A Major - A Major Triad & A Major Scale
Become a Pro in A Major Here
Three sharps and otherwise many white keys? That indicates A major. But which notes does A major include exactly? And how is the A major triad formed? You’ll find out on this page.
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Gordon November
Gordon November
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After you have worked through this article, you can:
- play the A major scale with your right hand.
- you’ll master the perfect A major fingering.
- you’ll play the A major chord and its inversions quite intuitively.
Practical explanatory videos and images will also help you hit the right keys – even if you can’t read music.
The Notes of the A Major Scale
The notes of the A major scale are
A – B – C sharp – D – E – F sharp – G sharp – A
Here they are in musical notation. If you can’t read them, that’s not a problem. You can also master A major without being able to read music.
So, you need three black keys to play the A major scale: C sharp, F sharp, and G sharp. The fingering is quite intuitive in this case. Because: your thumb is almost never on a black key. But it often – but not always – follows black keys.
So you play the A with your thumb. The B with your index finger and the C sharp with your middle finger. Then you slide your thumb under your hand and strike the D with it. Then you simply play the rest of the scale upwards with your remaining fingers.
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This is what the A major triad looks like
Now that you can play the A major scale, you already know all the notes that appear in the A major triad. They are A, C sharp, and E.
If you want to play these three notes as a triad, strike them simultaneously with your thumb, middle finger, and little finger.
That was A major in the root position. Time to learn the first and second inversions.
A Major Chord in the 1st Inversion
Attention, it will now be a bit theoretical. In a triad, we speak of the 1st inversion when the root note is played an octave higher. In our case, the A now moves over the C sharp and the E.
You play this triad with your thumb, index finger, and little finger.
A Major Chord in the 2nd Inversion
In the second inversion of the A major chord, the third of the root position is played an octave higher. The third? In the case of the A major root position, that is the C sharp. So you play the A major chord in the 2nd inversion like this:
E – A – C sharp
By the way: The parallel minor key of A major is F sharp minor.
Play A Major Freely and Intuitively
Hats off. You now not only know the notes of the A major scale. You can even play the A major chords in root position and both inversions on the piano.
If you want to learn to play all keys intuitively and play all your favorite songs by ear in the future, check out piano.university. Here I’ll show you – far from gray theory – how to make every song your own on the piano. I look forward to seeing you.
Play Piano by Intuition
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Master Keys Without Sheet Music
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