Question:
I have trouble naming chords I make up for my compositions. They may or may not be conventional chords. Possibly they are fantasy chords. I would like to know if there is a chord generator on the internet that works backwards from the usual chord generators that you see where you can type in the fret numbers and it will tell you what to name that chord when you type in above in your compositions. Do you know what I mean? In most chord generators you would enter, for example, that you are looking for A7 and it would give you a list of numbers that include among other things [353263], but I would like one where you enter your set of fret numbers [abcdef] and through some convention or protocols it names the chord or gives some alternate names for it. Does anything like that exist already somewhere, and if so, where?
Answer:
I think by far the best chord generator is your brain. It's not that complicated; the system for naming chords is based on the major scale; Root is the main note, then there's 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7. A basic 7th chord is constructed from R, 3, 5 and 7. You raise the 2nd, 4th, and 6th up an octave to get 9th, 11th and 13th. Anything else is an alteration of or variation on that. I recently had to write charts for some of my tunes that use some pretty chromatic harmonies and I just used the above logic as best I could; the weirdest (or most potentially confusing to the person reading the chart) thing I came up with was a minor/major chord where a chord contained both a major and minor third but clearly the flat 3 wasn't a sharp 9. I also wrote out the chords in standard notation though, to avoid any possible confusion. There is a certain sense of reverse engineering in your question. If such software exists it may not serve you as well as you might think and could only confuse things. If you bring me into the studio and put chord symbols in front of me you are basically saying that the interpretation is up to me. If you have composed something where specific voicings are required then they should be notated on the staff. This is the way things are clarified [or should I say documented] in music. BIAB has a midi chord detection function that works backwards. You play a voicing via midi and it offers you a range of standard nomenclature options. You have to realize however that the whole chord symbol thing will only take you so far. If you have seen any of the name that chord threads on this newsgroup you will know what I'm talking about. These threads are hysterical and entertaining but are also definitive statements regarding the limitations of our current system of chord symbols. Chord symbols lose their utility in direct proportion to increasingly complex harmonies. One of the things I find myself doing from time to time is working with song writers who don't know how to get their music down on paper. For rehearsals, recordings and copyrighting you will want to have a good accurate representation of your composition on paper. You can probably find a musician in your area to do this but be prepared to pay by the hour.
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