Hi I am new here, only discovered this site yesterday. Anyway, I have been learning piano for about 7 months now and I think I am doing reasonably well. However, I was given a tune to play for homework which required me to learn two new chords. These chords are Dm and D7. My teacher wrote down the notes that go with these chords so I can play and learn them. I have no problem with the Dm chord which is D F A, but the D7 chord she wrote as C D F# and on this site when I look at the chord for this one it tells you to press different notes. I am confused. Can anyone help thanks Surely my teacher would not give me wrong information, after all if she can get a pupil through their Grade 3 piano exam then she must know what shes doing

I ain't no expert, but it looks like an inversion with the 5th missing. The 8Notes chord chart gives...

C - 7th
A - 5th
F# - 3rd
D - root

The chord your teacher has given you starts on the 7th rather than the root, then does the root and 3rd, but stops before the 5th. I have no idea if it's okay to drop the 5th to play the chord 'properly'. Assuming it is, the 5th has presumably been dropped to make fingering easier, or maybe to get a specific feel from the chord that differs from versions of it that do include the 5th.

Maybe. But why would she teach me a simplified version of the chord. I am not a child, I am an adult and I want to be taught the proper way. I have every faith in her ability but this has thrown me. As I said, she can get students through their Grade 3 piano and beyond then she must be doing something right. And, she got me playing two handed in the second lesson. Some people have asked me if I can play with two hands yet, and I can.... If after all this time I could not use two hands to play the songs/tunes then there is something drastically wrong... either i am not being taught properly or i am not grasping it. How on earth can educated people assume that after 7 months I have not been taught and mastered the art of playing with the left and the right hand both together...

I don't know for sure why she'd teach you a different version of the chrod, except, perhaps for fingering reasons. Are you learning a tune that uses these two chords? If so, maybe she reckons the transition is easier if you use the inversion, or maybe there's a chord to follow that would be hard to get to from the normal chord shape. Maybe she has a tune in mind that she'll give you to learn, and that it uses this particular inversion.

Either way, you could ask her - it's her idea, so she probably has a reason.



<Added>

I meant to say that it isn't neccessarily a *simplified* version of the chord - she may have a reason, such as the above, for choosing that particular inversion.

the tune is jingle bells and it contained the two new chords that I did not know. I dont really want to say anything to her because I dont want her to think I am contradicting her abilities as a teacher. I just wondered when I discovered the fingering from this site was different thats all.

Can I just say what a good site this is. Its very good for advice on music and Im only a beginner but if I can help anyone with anything or ask something and someone can help then that is good. I only found out about it by accident when I was looking for advice on line on chords when someone told me that the fingering I was given was wrong.

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