This is a lesson taken from our Beginners Worship Keyboard DVDs. The clip explains how to play the song Lord Reign in Me. It is then demonstrated by the band so that you can watch and play along. There is a chord chart in the members section of our website (login to your account to access this free resource).
Reg Garner from Middlesex in the UK emailed saying:
“Thanks for the intermediate keyboard course; I’m enjoying it very much. I wonder if you could give me a bit of advice? If you were to play something starting in a minor key, say the key of ‘Am’, what would be the auxiliary notes to use for the best effect?”
Andy replies:
Probably the best place to start to find the right notes in a minor key is to find out its relative major key.
To find any relative major key you simply go up three semi tones from the minor root. So, for instance three semi tomes up from A is C. Then you simply use all those notes from that C major scale as each minor key has a relative major that it borrows the very same notes from.
In terms of which notes to use in the scale, well in theory you could use any but in reality its good to think about the chords you are playing over and use notes from those chords or a stepwise movement. This means using notes in the key that are directly next to a note you are trying to land on when the next chord is played. For example if the next chord in the sequence is F then try a run of D E and F notes but only get to that note when the F chord is actually played.
Other posts you may find helpful:
Understanding how to form and use melodic fills
Aks the Expert – Improvisation skills for keyboard
Free video lesson – 10 things to do with chords on a keyboard
E7#9 – Use in place of a dominant 7th. It’s effectively got both the major and minor 3rds so it goes crunch! Hendrix fans will recognise the sound of this.
Click through for the guitar version of Hendrix’s E7#9
Other posts you might like:
Keyboard Chord – A7#5
Guitar Chords of the Month – Archive
We’ve had so many requests for copies of our drum groove “backing tracks” on MP3 tht we’ve made them available on our webstore.
There are 19 tracks in total representing a wide range of grooves and tempos. Originally constructed by Matt Weeks as drum grooves for our worship bass DVDs, these tracks will be great practice tools for any instrumentalist – they will help you maintain good timing and discipline you to play in a range of styles.
There are grooves to accompany the songs Beautiful On, Holy Holy, Lord Reign in Me, Let Everything That Has Breath, Your Love is Amazing and more. There’s a reggae groove, straight beats, 6/8 and even a classic Paul Evans (Delirious?) groove.
Buy 10 and get a 30% discount (use the code “10 GROOVES” at the checkout)
Buy all 19 and get a 40% discount (use the code “19 GROOVES” at the checkout)
If you need more than just a drum beat then we’d recommend the Worship Backing Band DVDs. But if you fancy checking out the drum grooves go to our webstore.
Tim Martin, presented of our Worship Keyboard DVDs, will be bringing us a new interesting keyboard chord each month. We start with A7#5.
A7#5 – sometimes known as an augmented chord. Basically the 5th is a semitone higher than in a normal 7th chord. This can sometimes be used in place of a dominant 7th chord (but be careful!).
