The Essential Piano Chords to Know

If you want to play music quickly, you can learn the piano chords. When you are learning to play piano, there is a series of essential chords to know.

What is a piano chord?

In music, a chord is a combination of keys played simultaneously. As they exist for all instruments, the piano is no exception. When you press three or more keys on your piano, therefore, you are playing a chord.

They can be played with one hand and are scalable. Indeed, it is possible to make your chords more complex by using other keys.

There are many types of chords to learn the piano easily. The most common are the major and minor chords. Some chords only require using two keys. Triads, for their part, need three keys.

How to form a chord on the piano

Triads are among the essential piano chords to know. They always combine three notes:

• The first, called the root
• The third, which is one tone above for a minor chord
• The fifth, which is one and a half tones above the third.

The most important chords to know 

It is important to know the most commonly used chords. Indeed, there are a number of chords that come up more often than others. These chords appear naturally in certain scales. All these chords can be played in major or minor.

The tone given to the music defines the feeling that you want to convey to your audience. Major chords are much more cheerful. Minor chords, meanwhile, are more melancholy.

List of piano chords

Among the list of piano chords, we find:

• C major
• D minor
• E major
• F major
• G major
• A minor
• B major

An important skill for playing the piano

By knowing these chords perfectly, you can adapt to all the scales present on a piano. You can also make these chords more complex or play them with your left hand while your right hand plays the melody.

Chords are an integral part of piano music. Each time you play three or more notes on a piano, you are playing a chord. By learning this series of essential chords to know, you can quickly draw the first lines of a piece of music.

Take piano lessons to improve

Finally, any triad of keys offers different tones. Depending on the music, you can adapt very easily by changing the position of your fingers on the keyboard.

If you are starting to play, we recommend taking piano lessons. Thanks to them, you can learn the basics of piano and quickly make progress in learning this instrument! Don’t hesitate to contact us.