Piano chord chart videos and lessons from expert pianists. 25 basic chord charts, printable chord charts, blues chord charts and much more. While you’re here, don’t forget to download our free Printable Chord Chart
If you can’t be bothered trying to make your own chord chart, you can always find a printable piano chord chart off the internet. These are great as they help you see what keys are related and what you can use when you’re trying to improvise a harmony to a piece.
A complete piano chord chart is something that every pianist and guitarist needs to have at their disposal. These are invaluable for seeing common keys. For anyone who has had to suffer through cadences, the first thing we’re taught to do is write out the chord chart across the top of the page so we can see all the nitty gritty things like 7ths. Especially in a minor key, these can be a real pain!
Like a standard piano chord chart, a piano chord progressions chart is a valuable tool for both students as well as composers. Remember, just because a piece may be in a major key doesn’t mean that you won’t have a minor chords progression in there, and having a chart makes working out diminished and augmented intervals a whole lot faster.
You won’t have to search very long or hard to find a free piano chord chart. They range from a basic piano chords chart that outline keys all the way to charts that include how to modulate and even some progressions. Start off nice and easy by looking for a piano chord chart pdf so you can print it out and have it in front of you as you play and make your own notes as you go along.
If you’re after a piano chord chart for beginners, there are plenty available online as pdf files. Pdf files are generally better than standard docs as they don’t fall prey to formatting issues – this is particularly important for musicians as every line, space and dot can suddenly take on a whole new meaning!
There are different kinds of piano chord charts. For example, some only show one hand, whilst others will teach you how to play piano chords with both hands. These are good if you want to learn how to put your own piano chords for beginners’ songs
After a simple, straight forward basic piano chords chart? Look for a keyboard chart with finger placement. Good finger placement helps you switch between chords smoothly, ensuring a better performance!
If you’re going to learn piano chords online, make sure you practice them and listen really carefully to the sound that you create. If your keyboard chords chart is notated you’ll see that the notes are stacked up on top of each other. Make sure that when you play the notes, the keys are also struck down at the same time. There’s nothing worse than hearing individual keys being put down when you’re really after a good solid block chord.
The piano accordion is a whole other animal to a piano so please do NOT get confused!! Regardless, all keyboard instruments have the ability to strike down more than one note at the same time, meaning, they all have the ability to sound chords. Some chords sound great – these are usually major or minor, others are … less great.
Going through piano chords for beginners, a formula chart is handy as it shows chord inversions. For example, an A major piano chord will contain A, C# and E but we can easily re-arrange these notes so that the C# is now the root, then the E and finally the A. This is known as first inversion. If we allow E to become the bass of the chord we form a second inversion.
Speaking of chord inversions, you can quickly notate chord positions by using the letters “b” for a first inversion and a “c” for a second inversion. If you’re working with 7th chords, then you can also use a “d” to denote a third inversion. Practice playing around with these inversions as these are generally “weaker” than their root position counterparts and as a result, make for great chord progressions.
If you’re after a piano chord chart for beginners (pdf), then make sure you check out the video above. This is something you can either purchase or create yourself. A super handy, visual wheel that outlines what keys you need for each scale chord.
Sometimes you want to be a little bit more genre specific. Let’s say you’re after gospel piano chords and how to play chords on piano for worship. Quite often, a combination of specific chords will be used to create a typical sound. These can include Chord II – V – I.
Piano minor chords don’t have to be confusing. In fact they are quite easy to pick up. First of all, play a major triad (the intervals will be a major third A – C#, followed by a minor third C# – E. This will you give you the basic A-C#-E. To transform this into a minor chord, lower the middle note by a semitone, that is, make each key a minor third interval. You should now have A C E. If you are after a 7th chord, add another minor third above the E. Your final chord should be A C E G.
Sometimes you need to stick to the one key and bass all chords of that key. For example the key of F. Staying in this key we can play F major, F minor, F Augmented, F Diminished, F 7th chords. Really, there are some beautiful piano chord progressions.
If you’re a beginner, you may want to start with some easy piano chord progression exercises. These are especially important if you like to improvise harmonies or if you are a composer.
Another genre specific style of using chords, blues and piano has always been a fantastic combination. More often than not you’ll be using a variation of a walking bass with minor chords progression.
You can learn piano chords within a few minutes. Keyboard chords aren’t hard but they do take practice and concentration. Listen to what you create and let your ear guide you. No need for music lessons online or a piano teacher!
The main thing to take away from all this information is that chords are changeable. You can have a piece in C major and easily use the IV to move into F major, touch on Bb major, into G minor… you get the idea. Once you get the idea of chords you can play around with them, adding 7th notes to chords to create more richer harmonies and more exotic sounds.
Knowing all the keyboard chords and scales does make life easier but if you’re starting out, then watching a few videos isn’t bad. You can hear what the chords sound like and you can also check out fingering on the piano. Sneaky… but it works
Before you can jump into chords, you might want to familiarise yourself with the Blues Scale. It typically uses the tonic, flat 3rd, fourth, flat 5th, 5th and flat 7. There’s lots of chromaticism and don’t forget to use the syncopated rhythms for the melodic lines.
If you want to explore chords a little deeper, and you want more complex piano chord progressions, move beyond inversions and 7ths and explore the world of 9ths, 11ths and 13ths.
Want to know a little secret? Most pop songs can be harmonised by 4 chords. Usually it will stay in the tonic, move to the 4th, 5th and maybe the relative minor.
After some Jazz piano chords? Start off nice and easy with an A major chord (make sure you know the A Major piano scale) and then progress to a fourth higher. In this case, that will be a D chord.
If you’re composing a jazz piece, you really want to make sure your chord progression theory is up to scratch. Pay attention to 7ths and 9ths in particular as they will often feel unstable and need to resolve. Usually the 7th will want to step UP to the tonic.