Chapter 13:Accompanying Melodies 171
Block Chord Accompaniment
The easiest type of accompaniment to play is the block chordaccompaniment.
This approach is exactly as it sounds: Whenever there’s a chord change, you put
all your fingers on the keyboard (at the same time) and play the chord.
That’s it. You don’t play any special rhythms, you don’t arpeggiate the chord,
you don’t do anything except plunk!the notes of the chord all at once.
All you have to do is put the three (or more) notes of the chord in your right
hand and double the root of the chord with your left hand, like this:
Accompanying a melody with block chords.The primary benefit of playing a block chord accompaniment is that it’s easy—
for you, anyway. The drawback is that it’s a rather sparse accompaniment; it
really doesn’t add anything to the music, except to provide only the most basic
harmonic underpinning to the melody.
Still, if block chords are all you can master, that’s what you should play. No one
will ever accuse you of getting in the way or covering up the melody!Rhythmic Accompaniment
There’s another way to play chords that isn’t quite as boring as the block chord
approach. You play the block chords, but with a more interesting rhythmic pattern.
What kind of pattern am I talking about? There are several you can choose
from, including these:Rhythmic accompaniment in quarter notes.