Piano Chords for Beginners 1: Learn to Play the Carol, Silent Night With Three

[Shelly Hicks]

In this free beginners keyboard lesson on Silent Night, learn to play
this classic Christmas carol with just three simple piano chords. This
is just one of many beautiful beginner piano tunes that you can learn
to play using only a few basic chords. In this Piano Chords for
Beginners article series, I will introduce the most common piano
chords and show how they can be used to make simple accompaniments for
some famous old Christmas carols. Look for the other articles in this
series: -- Away in a Manger -- with G Major, C Major and D Major--
Good King Wenceslas -- with Bb Major, C Major, F Major and D Minor-- O
Christmas Tree -- with C Major, F Major, D Minor and C Seventh Silent
Night: Three Major ChordsFor Silent Night we only need the following
three Major chords: -- C Major: C E G -- F Major: F A C -- G Major: G
B DPlay the three notes together with the fifth finger, the third
finger and the first finger (thumb) of your left hand. Play these
chords in the two octaves below Middle C on your piano. Practice until
you are familiar with these chords and can find them quickly on your
keyboard.Tune of Silent NightPlay the following melody of Silent Night
with your right hand, beginning on G in the octave above Middle C.
Start with the second finger of your right hand on the G. There are
three quarter-note or crotchet beats in each bar in this tune. The ]
[But wait, there's more! This simple arrangement only uses Major
chords but there are many other types of chords that can add beauty
and contrast to your piano accompaniments. For example, there are
Minor, Seventh, Diminished, Augmented and Suspended piano chords. Some
piano chord tutors expect you to individually memorize these dozens of
chords -- an overwhelming task! Other systems expect you to work out
the notes of each chord by counting up oodles of half-steps or
semitones. But there is a much easier way! The simple relationships
between the chord types are the key to an easy technique for working
out any type of piano chord that you want. And you can also take
advantage of the huge range of music in Hal Leonard's excellent Fake
Book series if you learn how to read the notes on at least the treble
staff. It has never been easier to learn to play beginner piano songs
with your own unique style of accompaniment!

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