A basic Major, Minor or Diminished Chord in Any Key using Standard Notation will be Three Dots in a row regardless of which Key it is in! Below are several basic chords shown. Knowing which ones are major minor or diminished comes with knowing:

(1) What Key your in

(2) What Major - Minor - Diminished chords are in that Key

Above is in the Key of C and its Showing 2 Minor chords - 3 Major chords and a Diminished chord as well - can you tell the difference?

So it'll take you years to be able to notice a A minor from a A major - The only difference between an "A Major", "A Minor" and "A Diminished" in appearance is the number of Flats (#) at the beginning of the "Staff"

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As you can See from above, it is best to learn the Basic Chords in C and then Learn to change a Major chord into a Minor chord or Diminished chord or Visa Versa - the "A Major chord" happens to be in three different keys so It would look exactly the same when you write or read it but with different Key Signatures at the Beginning of the measure.

A Good learning plan is to learn what a Chord looks like on the Piano, for the most part, Piano is one instrument you can instantly play, Just Play every other white key with three fingers and you are playing a chord.

Whether you play the Guitar or the Piano, there are only Three basic Chord types - Major, Minor, Diminished - so you would want to learn say the "C Major Chord" and then Learn the one note that you change to make it into a "C Minor" - do this with the major and minor chords in the Key of “C” .

STANDARD 1 - 2 - 3

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