Ask the expert – diagram showing chords within keys

Bob Crockford emailed asking us to look at his chord chart:

“When playing by ear, apart from the common keys of C, D, E, F, G and A, I struggle to remember quickly ‘under pressure’ the equivalent chord sequences in other keys, and also the other chords beyond the normal four in any key e.g. the main chords in G are usually, in the best traditions of Status Quo….G, Em, C and D7, but Am, Bm and (in theory) F#m should also work.

I have jotted down the attached for blu-tacking on the keyboard. I’ve checked it as best I can but someone more skilled might want to double check it (I only ever got to Grade 4). For ease of speed reading under pressure I have abridged certain notes e.g. Ab/G# to G#, since I find it easier to visualise it as a sharp chord rather than a flat chord, conversely Eb is easier for me to visualise than D#.

What do you reckon? I’m sure I’m not the first person to do this, but I find the “Chord Wheels” etc unusable in real time.”

Andy’s chord chart

Andy replies:

Thanks for this. It’s a really good idea to put the 1 4 5 and relative minor (6) chords together in a visual chart, so it’s well worth posting on your keyboard. I think it’s a great idea that everyone who needs a bit of a prompt should do. To put it up on the site we do need to apply a bit of music theory to make sure everyone understands the right chords in the key – and if we don’t it’ll really upset yer classical musos!

So whilst you have the right note sounds here (see Bob’s chart below), the way those sounds are communicated needs to follow a few basic music theory thought process’s:

1. In every key you must have only one of each alphabetical letter between A and G
2. You must never miss out any letters
3. You never mix sharps and flats together in the same key.

I know its sometimes easier to think of Eb in the key of E rather than D# because sharp keys are less spoken about, but if you can get in the habit of thinking about the chords with their correct names for their relative keys it will really help your ear playing and crucially transposing skills in the long run.

In the keys you’ve listed it does mean we need to have an E# or a B# or in the case of G# – an F##! These double sharps genuinely exist in theory, although in practice its why you often see people put songs in flat keys rather than sharp ones. So it might be easier to think of G# as Ab.

Also as per the new chart which I’ve posted above – the 7^th chord is technically a diminished, which is like a minor but the 5^th note is also flattened. However if you play this it sounds quite jazzy and dark. So in pop based music, (i.e. what most modern worship music is based around) if we want to use the 7^th bass note we would play a 5 chord with the 7^th bass note added to it (5/7).

We do a lot of this chord understanding on all of our intermediate DVDs – so I think you’ll find the keyboard one particularly helpful. Similarly, the Intermediate Guitar or Intermediate Bass for those players.

Bob’s original chart – these chords may “sound” right but there are a few errors: