Do you know that without night time you wouldn’t appreciate daytime that sunlight brings?

 

Major Chords do sound bright and full of energy however playing minor chords in the Mix of your Chord Progression or Song makes your music a whole lot of a better experience.

 

Minor Chords adds that dark and sad  sound to the music thereby making you appreciate Major Chords even better.

 

The Minor Chord Formula

Root + minor 3rd + Perfect 5th (1 b3 5)

 

This is very easy to interpret on the Keyboard

 

To get a D minor Triad;

  1. Begin by finding the root note of the Chord. In this case D is the Root Note, hence it will be the starting note of the D minor Triad. If we were for an A minor Triad, it will definitely start with the “A” note
  2. Next, count three half steps (1 and a half step) from the root note D to find the minor 3rd (b3 or flat 3). I guess you arrived at F (that is correct) and this note gives the chord the minor quality.
  3. Finally, count up seven half steps from the root note to find the perfect 5th (you get A). This adds stability and richness to the chord.
  4. Play all three notes together to have the full D minor triad (D+F+A)

 

Below are all the 12 minor Triads on the Piano. You may want to save for practice reference.

 

NB: As an exercise, please try and see how we arrived at these minor chords using the minor chord formula.

Are you wondering about the fingering for minor triads?

Use same fingering as you did for Major Chords.

1-3-5 (on the right hand)

5-3-1 (on the left hand)

 

See beginners lesson on Major Chord fingering for understanding.

 

Once you are done practicing, let’s proceed to the next lesson.

Categorized in:

Step-Up Lessons