I frequently see chords written down in sheet music. Okay, so tell me...can people actually sight read that stuff? I know how to read (i.e. work out) simple notes, but I can't imagine being able to distinguish an entire chord at a glance.
Is the use of chords fairly common in sheet music? For guitars?
Do you read it as a combination of notes, or do you learn to recognize the whole chord as a unit?
Just curious. :D
It is rather easy once you know how to form the chords on the fret board.
Guitar music does come with the chords and often it will have the melody in tablature also.
I would say recognize the whole chord as a unit. I can play a couple dozen chords but I could only tell you the notes in a few of them. I'm sure others have a different approach to this.
Tim Madsen
Nobody cares how much you know,
until they know how much you care.
"What you keep to yourself you lose, what you give away you keep forever." -Axel Munthe
Yes, it's actually possible to sight read chords. After a while, you just get used to it.
A few things help - if you know what chords are naturally in a key (from the key signature, chords on I, IV, or V are major, ii, iii, vi are minor), any measure with no accidentals just has chords of those types. So if you know you're in C, you'll be looking at C, Dm, Em, F, G, Am chord types. A chord might be an extension - Cmaj7, Am7, G7, etc. - but you won't be looking at a diminished, augmented, etc. chords
Next - ya gotta know the key signatures. A chord written with notes (bottom to top) A-E-A-C-E is A minor in some keys, A major in others. If you're playing in minor keys, you'll see accidentals on chords pretty frequently - take a moment before you start to play and figure out what the 7th scale degree is. If you see that in a chord with an accidental, odds are really good it'll be dominant.
Third, look at the basic shape of the chord - are the notes tightly bunched together, or are they spread out over a couple of octaves? If they're bunched together - which is technically known as a 'closed position' chord - you've either got all the notes on spaces (or lines), or two sets - one on spaces, one on lines. The bottom note in one of those two sets is the chord root; that's just the way closed voicings work. If the notes are spread out, see if your eye notices octaves right off... doubled octaves in 'open voicings' are often the chord root ('open voicings' doesn't mean it's an open position chord, just that there's a lot of space between the tones)
Once you're used to reading in key and know the basic harmonies, most of chords will be a piece of cake to read at sight. The ones that really muck things up then aren't 'hard' to read, but they've got one of the following going on:
- open strings. Open string voicings sound great, but it means the lowest note of the chord isn't on the lowest played string.
- multiple accidentals combined with a 'big' key signature. If you're reading in five sharps and you come to a chord with a couple naturals and a flat, it's going to take you some time - this is a chord that isn't 'in key' with the main body of the piece
- you've painted yourself into a corner. Most chord progressions can be done in more than one place on the neck, and some progressions have a logical shift. If you miss that shift, you may suddenly discover the next voicing isn't very playable where you are... you need a 4-5 fret position shift at an awkward moment.
There's a pretty easy way to cope with these situations too... just keep a pencil handy. Make notes above the music for chord symbols or positions, or 'open G' or whatever - and it won't fool you a second time, at least not in the same piece :)
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