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Live Chord Display

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The chord bar above the keyboard names the chord you’re hearing, whether it comes from the song or from your own keyboard. Pause on any chord to study it on the keyboard or open it in the Chords Explorer.

IMAGE · practice-chord-display.png · 1200 × 400 px · The chord bar above the keyboard showing a slash chord such as D7/A while paused, with its right-click menu open (Show on keyboard, Open in Chord Explorer).

During playback

  • The chord name changes when the harmony changes, landing when you hear the new chord, not just on the beat.
  • A chord held under a moving melody keeps its name, and a broken or rolled chord shows as one chord rather than a string of single notes.
  • When the bass isn’t on the chord’s root, the name shows it as a slash chord, for example C/E.
  • The display follows key changes and waits for your sound card, so name and sound arrive together (see output delay).

How chords are recognised, and how to tune it for a particular song, is explained in How Orfeo reads chords.

Study a chord

  • Pause on the chord you want. While paused, the name updates as you scrub with the mouse wheel.
  • Right-click the chord name.
  • Choose an option:

Option

What it does

Show on keyboard

Lights the chord’s notes exactly as they’re played in the song, in the same register and inversion, and opens Lock-A-Chord so you can play it and step through its inversions.

Open in Chord Explorer

Opens the Chords Explorer with this chord selected, ready to hear its inversions or use it in a progression.

Hover over the chord name for a reminder: Pause to study the chord during playback, Right-click for options while paused.

Chords from your own playing

With a MIDI keyboard connected, or when you click keys on the screen, the chord bar names what you play. It’s a quick way to check a voicing or find the name of a chord you’ve worked out by ear.

How names are written

In Settings → Chords & Notation you choose the note names (UK/US, Central European with H, or solfège), sharps or flats, and Chord naming: abbreviations such as Cm7 and Gaug, or symbols such as G+ and F°7. The choice applies everywhere a chord is named. See Chords & Notation settings.

 Tip

To see the chords of one instrument only, hide all other tracks, pause, and scrub through with the mouse wheel. With Reflect on keyboard on, the keys light up under the playhead as you go.