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In music and music theory a chord (from the middle English cord, short for accord) is now three or more notes sounding simultaneously, or near simultaneously over a period of time. Originally however, a chord simply meant the sounding together of different tones, the resultant of these tones. Broadly, any combination of three or more notes is a chord, although during the common practice period in western music and most popular music some combinations were given more prominence than others. Thus in common usage a chord is only those groups of three notes which are tonal or have diatonic functionality. Chords being directly perceived units, sonorities of two pitches are often interpreted as fragments of three or four note chords.A chord is then also only the harmonic function of the group of three notes, and it is unnecessary to have all three notes form a simultaneity. Less than three notes may and often do function, in context, as a simultaneity of all notes of chord. One example is a power chord, another is a broken chord or arpeggio, where each note in a chord is sounded one after the other. One of the most familiar broken chord figures is Alberti bass. See: accompaniment.
Although, as Jean-Jacques Nattiez (1990, p.218) explains, "we can encounter 'pure chords' in a musical work," such as in the following example from the "Promenade" of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an ExhibitionPictures at an Exhibition is a famous suite of musical pieces, composed originally for piano by Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky and first published in 1874. Mussorgsky wrote the original composition in commemoration of his close friend, the architect and some:
"often, we must go from a textual given to a more abstract representation of the chords being used," as in the following example where the chord on the second stave are abstracted from the actual notes written on the first:
"For a sound configuration to be recognized as a chord, it must have a certain duration." Goldman (1965: 26) elaborates: "the sense of harmonic relation, change, or effect depends on speed (or tempo) as well as on the relative duration of single notes or triadic units. Both absolute time (measurable length and speed) and relative time (proportion and division) must at all times be taken into account in harmonic thinking or analysis."
1 Nonchord tones and dissonance
A nonchord toneA nonchord tone or non-harmony note is a tone in a piece of homophonic music which is not in the chord that is formed by the other tones playing and in most cases quickly resolves to a chord tone. For example, if a piece of music is currently on a C Major is a dissonantIn poetry, dissonance is the deliberate avoidance of patterns of repeated vowel sounds (see assonance). In music, dissonance is the quality of sounds which seem "unstable", and have an aural "need" to " resolve" to a "stable" consonance. Both consonance a or unstable tone which is not a part of the chord that is currently playing and in most cases quickly resolvesResolution in western tonal music theory is the "need" for a sounded note and/or chord to move from a dissonance or unstable sound to a more final or stable sounding one, a consonance. Resolution has a strong basis in tonal music, since atonal music gener to a chord tone.
2 Chord sequences
Chords are commonly played in sequence, much as notes are played in sequence to form melodies. Chord sequences can be conceptualised either in a simplistic way, in which the root notes of the chords play simple melodies whilst tension is created and relieved by increasing and decreasing dissonance, or full attention can be paid to every note in each chord, in which case chord sequences can be regarded as multi-part harmonyThis article is about musical harmony. For other uses of the term, see Harmony (disambiguation) . Harmony is the art of using pitch simultaneity (or chords, actual or implied) in music. It is sometimes referred to as the "vertical" aspect of music, with m of unlimited complexity.
to an example of a chord sequence from Erik SatieEric Alfred Leslie Satie (born Honfleur, 17 May 1866 died Paris, 1 July 1925) was a French composer, performing pianist and publicist. He also described himself as a "gymnopedist" (in 1887, shortly before writing his most famous compositions, the Gymnoped's Sarabande no. 3.
