The three subdrills of the Triads drill are Diatonic Chords, Random Roots, and Common Tone Chords.
Diatonic chords are chords built from the notes belonging to the major or harmonic minor scale that defines a key. In the Diatonic Chords subdrill the program picks a key and then cycles through all of the chords that occur in that key. Once all the chords have been used, it picks a new key and begins the cycle again. The keys used are determined by the setting in the Difficulty menu. See pages 23-24.
The notes used as chord roots are chosen at random. The available choices are determined by the setting in the Difficulty menu. See pages 23-24.
This command opens the Common Tone Chords dialog box, where you can choose a pitch that will be common to all chords. You can specify whether you want the common tone to be the soprano, alto, or bass note of the chord.
Choose Clef - Using the Choose Clef popup menu, choose the clef you want the common tone to apply to. You can choose a different chord voice and pitch for the common tone in each clef.
Chord Voice - Choose whether the common tone will be the soprano, alto, or bass note of the chord.
Staff - Click and drag the whole note up or down on the music staff to change the pitch of the common tone.
Accidental Toolbar - You can add a sharp or flat to the common tone. If a choice is unavailable, the accidental will be disabled.
For a tutorial on Common Tone Chords, see the User Guide, pages 37-38.
The following items modify the current subdrill.
Only major chords will be used.
Only minor chords will be used.
Both major and minor chords will be used.
Major, minor, and diminished chords will be used.
Major, minor, diminished, and augmented chords will be used.
This command opens the Triad Qualities dialog box, where you can choose the qualities you want to use.
All chords will appear in root position. In root position, the root is always the lowest pitch in the chord.
All chords will appear in first inversion. In first inversion, the third is always the lowest pitch in the chord.
All chords will appear in second inversion. In second inversion, the fifth is always the lowest pitch in the chord.
The program will use all inversions.
This command opens the Triad Inversions dialog box, where you can choose the inversions you want to use.
This command opens the Answer Options dialog box, where you can choose how specific the answer must be. A complete triad answer consists of three parts: root, quality, and inversion. Answer Options lets you use any combination of these parts; for example, just the inversion.
Note: This command is only enabled in the Naming activity.
