Establishing Chords From A Bass Line

[stewblack]

One of the areas of transcription I'm still weak on is adding chords. It has been suggested it's a useful addition to a score, and I have to agree. Knowing at a glance I'm moving between say, Gm C and F gives that little boost to my knowledge of which notes I am likely to be playing. 

However, as confident as I am in finding the notes in any bassline, establishing, with that same confidence, which chords are being played isn't easy. 

Here's what I do at the moment. 

1) guess the key sig. Learned a trick to do this by ear but also by how many sharps (or should they be flats?) occur with great frequency. 

2) assume I have the correct key (a leap of faith in itself) and I can establish the chords in that key - so broadly speaking I've narrowed it down. 

3) look for triads. 

4) hope for the best. 

How is it done by those who don't have to guess (I have no piano or guitars to try the chords with)? 

[thebigyin]

On 26/04/2020 at 13:14, stewblack said:

One of the areas of transcription I'm still weak on is adding chords. It has been suggested it's a useful addition to a score, and I have to agree. Knowing at a glance I'm moving between say, Gm C and F gives that little boost to my knowledge of which notes I am likely to be playing. 

However, as confident as I am in finding the notes in any bassline, establishing, with that same confidence, which chords are being played isn't easy. 

Here's what I do at the moment. 

1) guess the key sig. Learned a trick to do this by ear but also by how many sharps (or should they be flats?) occur with great frequency. 

2) assume I have the correct key (a leap of faith in itself) and I can establish the chords in that key - so broadly speaking I've narrowed it down. 

3) look for triads. 

4) hope for the best. 

How is it done by those who don't have to guess (I have no piano or guitars to try the chords with)? 

Don't know if this helps and forgive me if you already know but say for instance it's the Key of C Major the chords will be...
C Major
D Minor
E Minor 
F Major
G Major
A Minor
B Diminished

The above will apply to any Major Key.

[stewblack]

20 minutes ago, thebigyin said:

Don't know if this helps and forgive me if you already know but say for instance it's the Key of C Major the chords will be...
C Major
D Minor
E Minor 
F Major
G Major
A Minor
B Diminished

The above will apply to any Major Key.

Yep I remember that from my lessons! But thank you nonetheless I really appreciate the help I get from people like yourself. 

[thebigyin]

9 hours ago, stewblack said:

Yep I remember that from my lessons! But thank you nonetheless I really appreciate the help I get from people like yourself. 

Thought so Stew I am just dabbling with Theory as I haven't gigged in years and got to the point of either packing up or just going right back to basics...I always avoided theory in the past it looked so daunting but it's made a big difference and actually quite interesting, still just scratching the surface but knowing a bit can only benefit you in the long run all the best.

[adamg67]

I like this guy's Youtube Videos for theory: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRDDHLvQb8HjE2r7_ZuNtWA/videos 

There are loads on chords although they are very guitar oriented, and it's maybe backwards in that he's dealing with writing using these progressions (which is what I'm interested in) rather than recognising them, but still maybe useful. A few examples:

 

 

[Horizontalste]

You can usually figure chords out from looking at all of the harmonic content & not just the bass.

For example, if the bass is centered around the root there's a good chance the melody will include the 3rd etc.

It's trial & error at first as with most things but as your ears get used to picking out the chord quality & individual notes it gets easier.

[stewblack]

43 minutes ago, Horizontalste said:

You can usually figure chords out from looking at all of the harmonic content & not just the bass.

For example, if the bass is centered around the root there's a good chance the melody will include the 3rd etc.

It's trial & error at first as with most things but as your ears get used to picking out the chord quality & individual notes it gets easier.

Thank you. So I'm on the right track, that's good to know.

[Guest]

Hearing chords is just an extension of hearing one note after the other. If you hear two notes played separately, say C, followed by an A (higher in pitch) and you can tell that’s a major 6th, then hearing chords begins with picking out the same pair of notes played together. This is where a keyboard comes in really handy as you can play any combination of notes together and hear ‘that’ sound. My ability to transcribe the right chords came on leaps and bounds when I got a keyboard. It’s also the instrument any classical or jazz musician should have in addition to their main instrument for learning harmony. It’s really easy to hear and play chords and their inversions.

Worst case, record random pairs of notes on your bass, leave it a while then play it back and try to identify them by ear.

The other things I’d say is the simpler the sound, the more likely that the chord is more basic. So a C major chord sounds very “straight” compared to something more exotic like a Cmaj7#11. The Augmented and Diminished chords and scales are symmetrical so have a specific sound. But enough of the theory - your ears are more important