The only problem is that it seems like a lot of work.

Not so!

I want to give you hope that if you learn just two chords that I'm going to show you, you can actually sit around the piano or keyboard and have fun with your kids.

And if you don't know already, those two chords are the 1-chord and the 5-chord.

The numbers may be throwing some people off. Let me briefly explain...

Every major key can be looked at using numbers.

For example, the C major scale:

C D E F G A B C
1 2 3 4 5 6 7

(For my newbies... these are played separately, one after the other.)

But the scale has a ton of other usages.

And I'll help you to understand one of them today.

See those numbers?

If you take the 1st, 4th, and 5th tones out of this scale, you'd get:

C F G
1 4 5

And what we do is play major chords on each of these tones:

C major = C + E + G
F major = F + A + C
G major = G + B + D

(For my new readers, when you see me using the plus + sign to connect notes, that means to play them all together. Just my own way of breaking up each note of a chord. So the "C + E + G" would mean to sound all three of those notes at the same time, creating a C major chord.)

Moving on...

These are what we call "primary chords."

These chords will appear the most in your songs. In fact, most songs could be written with JUST these chords.

Composers use other tones of the scale to make the music more interesting. For example, I could have a progression that just goes from C major to G major and that would be fine. But if I wanted to add more variety, I'd employ maybe the 2nd tone of the scale to push me to the G major chord (...but that's another lesson).

Now, primary chords are in every key. Just take the 1st, 4th, and 5th tones of any major scale and there you have it, the primary chords of that key.

So you've got three chords and they're found in just about every song.

Let's explore them:

The 1-chord

The 1-chord is basically the same as the title of your major scale and key signature. If you're in the key of C, obviously the first tone of the scale is C... therefore, the first chord is C major (since primary triads are major chords). This chord is most likely to begin your songs. It's also most likely to end your songs. Even in the middle of songs when they tend to go back to the beginning (like the second half of "Mary Had a Little Lamb"), 1-chords are used. So when you feel like the song is at a permanent "home base" or even a temporary one (as in the middle of the song), most likely, you're looking for the 1-chord... in this case, C major.

The 4-chord

The 4-chord usually comes right after the 1-chord. The 1-chord finds itself always progressing to the 4-chord. It doesn't happen all the time (of course) but it's pretty frequent. And like I said above, if the composer doesn't choose to go directly from the 1-chord (C major) to the 4-chord (F major), she's probably using other tones of the scale that will eventually lead to the 4-chord.

An example of this is in the beginning of "Amazing Grace."

"A-ma-zing grace how"
C major
(C + E + G)

"Sweet the"
F major
(F + A + C)

"Sound."
C major
(C + E + G)

"That saved a wretch like"
C major
(C + E + G)

"Me"

?

(What chord might you guess here?)

You see how that works? We basically played the whole beginning part of Amazing grace with just the 1 and 4-chords. And where I left you off, the 5-chord would have come next...

The 5-chord

The 5-chord tends to come in the middle of the song or verse. It's that thing that connects you back to the 1-chord. But if you think about it, the 1-chord usually comes in the beginning of a song or at the end of the song (or in the middle of the song when it appears to have start all over). So, if that's the case, the 5-chord is that feeling that tells you the song is about to end or about to go back to the beginning.

Don't you feel that in the middle of Amazing Grace?

"A-ma-zing grace how"
C major
(C + E + G)

"Sweet the"
F major
(F + A + C)

"Sound."
C major ~
(C + E + G)

"That saved a wretch like"
C major
(C + E + G)

"Me"
G major ~
(G + B + D)

When you sing "me," that is the the middle area I'm talking about. That is the part that lets you know something is about to repeat.

That is where the 5-chord is best used. Of course at the end of songs too.

But you know what?

Most songs you can play with just the 1 and 5 chords. Here's an example:

"Mary Had A Little Lamb"

"Ma-ry had a lit-tle lamb"
C major
(C+E+G)

"Lit-tle lamb"
G major
(G+B+D)

"Lit-tle lamb"
C major
(C+E+G)

"Ma-ry had a lit-tle lamb, her"
C major
(C+E+G)

"Fleece was white as"
G major
(G+B+D)

"Snow"
C major
(C+E+G)

"The Wheels On The Bus"

"The"
G major (either you can play a G major here or you can play no chord here and come in on "wheels").

"Wheels on the bus go round and round"
C major

"Round and round"
G major

"Round and round. The"
C major
(note: you can play a G major chord on "the" if you want or you can leave it alone)

"Wheels on the bus go round and round"
C major ~

"All through the"
G major ~

"Town"
C major

So try this:

Try to pick out your favorite nursery rhymes by just using the 1st, 4th, and 5th chords of a major key. It's about trial and error in the beginning. If the 4-chord doesn't sound right, just move to the 5th chord (and vise versa).

Do this until you've mastered a good 4 to 5 songs. They all work the same way, trust me!