When composers choose the notes or chords that accompany a melody, this is called harmony. Sometimes all the notes in a chord are played together; elsewhere, they may be played one note at a time, such as in arpeggios. Some harmony chords sound very nice, sweet and peaceful. Others may sound a bit ugly and quite uptight.

Chords that sound stormy are called dissonant chords; they feel tense. They are important in music because they make you want to hear them change to a nice sounding chord. They take music to another place. You don’t want to be stuck with a tense sound for too long because it begs the listening ear to resolve itself.

Chords that sound good are called consonants. Usually you want to have both in the music to make it more interesting. Harmony provides the emotions in music. It can make music sound happy, sad, calm, angry, and any other emotion you can think of. When you look at your piano music, see if you can name an emotion for each piece. Is he happy, sad or anxious?

You can make a chord out of every note in a scale by adding thirds to it. To name these chords, musicians use Roman numerals, such as I ii iii IV V. When the chord is major, the Roman numerals are capital letters, and when the chord is minor, the numbers are lowercase letters. Chords also have English names like tonic, dominant, and through.

Composers often use specific combinations of these chords in the harmony of their music. When they use the chords in one of these patterns, we call it a chord progression. Probably the most famous chord progression is the Amen which concludes a hymn. It uses the chord of the 4th note of the scale and the first chord (or tonic).

Another important chord progression heard in almost all rock and roll music is I, IV, V, I. ​​Hundreds of songs use just these three chords.

So when you harmonize a major scale, you have now created a diatonic harmony. You are using any note in the Major scale and using only notes within the scale to create the Diatonic Harmony. Listen to it because it is not only in classical music but also in pop music.

When we talk about a diatonic third, let’s start with the Key of C and going from C to E we have a major third. When we play the notes D to F, we have a minor third. Many songs are made with diatonic sixths in the melody. This is where C goes up to A, D to B, E to C, F to D and so on. These diatonic sixths are both major and minor.

As long as you don’t use other notes added from outside the key, adding or subtracting flats or sharps, the harmony remains diatonic. Rock music is made up of intervals of fourths and fifths. Choosing to harmonize with 2nd and 7th intervals results in a dissonant sound. The favorite harmony of many is to harmonize the major scale in thirds or diatonic sixths. Have fun creating and listening to the various interval sounds of harmony.