This is a 3-part on how to play and effectively use chord inversions.

• Part 1 – [You Are Here] – What Are Piano Chord Inversions
• Part 2 – Piano Chord Inversions Explained in Simple Language
• Part 3 – How to Play Chord Inversions on the Piano

Piano Chord Inversions will help you get the most out of playing chord piano.

Chords are the foundation and structure of a song. It gives you the basic progression of the song allowing you to play a song quickly and easily. The problem with chords is that they lack the flare and important elements in the song.

Chords give you the basic information of the song. It gives you a 30,000 foot view of the song. A vague overview of what needs to be played.

Chord progressions are great because they make it much easier to play songs that have large jump from chord to chord. They also help you add more uniqueness to a song. Rather than just playing a simple chord progression, you can add different inversions into the song to give different sounds and texture to the song.

What is an inversion

Piano chord inversions are taking any piano chord and shifting it up or down the piano.

The notes in the chord don’t change, but the position or place on the keyboard are different.

From our lesson on the piano keys, we learned that the notes on the keyboard repeat themselves all the way up and down the piano. Instead of playing a chord in its original position, you can play it with the same notes, just inverted to a different position.

Take a look at the image and you can see how the bottom note in the chord is being moved to the top of the chord. This is the basics of chord inversions.

Why Use Inversion

Chord Jumps

Piano Chord Inversions are helpful when playing songs that have chords that jump around a lot. What I mean by jump around is, they require you to make a pretty big jump from one position to another to play the chord.

If you look at the image you can see that moving from the C Major Chord to the G Major Chord is a decent jump. You have to pick your hand up and move a large distance to play the G chord.

Inversions are great to help eliminate this problem. Instead of picking your hand up and moving it to whole new place on the piano, you can just play an inversion and you hand stays in the same place!

Voicings

A great thing that piano chord inversions do to your playing is they add different voicings to your music.

A voicing is when a musician rearranges the notes in a chord in a different order.

Why is this important!?!?!

It makes the song you are playing sound more natural. If you played a song with the chords C major and G major, and always played them in the same way the entire song, it would sound dull and amateurish.

What makes these voicings so great is that it almost changes the sound of the chord. Listen to the three inversions in the audio file. They are the same C Major Chord, just played in different inversions.

They all sound a little bit different. Using piano chord inversions, you can play the same chord progression and make it sound totally different by using the different voicings of the inversions.

Lets stop talking about inversions….. Let’s make them!

Inverting 3 Note Chords

Let’s look at inverting three note chords first. These are the most common chords used and the easiest to make piano chord inversions with.

To make a piano chord inversion, the bottom note in the chord is moved from the bottom of the chord to the top of the chord.

Let’s look at an example using the C Major Chord

For the first inversion, the C note at the bottom of the chord is moved to the top. The other two notes stay the same.

For the second inversion, the E on the bottom is moved to the top and other two notes stay the same.

In all three of the inversion, the notes do not change. All that changes is the position in which you play the note. To play an inversion, you never change the notes of the chord, just where they are played.

Types of Inversions

There are three different inversions for each chord. Because there are three notes in the chord, there are three possible inversions.

Root Position

The main inversion that most players know is the root position. Root position is the standard voicing for the the chord. It starts on the root note and plays the other two notes in the chord above it.

It is called root position because the note in which the chord is named is called the root. Like the root of a tree, the root note is the base in which the chord is built.

Click here for more information on major chords!

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First Inversion

When you move the root note to the top of the chord you have made the first inversion. Instead of paying the root note at the bottom of the chord, you are now playing it at the top.

It’s known as the first inversion because it is the first transition from the the original root position.

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Second Inversion

The last inversion takes the the third middle note in the chord and makes it the bottom note. In the example, the G is now the lowest note in the chord. The E is now on the top of the chord.

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Bass Clef Inversions

Most of the time, when using piano chord inversions you play them in the right hand or treble clef. Even though they are most commonly used with the right hand, they are still good to know for the left hand also.

Bass Clef Inversion follow the same principle, instead they use bass clef notes.

Look at the image and you can see that the same process is being used in the bass clef. The bottom note is being switched to the top of each of the chords. The notes are staying the same, but the position is different.

Learning inversion with the left hand can make the chord really sound unique. Instead of playing the same bass note every time you play a chord, you can change it and play the third note as the lowest bass note.

Quick Tip!
Want to make a boring chord progression sound unique? Use a different left hand inversion. Play the first inversion in stead of the root inversion and it will make the sound of the arrangement almost totally different!

Fingering

Right Hand Inversion Fingering

Inversions in the right hand have a different fingering than in the left hand. For the best transition and feeling for these inversion you need to lay them with the following fingering.

The Root Inversion stays the same as a regular major chord. I uses the thumb, middle finger, and small finger.

The First Inversion is a little different. Using the thumb and small finger, but the middle note should be played with the index finger, or second finger) instead of the middle finger. This is a whole lot more comfortable then trying to play it with the third finger.

The last inversion is going to be played with the same fingering as the root position fingering.

Left Hand Inversion Fingering

The left hand has its own way of playing these piano chord inversions. The root position and first inversion is going to be played the same. Use the fifth, third, and first fingers in the left hand to play those inversion

For the second inversion it gets a little different. Use the first and fifth fingers, but for the middle note, use the second, or index finger.

These fingerings are not very different from each other, but it is important to play each of them correctly or the will feel awkward when you play them.

Four Note Piano Chord Inversions

Making an inversion with a four note chord is exactly the same as three note chord. The only difference here is that there are a lot more combinations that you can make with a four note chord then a three note chord.

To see all the differences, just move the bottom note to the top of the chord. You will see that there are a lot of different unique sound you can make here. Try out as many as you can to see all the cool sound you can get.

What Next

Once you have them mastered go ahead and add them into you songs. You will be surprised how much better they will sound. Not only will they sound better, but they will be easier to play. Instead of moving your hands all over the place, you can comfortably play the chords you want in a small area on the piano.

Piano Chord Inversions are great to add your own unique personality to a song. Instead of playing all the same boring chords, add these inversion in and see how your songs evolve from plain to extraordinary!

Automatically Find Any Chord With One Click Of The Mouse

The piano chord finder is a powerful tool you can use to help you find any all of the piano chords and scales with just one click of the mouse. It will show you the exact notes that belong to every chord in every key.

Using this free chord generator will allow you to automatically find any chord in just a few seconds. It will automatically display the notes any chord on the piano keyboard in an easy to read format.

Use this tool to quickly and easily find the notes in any chord in the matter of seconds!

How to use the Piano Chord Finder

The chord finder is a very powerful tool, but like most tools, if you don’t know how to use it properly you won’t receive all of the benefits.

Use the step-by-step guide below to easily use the chord finder. You can quickly find any chord in just 4 easy steps.

Also, make sure you take a minute to read through the list of additional features so you can get the most out of this virtual piano keyboard.

Step-By-Step Guide For Using the Chord Finder

1. Find the root note of the chord or scale that you are wanting to find the notes for.
2. Click the radio button to choose if you want the generator to display chords or scales.
3. Select the type of chord or scale on the piano chord finder that you want the chord generator to build. (Ex. Major, Minor, Major 7th…)
4. The chord generator will then display the notes that belong to that chord or scale on the virtual piano keyboard.

Virtual Piano Chords Root: Chords Scale Formula: C C# / Db D D# / Eb E F / E# F# / Gb G G# / Ab A A# / Bb B / Cb Major Minor 5 Dominant 7th Major 7th Minor 7th Minor Major 7th Sus 4 Sus 2 6 Minor 6 9 Minor 9 Major 9 Minor Major 9 11 Minor 11 Major 11 Minor Major 11 13 Minor 13 Major 13 Minor Major 13 add 9 Minor add 9 6 add 9 Minor 6 add 9 Dominant 7th add 11 Major 7th add 11 Minor 7th add 11 Minor Major 7th add 11 Dominant 7th add 13 Major 7th add 13 Minor 7th add 13 Minor Major 7th add 13 7b5 7#5 7b9 7#9 7#5b9 m7b5 m7#5 m7b9 9#11 9b13 6sus4 7sus4 Major 7th Sus4 9sus4 Major 9 Sus4 Major Minor Harmonic Minor Melodic Minor Pentatonic Major Pentatonic Minor Pentatonic Blues Pentatonic Neutral Ionian Aeolian Dorian Mixolydian Phrygian Lydian Locrian Dim half Dim whole Whole Augmented Chromatic Roumanian Minor Spanish Gypsy Blues Diatonic Double Harmonic Eight Tone Spanish Enigmatic Leading Whole Tone Lydian Augmented Neoploitan Major Neopolitan Minor Pelog Prometheus Prometheus Neopolitan Six Tone Symmetrical Super Locrian Lydian Minor Lydian Diminished Nine Tone Scale Auxiliary Diminished Auxiliary Augmented Auxiliary Diminished Blues Major Locrian Overtone Diminished Whole Tone Pure Minor Dominant 7th Enter as Numbers Enter as Notes Enter as Scale Let scales cover keyboard: Notes in Chord / Scale: Note this formula is in key of C enharmonics. Click here for help in entering formula

Additional Feature of the Piano Chord Finder

• If you want to know the note names as well, look at the “Notes in Chord/Scale” box to see the written notes.
• If you want a scale to cover the entire keyboard, click the “Let Scales Cover Keyboard” button. This feature will make the scale cover three octaves instead of just one. This will help you see the scale spread over a larger range on the piano.
• One of the best features of the piano chord finder is the invert chord button. This button will display inversions of the chord you are looking for. This feature can turn one chord into multiple different chords. Click here for more information on chord inversions.
• You can also enter a formula for a chord or scale. This is explained in more detail here, or at the link at the bottom of the chord generator. You can enter interval numbers or note names into the generator and it will display exactly what you input into the box on the virtual piano keyboard. (Example: Enter 1,3,5 into the piano chord finder with a root of C and it will show you a C major chord.)

This is an amazing free tool for all levels of players. This chord generator plays an important role as a reference guide to find chords and scales. Use the piano chord finder whenever you need a refresher on those hard to remember chords, or just use it learn some new chords.

Use this tool whenever you feel lost or need help. Its an amazing resource to put in your piano playing toolbox.

Here is another resource you will find helpful that includes tons of piano chords.

This encyclopedia is an helpful resource that will compliment the chord finder above. These two piano tools will defiantly boost your piano playing.

Click here to find out how these two resources can be used to enhance your piano playing. 

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Everyone wants to know how to play by ear. Music theory intervals are one of the key components to obtaining this skill that so many people struggle to learn.

When I first started learning to play piano using chords, I was so impressed by people who could hear a song and play it back almost flawlessly.

I thought they “Just Had It.”

That they had an amazing talent, and I could never achieve that kind of status.

But after years of studying music I learned that it wasn’t something that you had to be born with, that I could learn to play music by ear using music intervals.

And the truth is, you can too!

Use these simple tricks to learn how to use musical intervals to start playing by ear.

What Are Music Theory Intervals?

Musical intervals are described as: The distance between two notes.

To help better illustrate this concept, think of the melody of your favorite song.

Focus on the first two notes of the song.

The interval for those two notes will be how much higher or lower the second note is related to the first note.

Take a look at the image.

A music interval is how much distance there is between the first note and the second note.

In this example the distance is a major third. (More on this later)

The Wide World of Music Theory Intervals

There are twelve standard notes in music, so there will be twelve different intervals.

Each interval has a unique sound, that once memorized, can be used to help you play music by ear.

To really understand intervals we need to number the keys on the piano.

Take a look at the images below and see that the piano is labeled from 1 to 8, starting on C, and going up on all the white notes.

This is going to be our reference point for when we start finding intervals.

If C is the starting note, then the rest of the 12 notes in the image are going to be given a music interval based on its relation to C.

So D in its relation to C would be a Major 2ndbecause it’s the second note relative to C.

This is the same with E, it is a Major 3rd from C.

I know this sounds a little confusing. I could go on all day explaining all the music theory intervals, but instead, you can check out my page that explains music intervals more in depth.

Also, check my chart that gives example of each interval with popular songs you can use to help you when memorizing intervals.

Here is a chart with all the intervals listed along with names and examples.

This will help you understand the many different intervals and what they look like on the piano staff.

Using Music Theory Intervals To Play By Ear

The magic behind musical intervals is that once you learn them, and can recognize them, you will be able to play almost any song by ear.

Before you are able to learn to play by ear using music intervals you need to understand piano chords. Check out my page on chords When you have a good knowledge of chord come back here to continue.

Once you have a basic knowledge of chords and how they are built you will be able to use them along with intervals to start playing by ear.

Playing Chords By Ear

When starting to learn to play by ear you need to listen for certain things in a song. There are many parts to a song such as melody, harmonies, highs notes, low notes………the list goes on and on.

The part of the song that you need to focus on is the movement of the bass notes. In order to know what chords to play at the right time, you need to listen very intently to the bass.

When listening to a song there are a lot of things that can make the choice of a chord more difficult. Things like inversions which can make a chord sound very different.

If everyone played the standard root chord it would be easy to pick out chords and play by ear.

But once they start using different inversions or adding different voicings, it can make interpreting the song quit difficult.

Quick Tip!
Listen Closely To Bass Note Intervals To Find The Chord Changes

This is why I like to listen to the bass notes in a song.

This is the one thing that tends to stay pretty consistent.

If the bass moves up perfect fourth, chances are, the chord moves up a perfect fourth. You can be pretty confident that where the bass note moves, the chord will move to same place.

Let’s look at an interval of a perfect fourth.

If we start on C Major Chord, and the bass has a music theory interval of a perfect fourth, this tells us that the next chord you should play is an F Major Chord.

Listening to the intervals of the bass will help you to know what chords to play and when. Listen to the amount of distance there is between one bass chord and the next to determine what chord to play.

Chords are the backbone to playing music by ear, use the piano chord encyclopedia to learn how to play piano chords.

Playing Melodies By Ear

If you want to play the melody of the song (what the singer is singing) by ear, you need to know intervals as well.

Knowing the distance between one note in the melody compared to the previous note will help you to play the harmony by ear easily.

If you are able to recognize intervals, then playing back the melody of a song will be simple.

As you practice playing by ear you will start to almost instinctively and naturally know the music theory intervals without even thinking about it.

Most people just start randomly picking notes when trying to find the melody, but the people who can really play by ear are using their knowledge of intervals to make the best guess of what the note is.

Some people are better at this than others. They might have a better “ear” for music. But this doesn’t mean that you can’t learn the same.

If you take time to learn musical intervals, you will notice that when you are guessing for notes less and less of the time.

Ear training is just as important as physically practicing piano.

I try and practice ear training for a short amount of time during every practice session.

See the power of music intervals when you start playing your favorite songs by ear.

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Learning how to play a piano is not a hard as most people think.

I Know, I Know…… You’re saying “There are SO many keys!”

Don’t let that bother you. With a simple trick you can learn all of the keys on the piano and their note names.

There are tons of quick and easy tips you can learn that will speed up the learning curve for the piano.

Let’s take a look at some of the most important steps that you must follow as you start learning to play the piano.

Naming The Keys The very first thing you have to do is learn the names of the keys on the piano. Before you even look at any of the note names, you have to learn what the keys on the piano are called.

On a full size piano there are 88 keys. The thing that most beginners don’t realize is that these notes repeat themselves over and over again. There is a set pattern of notes that the piano follows making it easy to remember the names of all the keys.

If you can learn the pattern, then you can name every key on the piano. This is a great asset when you want to learn how to play a piano.

Tip – Learn the pattern of the keys to learn to name all 88 keys on the piano!

Music Rhythm

After you have a firm grasp on the names of the piano keys, you need to focus on a music rhythm.

Musical rhythm can take some time, but with practice it will become easier and easier.

You first need to understand note value. Note value how long a certain note is to be held out.

When reading music, you have to know how long a note should ring. The sheet music will give a single note. This note will tell you the name of the note to play, and it will also tell you how long to hold it out for.

There are multiple types of music note values. The most commonly used are:

• Whole Notes
• Half Notes
• Quarter Notes
• Eighth Notes
• Sixteenth Notes

These notes are written within what’s called a measure. This tells you how long each note should be held out. Either for the whole measure (whole note), half the measure (half note), or a quarter of the measure (quarter note).

Here is a lot more info on learning note value and learning how to play a piano online.

Musical Rests

Rests are similar to note values except, the note value tells you how long to hold a note out, and a rest tells you how long to hold out silence.

A rest tells you that you are to stop playing for the entire amount that the rest calls for.

There are five main types of musical rests. Similar to the note value, there is a whole rest, half rest, quarter rest, eighth rest, and sixteenth rest.

Chord Piano

Playing chord piano is the easiest and simplest way to learn how to play a piano online.

There are three notes in each chord. Those three notes gives the chord its unique sound. If you can learn all the major chords and minor chords on the piano then you will be playing not time. Use this chord finder to learn almost every chord possible.

Each song is made up of just a few of these chords. If you know all the chords in a song, you no longer have to sit and try and read music all day, just learn the chords in the song and it makes things a whole lot easier.

When you start getting a little more confident playing with chords, you will learn that almost all song have the same chords. This is called a chord progression.

A chord progression is a sequence of chords that usually go together. There is usually four chords in a chord progression.

Most popular contemporary songs have the same four chords in them. Learn some of the more common chord progressions and you will be playing just about any song you want in no time!

Scales

Now that you’ve learned chords, its time to focus on making your music sound Great!

When you play with chords it sometimes can sound robotic. I know when I first started to learn how to play a piano I just played one chord on each beat and it really didn’t sound all that great. I was just keeping the rhythm with the piano.

As you start getting better at playing with chords you can start focussing on scales. Scales can be used to add embellishments to the music. It also tells you which notes you can play and which ones not to play.

Playing with chords is easy, but really knowing which chords and notes go with which scale add a whole new element to your playing.

Learning all the scales is going to allow you start adding different notes in with the chords. Rather than just playing a three note chord, add a few of the notes close by that in the scale. This will make your playing sound much by adding in addition note to the chords that you playing.

Practice

Once you have learned all of the little tricks to how to play a piano, you can start practicing effectively. Start working on your piano fingering and other important techniques.

Start practicing all the scales with both hands, practice all the chord inversions, train your ear. Set a time in each day to allow yourself to practice. Whether its and hour, two hours, thirty minutes, whatever. Just make sure that you use all of the things that have learned and practice them to perfection.

Use all the resources you can. Scour this site for all kinds of great info that will help get you started playing fast.

You can start with my video course, Mastering Basic Piano Chords. This course gives you a complete run-through of how to get started playing the piano by ear.

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Looking to write your own songs or music scores? Here’s some blank piano sheet music to get all that music that is floating around in your head down on paper. 

It always seems like when I get that great new song or melody I never have any music paper to write it down on. And if I don’t get it down on paper as soon as I can I end up forgetting it. It’s awful to loose that awesome melody or lick because you don’t have any music paper to write it down on.

So…. here is some staff paper that you can use to get all of those piano music notes written down before you forget them and they are lost forever.

Click here to download our Free Blank Piano Sheet Music.

Types of Free Blank Sheet Music

There are a few different types of blank piano sheet music that I have available. Not every situation calls for the same type of paper. 

For piano players, you are more than likely going to need blank piano music paper. This type of music paper contains the grand staff. The grand staff is made up of both the treble clef and bass clefs.

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The piano solo sheet is similar to the above piece of music except instead of labeling the treble and bass clef, it leaves them out. This is good if you want to really customize your piece of
music to meet your needs.

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If you are looking for a blank canvas of staff lines, you can use the eight staff paper, or the 10 staff paper. This paper is great for any instrument. All you need to do is add the clef you want and you’re ready to go.

The eight staff blank piano sheet music gives a lot more room for writing your music. If you are needing to edit or add any side notes, this music paper is great. If you are just copying a piece of music, or don’t need all the extra space, then the ten staff paper will work. 

The elementary music paper is great too for young children. It has only six sets of staff lines. It gives a lot of room for kids to learn to read and write music notes. It is a wide-ruled paper giving plenty of room!

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If you have a melody for a solo singer, then you can use the Vocal with piano sheets. I love this paper if I have a piano piece and need to add in the vocal melody.

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Most choirs directors will use the SATB with piano paper. If you are needing to write out each part: Soprano, Alto, Tenor, and Bass, along with the piano, this is great for that. It gives you one set of staff lines for each part, and a grand staff for the piano.

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The SATB paper gives you a blank music score with a set of staff line for each part like above. The only difference is, you get a lot more on one side of the paper. Here you can get three lines of parts, where above you only get two.

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For two piano playing together, or multiple instruments with a piano, use the two part piano sheet. Use this blank piano sheet music to write multiple piano parts, or you can add any other instrument together with the piano.

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Click here to download the Free Sheet Music.

How To Use This Sheet Music

Now that you have you sheet music, it’s time to learn how to use it.

To use this paper properly, you need to first decide what purpose you are using them for. Make sure to use the guide above and pick the best sheet music that works the best for you.

Each piece of music has to have the key signature labeled. First decide what key the song is in, and label the proper number of sharps and flats next to the clef.

It is helpful to go ahead an label the sharps and flats on every set of staff lines in the song.

Also, make sure to draw in the correct clef. The piano uses the grand staff which is made up of the treble clef and bass clef.

Other instruments might only use one clef. Make sure you know which clef your instrument uses, and label them on the staff lines.

Another important thing to mention when when using this blank piano sheet music is to label any accidentals.

An accidental is a sharp or flat note that falls outside of the key you are playing in. If you are in the key of C, and you need to write an E flat, you need to make sure to draw in a flat sign next to the E so you know to play a flat.

You have to write this in because E flat is not in the key of C, so you have to label it next to that note.

A final tip when writing music, is to make sure you always have something with you to write it all down with. If you don’t have this sheet music with you, make sure you have a piece of notebook paper on hand so you don’t forget anything.

It is very easy to get an idea in your head and then forget it.
 With this free blank piano sheet music that will never happen to you.

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