How to Play Piano: Harmonizing Scales

(Piano Playing) Man: All of them playing by ear, you can learn which chords to used when in tune by learning how to harmonized a Major Scale. These are simple rules, although, a lot of great music is been written using just a few of these chordal relationships. Later, all now come to that, you can break as many rules as you like. As long as it is sounds good to you, and hopefully your audience. There are many variations of these chords which are created by altering just one or two notes. Let us use the C Major Scale again. This is a diagram of the C Major Scale written with music notation unto what it called Staff Lines. In piano music, these lines are usually broken up into two sections of five lines. An Upper set and a Lower set. The individual lines and the spaces in between correspond with the notes the composer wants the musician to play. The music also indicates note length, velocity and timber. Time Signature is in fill are also written in. The two sets of five stave lines have also been separated for ease of reading. There is a line in between the two sets of five that has been taken out to provide better orientation for the reader. Short versions of these lines are written in when it is needed. (Piano Sound) Man: Missing line represents Middle C on the piano. (Demo on Piano) Man: Middle C has a short line running through it, representing the missing line. (Piano Playing) Man: The notes above and below Middle C are above D and below B. (Demo on Piano) Man: The top five lines are called the Treble Clef and generally represent notes played by the right hand. The bottom five lines are called the Bass Clef and usually indicate notes played by the left hand. However, you had it sometimes required to cross-over. As you can see, (Demo in Writing) Man: Middle C shows up twice: One is in the Bass Clef and one is in the Treble Clef. Again, there are separated for ease of reading but they are the same note. To learn how to harmonize a Major Scale into Chords, we will only concern ourselves with the Treble Clef. Play each notes of the C Major Scale, which you should be pretty familiar with this by now. (Demo on Piano) Man: As you already know, to form a Chord, you take the Root note of the scale. In this case, C, (Demo on Piano) Man: Add the 3rd note of the scale and the 5th note G, this gives you a Three-Note-Triad. (Demo on Piano) Man: The minimum notes required to create a Chord. (Demo on Piano) Man: And then, repeat this pattern for each note in the scale (Demo on Piano) Man: Just provides a group of Chord (Demo on Piano) Man: We alter each notes only using the notes from the Scale. (Demo on Piano) Man: So, the diagram shows you the harmonize C Major Scale. (Demo on Piano) Man: Written in musical notation. (Demo on Piano) Man: here is what it sounds like, first the C (Demo on Piano) Man: Which is Ionian Scale. (Demo on Piano) Man: So, again, the resulting chords are C Major, (Demo on Piano) Man: D minor, (Demo on Piano) Man: E minor (Demo on Piano) Man: F Major (Demo on Piano) Man: G Major (Demo on Piano) Man: A minor (Demo on Piano) Man: B Diminished (Demo on Piano) Man: And, C Major.