PhysMuse

This tutorial is a taste of the tutorial for silver members and is just a brief overview of the diatonic chords of the major scale.

If you would like to see the full tutorial, please consider subscribing to silver membership by going to the register link in the menu.

What are diatonic chords

The word diatonic means in the original Greek ‘through the tones’. This means that we construct triads on each scale degree, using only notes from within the scale without adding accidentals from outside that scale. These chords thus all “belong” naturally to the key you’re working in.

How to construct diatonic chords for the major scale

As we learnt in the tutorial on the major scale the major scale is composed of seven notes based upon a specific step pattern

W – W – H – W – W – W – H

For example, the C major scale

C – D – E – F – G – A – B – C

We also learnt in the tutorial on the construction of triads that we can build triads by stacking thirds.

If we start on each note of the major scale and stack thirds to create triads using only notes from the scale, we get the following combinations of notes and examining the third qualities (major or minor) we can see that the triads that are built are as follows

• C-E-G – M + m – Major Triad
• D-F-A – m + M – minor triad
• E-G-B – m + M – minor triad
• F-A-C – M + m – Major Triad
• G-B-D – M + m – Major Triad
• A-C-E – m + M – minor triad
• B-D-F – m + m – diminished triad

So, we end up with the following chords

• C Major
• D minor
• E minor
• F Major
• G Major
• A minor
• B diminished

Diatonic chords are the backbone of tonal music and are used to build harmony, create progressions, establish a key, and guide emotional movement in songs.

If you would like to learn more about diatonic chords and the different nomenclatures that are used for scale degrees and diatonic chords based upon the different scale degrees, you will find treatment of this in the silver member tutorial.

Some uses of diatonic chords

Here are some of the uses for diatonic chords

• Establishing Key and Tonality
• Creating Chord Progressions
• Supporting Melody
• Functional Harmony – Each diatonic chord has a role
• Improvisation & Composition
• Songwriting & Analysis

Final Thoughts

As can be seen, the process of constructing the diatonic chords for the major scale is relatively straightforward.

For a fuller treatment of the diatonic chords of the major scale please subscribe to silver membership.