How to Play Diminished Chords on Piano (Video): Learn about enharmonic equivalents here and the difference between piano notes and keys. Bbb corresponds to the A key on the piano.

Where you see a double flat (for example Bbb), simply take the note which is already flat and make it a semitone lower. On the piano, the same note is played but in music theory the note name depends on the key the music is in. For instance C♭ and B are enharmonic equivalents. You will notice above, that some notes have different names. It’s really four inversions of the same chord containing the notes D-F-Ab-B. It’s really four inversions of the same chord containing the notes C#-E-G-Bb.ģ. Ddim7, Fdim7, Abdim7/G#dim7 & Bdim7 (Cbdim7) all contain exactly the same notes. It’s really four inversions of the same chord containing the notes C-Eb-Gb-A.Ģ. C#dim7/Dbdim7, Edim7, Gdim7, & Bbdim7 all contain exactly the same notes. There are only three diminished 7th chords. Every dim7 chord is really four chords containing four evenly spaced notes each.ġ. Cdim7, Ebdim7/D#dim7, Gbdim7/F#dim7 and Adim7 all contain exactly the same notes. You play the seventh when you come across the chords written like this: Cdim7, C☇, or Cm6(♭5). In other cases, mostly in modern jazz books and some music theory literature, when you see the chords, Cdim or C°, you simply play the triad and leave out the seventh. The note, A is in theory the 6th tone of the scale. Bbb (B double flat) is enharmonic to A on your piano but in theory the correct name for the note is Bbb.

In this case you add the double flat seventh (♭♭7) of the scale. In most sheet music books, Cdim or C° denotes a diminished seventh chord with C as the root. Symbols for this type of chord are dim and °. The formula for the diminished chord is root plus three half steps plus three half steps (Root + 3HS + 3HS). On your piano keyboard, to form any dim chord, simply hold the root note and each time skip two keys and play the key to the right of the two keys you skip. To learn more about this chord and others, check out my course, Piano Chords: How To Form Basic Chords On Piano And Keyboard. Alternatively, you can play a major chord, C-E-G and simply flatten the third and fifth notes of the scale, resulting in C-Eb-Gb. Just play a regular minor chord but instead of playing G, play G flat. To form C diminished, you combine the notes, C, E♭ and G♭.Ī quick way to form this chord is to hold the minor chord, for example C minor, and to flatten the fifth note of the scale, which is G. Diminished chords are formed by combining the root, flatted third (minor third) and flatted fifth of the major scale (1, ♭3, ♭5). For example, the notes of the C major scale are C, D, E, F, G, A, B.

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