How many notes I hear in powerchorded quitar?

[FarleyCZ]

Hi.
I really love rock and all "normal" music as much as trance and all electronical stuff. Now while thinking of combining techniques of both of the world I found out that mayority of today's pop/rock/punk/metal songs uses powerchord technique on background quitars.
Now I'm not a quitarist. On piano, powerchording means pressing bass note instead of the third note of the chord, so you're playing just 2 notes with wide bass. I saw some quitar tutorials and they were pressing just 2 strings, but they were also strumming, which means 6 strings. And that makes me confused.
Is in strings tuning a system which results in hearing 2 notes threetimes or we hear whole chord? Or even more notes than tree?

[jupiter8]

I'm not much of a guitar player but no more than 3 with regular tuning. The third becomes the octave which is nice for a thicker sound.

[jkleban]

Keep in mind that to make a note ring out on a guitar, it needs to be completely FRETTED... that is, putting your fingers on the frets without pressing down completely, mutes those strings.... as such, many rhythm guitar parts play only a couple of notes (depressed completely) but strum more strings which gives you a chuga chuga sound.

Just trying to explain what you might have saw or heard.

Jim

[FarleyCZ]

Yeah, thanks, but I'm interested mainly in exact powerchord technique.
I spoke with guy from LyricalDistortion about use of their powerchord samples and he told me something about 2 notes in powerchord, but I still don't get that strumming.

[geroyannis]

It looks like strumming many strings but they're only using two or three of them. Basically it's just root and fifth, and sometimes they add an octave. Nothing more to power chords.

Yes, I've been playing the guitar for many years.

[Resonator63]

Power chords are mostly 2 or 3 string chords.They sound great when overdriven.
Open chords or barre chords just tend to sound muddy when overdriven too much.

[jcrisman]

A power chord is simply a root note and a fifth (though sometimes the octave of the root or fifth is also played). It is not a "proper" chord as it is only two notes instead of the three or more notes that create a proper chord.

Frequently one will see it spelled out as A5, A#5, etc.

Power chords are used in lieu of triads and extended chords since fuzzes, overdrives, and distortions often turn full chords into mud.

Also it is usually easier for a guitarist to add muted chugging pedal notes, fills, and other lead-type articulations when playing power chords as compared to trying to play fast licks between chords that require fingers and hands to be anchored down in elaborate positions.

...or something like that.

[tapper mike]

The notes can be repeated higher up. It is possible to play 5 notes on a power chord if you mute the third.

[The Fex]

It's easy enough to play E with B on all six strings simultaneously.

[pinkjimiphoton]

speaking as a guitarist, a power chord is simply either a root/5, or parallell 4ths (inverted root/5). sometimes you'll add the octave, but strictly speaking,
all it is is a diad...not a chord, which generally is a triad....root, third, fifth (or others)

there's other possibilities with power chording, but the base is really just the root and 5th.

it's possible to play other combinations of notes as well, like root/6th, but generally any other intervals will lead to too much intermodululation between the harmonics, and sound like poo with the amount of distortion most guys use.

even if it looks like we're strumming, we generally mute the rest of the strings when using power chords...and try to avoid the third when possible.

hope that helps, mate..

[emanual tehpirate]

if you stick a shed load of distortion ontop of the 2notes (3 strings) it sounds so much more harmonicaly complex too, its a very full sound. i think that threw me when i first started on guitar. i guess taking out the third note removes the emotional charge of the backing and lets the lead voice dictate the vibe of the song better, and then when you really wanna emphasise a feeling (seriousness/sadness/joy or whatever) bang the third back in and its like a whole new dimension for the listner to get their ears around without ever really changing anything. soz i guess i was just thinking aloud for my own song writting efforts then lol

[MikeInOttawa]

I've been wondering for a long long time whether power chords were a 1st and 5th or a 1st and 4th. Thanks for the answer.

This also explains the drop-D tuning I've heard about, where the low E string is tuned lower to be a D; the bottom two strings on the guitar are a fifth apart from each other, making a power chord really really easy to play in any key.

[FarleyCZ]

i guess taking out the third note removes the emotional charge of the backing and lets the lead voice dictate the vibe of the song better, and then when you really wanna emphasise a feeling

Yep. That emotional charge is given to the bacghround instruments. Actually you can see this effect in Trance music too. For example in Paul Van Dycks For An Angel, or in pop like BEP's I've gotta feeling. Riffs here just 2 notish.

[pinkjimiphoton]

the main reason to dump the 3rd, is the harmonics from it cancel and argue with the harmonics of the tonic and 4th or 5th, which tend to reinforce one another..

to (mis)quote van halen, "if ya play all kinds of thirds and pretty chords thru a blazing stack of amps, it's gonna sound like shit".

he ain't kidding...

however, you can get away with some more complex chords with a lot of distortion, depending on the inversion of the notes.

but for most of us, root 5 is the way to go.

[pinkjimiphoton]

ps...speaking of inversion...

you can IMPLY a whole chord on a guitar with distortion with a major third and a dominant seventh, the harmonics of the two notes seem to fill it out and make it sound like the missing notes are there. it's a groovy trick, if you go up a half step, you get the V7, slide it down a half step, you get the IV7.

peace!