Tag: glossary

Dynamics

Here is a list of dynamic markings you might encounter in drum sheet music. This list will be updated as more dynamic markings are thought of, and will start out as a basic list of fundamental dynamics notation.

  • pp (pianissimo = very soft/quiet)
  • p (piano = soft/quiet)
  • mp (mezzo piano = medium quiet / medium soft)
  • mf (mezzo forte = medium loud)
  • f (forte = loud)
  • ff (fortissimo = very loud)
  • a wide version of this shape: < (crescendo = gradually getting louder)
  • a wide version of this shape: > (diminuendo = gradually getting quieter)
  • > these arrows above the notes are accents, which indicate that you play loud on this note only.

Chord inversions, Slash Chords, Alternative Bass Notes – A quick explanation

You may have seen chords like Am/C or G/F#. You may have just learned the chord without understanding it. You may have panicked and not played it.
Here is a quick explanation of how it works

The first part of the slash chord is the main chord being played. Some of the slash chords add a lower note, and some take away the lowest notes and replace them with the second part of the slash.

For example, on Am/C, it’s mainly the Am that’s being played, but with an added C note. In this case, the ‘A’ root note is not played, because you will play the C instead.

In another example, for D/A, you are mainly playing a D chord, but you also play the A string as the root note, so in this case no notes have been removed.
Is it an inversion?

An inversion is when you use one of the notes that make up a chord (eg. C E G = the C chord), and place one of those notes as the lowest note (e.g. play the low E string and you get C/E).
When is it not an inversion?

When you add a note that’s in the same key, but wasn’t in the chord initially. For example, G/F# is not an inversion; it’s just called a slash chord with an alternative bass note, because the regular G chord is only usually made up of the notes G, B and D. An inversion of G would be G/B or G/D.
Further Reading

There is some quite good info here that shows you various chords: http://www.scenicnewengland.net/guitar/chords/slash.htm

 

Relative minor and relative major theory summary

Natural minor scales consist of 7 different notes, and the same goes for major scales.Some major and minor scales have the same notes as each other, but start on different notes, making them different key signatures. These are relative keys. For example, the C major scale uses all the same notes as the A natural minor scale. On the piano, only the white keys are used for these two scales. For C major, you would start on a C and play ascending notes up to the next C, using only the white keys. For A minor, you would do the same but starting and ending on an A note.

  • C major scales have these notes: C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C
  • A minor scales have these notes: A, B, C, D, E, F G, A
  • Notice both scales use the same notes, but start on a different note.

‘A minor’ (also known as ‘A natural minor’), is called the “relative minor” of ‘C major’, because they are related in terms of using exactly the same notes. Or you could say, C major is the relative major to A minor. Sometimes these can be used in the same song because they fit together. For example, ‘Run’ by Snow patrol plays in the key of A minor for the verses, but then bases the chorus around the C major key, and it works because all the notes and chords in both keys use exactly the same notes, but are just centered in a different place.

Accents

Accents are where you play notes or chords a bit louder. It enables the dynamics for a section to stay the same, but highlight certain notes as being a bit louder. They are used by all styles of music, and are a good way to add dynamic rhythm. For example, to make a driving rock groove, you could play 8th notes (1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +), and accent only the numbers. Heavily accented notes can be used for stabs, or ending notes.

Accents are displayed on sheet music as a right arrow > symbol, or as an upward arrow for a heavily accented note.

Root Notes

Questions about learning root notes and why comes up a lot by guitarists.

In this article, I will attempt to answer some questions you might have about root notes, and hopefully encourage some people enough to spend time to learn them.

Learning root notes might sound like a lot of work, but I recommend that you learn them as you go, for example, learn the root notes of an A major barre chord shortly after learning the shape.

Don’t try to learn all the root notes for everything in one go, as that would probably get a bit boring! Instead, you could read through this to pick up the main points, and perhaps check back here when you learn a new barre chord or scale to refresh your memory if you need it.

What are root notes?

Root Notes in Scales

In scales, the root note is the first note in the scale. This is also the root note of the key of the song. In a 2 octave scale, there will be 3 root notes: The first note in the first octave, the first note of the second octave, and you normally end on the 1st note of the 3rd octave.

These are important to know because when you are soloing, it’s often a good idea to resolve to the root note at the end of the solo.

Another good thing for knowing the root notes, is that you could start soloing half way through a 2 octave scale, by starting on the second root note. In RGT grade 5 and above, you actually are required to know many scales in this way, by playing 1 octave scales in 5 positions. They are all actually the same notes,but played starting on various root notes. So here you will be forced to learn the root notes! The idea of this is useful: to be able to play the same riff all over the guitar neck but a acheive different tones, or be able to apply different techniques such as hammer ons or slides in different places that you couldn’t in others.

Root Notes in Chords

Major chords are made up of 3 notes (a root note, and two others). Almost always, the first note in any chord is the root note. The root note of an A chord is A. The root note of an E chord is E. Easy.

In standard major and minor barre chords on the E string, there are 3 root notes in total. This is the first note, last note, and the one that you hold down with the little finger. Knowing where root notes are in other chords, and how they are constructed is usefull for picking out those notes if you want to, or for creating variations of the chord. If you want to find out more, do a quick search on here, or on google, for ‘chord construction’.

Root Notes in Arpeggios

Knowing the root notes in arpeggios is similar to learning about chord construction, because an arpeggio is basically the notes that make up a chord in chronological order, played for 1 or more octaves. For example:

  • a C major barre chord is made up of the notes C E G.
  • the order that these notes are played in on fret 8 of the E string is actually C G C E G C when you use the major barre chord shape on the E string.
  • The 2 octave major arpeggio shape on the E string would be played on fret 8 as well so it’s in C. The notes would be in order though, so they would be C E G C E G C. Knowing where the root notes are (the C’s) is helpful for starting the arpeggio half way through, or making your own custom arpeggios.