Like I am 5 please, my teacher explained it to me like I’m an adult and it didn’t take
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Simple explanation: you have a song or piece of music. It’s in a minor key. Normally, you would end the song or piece on the primary minor chord of that key (the tonic.)
But sometimes, the minor sound feels too sad and you want something more uplifting. So you change the last chord of the music to a tonic major chord instead of the minor chord.
The difference between a major chord and a minor chord is in the third (major or minor third). So a lot of composers made that minor to major change and that changed third became known as a Picardy third.
Why Picardy? Because the person who named that in the 18th century thought he heard a that sound a lot in the Picardy region of France.
It’s when you write or play a piece of music in a minor key, and then in the last note, change the key from minor to major. Major and minor scales only differ on some of the notes. For a lot of resolution chords, the notes played are 1, 3, 5, and 8 on the scale. The only one of those that’s different between major and minor is the 3. So, changing the 3 up a half-step changes the key from minor to major.
You’ll also learn to instinctively recognize it once you’ve heard it a few times. Basically, if you hear a haunting and beautiful melody, and then it feels like the composer decided to piss in your Cheerios on the last note and ruin the song for no earthly reason, that’s almost always a Picardy Third.
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