Slash chords can be a fantastic addition to any song or piece of music. They can help to bring such an array of beautiful sounds into our music in a simple, easy & effective way. When you see a slash chord appearing on a lead sheet, you are being given two very valuable and important pieces of information.
Firstly, you are being told which chord you need to play in your right hand and secondly, you are being told which bass note to play in the left hand. For example, if you see a slash chord written as C/G, this is telling you that you should play a C major chord in your right hand over a G bass note.
C/G SLASH CHORD
Slash chords are very common in pop songs and for lots of good reasons. The first reason is that slash chords can give you access to truly awesome sounds. For example, slash chords on piano give the musician the ability to use passing chords, walking bass lines or to create their perfectly unique sound, and then share this information in a very simple way.
For example, in jazz music, slash chords are commonly used because it is often easier to read something like B/C (i.e. play a B major triad over a C bass note) as opposed to reading something like Cmaj7#9#11. Please note that in some cases, slash chords may omit some notes (compared to the full piano chord) but the sound being created is still very similar.
B/C(Cmaj7th#9#11)
How to play beautiful slash chords on piano
One of the easiest ways for beginners to get started with playing slash chords on piano is to use a 'third below' slash chord technique. With this technique, we start with the root position triad and simply drop the third note of the chord into the left hand (to use as a bass note).
For example, if we were playing a G major chord with this technique, we would drop the third note of the chord (B) into the left hand and then play a normal G major chord over this. This would be written as G/B.
G/B
If we play the G/B chord shown above, it sounds pretty good just as it is. Now try playing a Gsus2 chord instead of the G major chord and hear the sound that it creates. Pretty cool right? Also, instead of using a Gsus2 chord, you can also play around with playing a Gadd2 chord (or any of its inversions) to help give you more sound variety.
Now that we know how to make very simple, but beautiful sounding slash chords (by putting the third note in the bass), we can start to now use these chords to create beautiful chord movements. For example, we invite you to play along with the following progressions to help you get the hang of using slash chords (with other chords) to create beautiful music.
Progression 1 - C major -> G/B slash chord -> A minor Progression 2 - A minor -> C/G slash chord -> F major Progression 3 - F major -> C/E slash chord -> D minor
Did you notice?
How super smooth your chords sound with the slash chords added in? That these slash chords can very easily be used as beautiful passing chords? That we introduced a 'fifth below' slash chords as part of progression number 2? That we are basically walking down the C major scale when playing these progressions? That you can also reverse the order of these progressions to move up the C major scale? That you can do this same practice across all musical keys & major scales to master slash chords?
So far, we have introduced you to the idea that you can put any of the chord notes into the left hand (as the bass note) to create a slash chord and for major triads, this means that we can play the third note or the fifth note as our bass note. And yes, this is a great place to start with slash chords but there is also a whole lot more to slash chords than just this!
1) Use any chords you want
Rather than just using a standard major triad slash chord like F/A, where F represents an F major chord (or a Fsus2 or Fadd2 chord) and the A represents the bass note, we can actually change this to a Fmaj7/A instead. This is telling us that we should play an F major 7th chord in our right hand and an A bass note in our left hand.
For example, this chord might be useful to us if we were playing the following chord sequence:
Fmaj7th/A -> E minor 7th/B -> A minor 7th
Fmaj7th/A
Emin7th/B
A minor 7th
2) Use any bass notes you want
With slash chords, we are also not limited to using the piano chord notes as our bass notes. We can actually use whatever bass notes we like to help us create the right kind of sound for what we want to create. For example, here are some slash chords progressions where the bass note is not always taken from the chord notes:
Pro Tip - Some of these slash chords are actually commonly used polychords e.g. Em/C = C major 7th
3) Use non-diatonic slash chords
So far, all of the slash chords that we have introduced have all been diatonic to the key of C major, which just means that all of the notes are consistent with the C major scale. But when using slash chords, it is also possible to temporarily go 'out of key' to help keep things interesting for the listener. For example, here are some slash chord that go out of key:
Progression 1 - C major -> *E7/B -> Am -> E7/G# -> Am/F -> Am/G Progression 2 - F major -> *FmM6th/Ab -> C/G -> F/A -> G/B -> C major *E7 = E dominant 7th *FmM6th = F minor major 6th
4) Add to your left hand 'bass note'
If you see a slash chord written as C/E, it is very natural that we will want to play this with a simple E bass note in our left hand and a C major piano chord in our right. But as we continue to progress, we will normally want to add additional notes to our left hand so that we can complement what we are playing in our right hand. For example, here are some nice voicing ideas for a C/E slash chord which can help to provide you with some good ideas for your own playing:
C/E (LH = ECD)
Csus2/E (LH = ECE)
Where to from here?
Slash chords are a great way to introduce an array of beautiful sounds in a simple & easy way. Like always, we recommend that you take whatever time you need to digest the various piano chords, techniques and progressions that have been introduced here on this page and when you feel ready, we invite you to continue moving forwards on your journey.