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| Version | User | Scope of changes |
|---|---|---|
| Dec 5 2008, 9:00 PM EST (current) | rserpe | 426 words added, 5 photos added |
| Dec 5 2008, 8:57 PM EST | rserpe |
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What Are Power Chords?
Power chords are used quite often in rock and heavy metal music on electric guitars, but you can also hear them in other types of music. Technically speaking, power chords are not true chords. A chord is made up of 3 or more notes. Power chords are only made up of 2 different notes. Before you can fully understand what a power chord is, let us take a look at a true major chord. A major chord is made up of the 1st, 3rd and 5th notes of its corresponding major scale.For example, let us look at the C Major Scale. The C Major Scale is made up of the following notes:
| C | D | E | F | G | A | B | C |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 |
To play a C Major Chord, we will need to play the 1st , 3rd and 5th notes of the C Scale, which are: C E & G As you can see from this diagram the C Major Chord is only made up of the notes C E & G
Let’s do one more. Let’s take a look at the A Major Scale. The notes of the A Major Scale are:
| A | B | C# | D | E | F# | G# | A |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 |
To play the A Major Chord, we will need to play the 1st, 3rd and 5th notes of this scale, which are: A C# & E As you can see from the diagram below the A Major Chord only uses the notes A C# & E
Now to play
Power Chords, you only play the 1st and 5th notes of the scale. Let’s look at both a Major Chord and a Power Chord side by side to help illustrate this point. |  |
Be careful with power chords. Power chords are enjoyable and easy to play, but because they are so easy to play, beginners often get too caught up in them and neglect learning the real chords. Don’t do this! Learning real chords is very important to your growth as a guitar player....
Please follow this link to view the rest of this article including a free guitar power chords chart...
