Chord Notation Discussion

Chord Notation Discussion

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When we say Chord notation, it refers to the written notation for musical chords using chord symbols.
Although these symbols are used occasionally in classical music, they are "universally used in jazz and
popular music" to specify the harmony of compositions, usually inside lead sheets (cheat sheets) and fake
books.

Contents:
1 Chord symbols and staff notation
2 Intervals
3 Chord Notation
4 Triads
4.1 Major Triads
4.2 Minor Triads
4.3 Augmented Triads
4.4 Diminished Triads
5 Sevenths
6 Extended tertian chords
6.1 9ths
6.2 11ths
6.3 13ths
7 Added Chords
8 Suspended Chords
9 Inversions
10 Hybrid chords
10.1 Upper structures
10.2 Polychords
11 Notes
12 References
13 See also

Chord symbols and staff notation

Although it is possible to notate any chord using staff notation, showing not only the harmonic
characteristics but also the exact voicing, staff notation is more difficult to read, requiring years of training.
It may also provide too much information, making improvisation difficult. In fact, although voicings can and
do have a significant effect on the subjective musical qualities of a composition, generally these
interpretations retain the central characteristics of the chord. This provides an opportunity for
improvisation within a defined structure and is important to improvised music such as jazz. Other
problems are that voicings for one instrument are not necessarily physically playable on another (for

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example, the thirteenth chord, played on piano with up to seven notes, is usually played on guitar as a 4or 5-note voicing that is impossible to play on piano with one hand).
As a result of these limitations, a shorthand describing the harmonic characteristics of chords is used. For
more information on chords themselves, see Chord (music). This article concerns systems of notation for
chords, rather than the chords themselves.

Intervals
A chord consists of two or more notes played simultaneously that are certain intervals apart. The following
table shows the labels given to these intervals and the respective notes for each of the twelve keys. Chord
notation provides a shorthand for intervals, not actual notes. This table provides a mapping of intervals to
actual notes to play.

Chord Notation
The first part of a symbol for a chord defines the root of the chord. The root of the chord will always be
played by one of the instruments in the ensemble (usually by a bass instrument) failure to include the
root means that the indicated chord is not being played. By convention, the root alone indicates a simple
major triad, i.e., the root, the major third, and the perfect fifth above the root. After this, various additional

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symbols are added to modify this chord. There is unfortunately no universal standard for these symbols.
The most common ones are presented here. Chord notation does not easily provide for ways of
describing all chords. Some chords can be very difficult to notate, and others that exist theoretically are
rarely encountered. For example, there are 6 possible permutations of triads (chords with three notes)
involving minor and major thirds and augmented/diminished and perfect fifths. However, conventionally
only four are used (major, minor, augmented and diminished). There is nothing to stop a composer using
the other two, but the question of what to call them is interesting. A minor third with an augmented fifth
might be, for example, Am+, which will strike most musicians as odd; in fact, this turns out to be the same
as F/A (see slash chords below). A major third with a diminished fifth might be shown as A(?5). Usually,
when a composer requires a chord that is not easily described using this notation, he/she will indicate the
required chord in a footnote or in the header of the music.

Triads
Major Triads
A major triad can be built on each note:

Referring to the interval table, we can see that the notes to play for C are the root C, the major third E and
the perfect fifth G. For Bb the notes are Bb, D, F:

For the rest of this article, we will build our examples using C as the root of our chords.

Minor Triads
Minor triads are the same as major triads, but with the third lowered by a half step. The most common
notations are as follows:

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Augmented Triads
These are the same as a major triad, but with an augmented fifth instead of a perfect fifth. The most
common ways to notate this are as follows:

Diminished Triads
Diminished triads are similar to minor triads, but with a diminished fifth instead of a perfect fifth (the minor
third is retained). The most common ways this is notated are as follows:

Please note that while the above symbols are commonly seen, the technically correct way to write a C
diminished triad is C.

Sevenths
A seventh chord is a triad with an added note, which is either a major 7th above the root, a minor 7th
above the root (flatted 7th), or a diminished 7th above the root (double flatted 7th). Note that the
diminished 7th note is enharmonically the same note as the major 6th above the root of the chord.
There are several different kinds of seventh chords, including major, dominant, minor, and diminished. For
example, if you add the major 7th interval to your triad the resulting chord is called a major 7th, because
the note you are adding to your triad is a major 7th interval above the root and the base chord is a major
chord. A major chord built with the flatted 7th note above the root is known as a major-minor 7th chord, or
a dominant 7th chord, or simply just a 7th chord. However, a dominant 7th chord usually refers to a chord
built on the 5th note of the scale (in C major, this would be G). The G chord is the dominant (V) chord in
the key of C major, therefore a G7 chord in C major is the dominant 7th, and all the notes used in this
chord are diatonic to the key of C Major.
The table below shows the various kinds of 7th chords:

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Note: A chord written with a minus sign to the right without any other symbol is a straight minor chord.

Extended tertian chords

Extended tertian chords add further notes onto 7th chords. Of the 7 notes in the major scale, a seventh
chord uses only 4. The other 3 notes can be added in any combination; however, just as with the triads
and seventh chords, notes are most commonly stacked a seventh implies that there is a fifth and a third
and a root. In practice, especially in jazz, certain notes can be omitted without changing the quality of the
chord.
The 9th, 11th and 13th chords are known as Extended Tertian Chords. As the scale repeats for every
seven notes in the scale, these notes are enharmonic to the 2nd, 4th, and 6th except they are more than
an octave above the root. However, this does not mean that they must be played in the higher octave.
Although changing the octave of certain notes in a chord (within reason) does change the way the chord
sounds, it does not change the essential characteristics or tendency of it. Accordingly, using 9th, 11th and
13th in chord notation implies that the chord is an extended tertian chord rather than an added chord (see
Added Chords below).
9ths
These are chords with the note that is an interval of a ninth added to the chord. The 9th notation implies
that the 7th is also included in the chord, though in some cases it may be omitted. 9ths may be
theoretically added to any type of chord, however they are most commonly seen with Major, Dominant and
Minor sevenths. The most commonly omitted note for voicings is the perfect 5th.

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11ths
These are theoretically 9th chords with the 4th note in the scale added. However, it is common to leave
certain notes out. As well as the 5th, the 9th (2nd) can be omitted. The major 3rd is omitted because of a
strong dissonance with the 11th (4th), therefore called an "avoid note". Omission of the 3rd reduces an
11th chord to the corresponding suspended 7th or 9th chord and it is properly no longer an 11th chord
(see Added Chords below). Similarly, omission of the 5th in a sharped 11th chord reduces its sound to a
flat-five chord.

Alterations from the natural diatonic chords can be specified as C9#11 etc.

13ths
These are theoretically 11th chords with the 6th note in the scale added. Again it is common to leave
certain notes out. After the 5th, the most commonly omitted note is the troublesome 11th (4th). The 9th
(2nd) can also be omitted. A very common voicing on guitar for a 13th chord, for example, is just the root,
7th, 3rd and 13th (6th).

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Added Chords
An important characteristic of jazz is the extensive use of sevenths. The combination of 9th (2nd), 11th
(4th) and 13th (6th) notes with 7ths in a chord give jazz chord voicing their distinctive sound.
However the use of these notes is not exclusive to the jazz genre; in fact they are very commonly used in
folk, classical and popular music generally. Without the 7th, these chords lose their jazzy feel, but can still
be very complex. These chords are called added chords because they are basic triads with notes added.
Added chords can be described as having a more open sound than extended chords. Notation must
provide some way of showing that a chord is an added chord as opposed to extended. There are two
ways this is shown generally, and it is very common to see both methods on the same score. One way is
to simply use the word 'add':

This would indicate that the 13th is added to the 7th, but without the 9th and 11th. The use of 2, 4 and 6
as opposed to 9, 11 and 13 pretty safely indicates that the chord does not include a 7th unless specifically
specified. However, it does not mean that these notes must be played within an octave of the root, nor the
extended notes in 7th chords should be played outside of the octave, although it is commonly the case. It
is possible to have added chords with more than one added note. The most commonly encountered of
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these are 6/9 chords, which are basic triads with the 6th and 2nd notes of the scale added. These can be
confusing because of the use of 9, yet the chord does not include the 7th. A good rule of thumb is that if
any added note is less than 7, then no 7th is implied, even if there are some notes shown as greater than
7.

Suspended Chords
Finally, mention should be made of a special kind of commonly encountered chord, the suspended chord.
A suspended chord is a triad where the 3rd is replaced by another note. In practice the 3rd is replaced
either by the 4th or the 2nd. These are called suspended chords because they create an impression of
suspense. These chords "desire" to resolve into a normal triad. Suspended chords are notated with the
symbols "sus4" or "sus2". Sometimes you will see "sus" on its own, in which case the 4 is implied. This
can be combined with any other notation. So for example: Csus 9
This chord is an extended 9th chord with the 3rd replaced by the 4th (C-F-G-Bb-D). However, the major
third can be added as a tension above the 4th to "colorize" the chord (C-F-G-Bb-D-E). A sus4 chord with
the added major third (sometimes called a major 10th) can also be quartally voiced as C-F-Bb-E.

Inversions
In addition to all of the ways of building chords (listed above), a chord may be inverted. Inverting a chord
refers to playing a chord, but with a note other than the root as the lowest note of the chord. Take, for
example, the C Major Chord. Refer to the table below for a list of inversions.
C Major Chord

The notation C/E indicates that you are playing a C major chord, but with an E in the bass, likewise the
notation C/G indicates that a C major chord is played with a G in the bass.

Hybrid chords
Upper structures
Those are notated in a similar manner to inversions, except that the bass note is not necessarily a chord
tone.
Examples: C/Ab (Ab C E G), equivalent to A?7?5;
C?/E (E G? C? F); Am/D (D A C E) etc.

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Chord notation in jazz usually leaves a certain amount of freedom to the player as for voicing chords, also
adding tensions at the player's discretion. Therefore, upper structures are most useful when the composer
wishes for a specific tension array to be played.
Example:

produces a certain coloration of the following chord progression:

Polychords
Polychords, as the name suggests, are combinations of two or more chords. The most commonly found
form of a polychord is a bi-chord (two chords played simultaneously) and is written as follows:

In case a very specific voicing is needed, the individual chords can be written in their desired
inversions,for example:

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