUSIC] A major. [MUSIC] We can do the same thing for the key of D. We can start with D. [MUSIC] We have the A which is five. [MUSIC] We double the D which is the root. [MUSIC] We have F sharp on top. Which is our third, and we wind up with an open position D Major chord. [MUSIC] Now if we want, we can play the fifth string which is an open A, because A is part of the chord too. So we can double the A, which is the fifth in the chord, and it sounds like this. [MUSIC] We wouldn't play the sixth string, which is the open E, because E is not part of the D Major chord. The D Major chord one, three and five would be D. F sharp which is the third, and then the A which is the fifth. We can play the A which is part of it. Many people leave the A out because they'd like to hear the root on the bottom of the chord. It sounds a little stronger. [MUSIC] Now we can do the same thing for the key of E. E major we can start off with the root which is E. [MUSIC] We have the fifth which is the B. [MUSIC] Then we have the root doubled here on the fourth string, second fret. [MUSIC] We have a G sharp which is the third. [MUSIC] We have the B which is the fifth. [MUSIC] And then we double the root again. So now we have an open position E major chord. [MUSIC]
