Warp wrote:
> Orchid XP v8 <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
>> 1. You're aware that there are only 12 possible notes in existence, right?
> 
>   Chords != notes.

Indeed. But chords are composed of notes. Pick 3 items from 12 
possibilities and there aren't that many options available.

>   (Besides, technically speaking, the western chromatic scale, which divides
> the octave into 12 notes, while certainly by far the most popular, is not
> the only possible way of dividing an octave into notes. And even within the
> western chromatic scale there is no one *absolute* correct way of dividing
> the octave into notes. See, for example, "Pythagorean tuning".)

All of which is strictly *true*, however... in practise, all modern 
music you will hear today uses the even-tempered diatonic scale.

>> So there are 12 notes in the scale, each one can be major or minor, so 
>> that ought to give you 24 possible chords.
> 
>   There are many more chords than just "major" and "minor". Even chords
> that sound nothing like either (eg. the diminished chords).

Again true. However, the major and minor chords are vastly, vastly more 
common than any of the others. Diminished chords are vanishingly rare. 
Suspended chords and 7th chords are just variations on either a major or 
a minor chord (and usually you can replace such chords with simple 
majors or minors without significantly altering the line of the chord 
progression).

So again, in practise, you've basically got 24 chords to play with, plus 
embellishments like 7ths and suspensions.

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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