Music Chord Finder — Gökdeniz İnan

Overview

Music Chord Finder is a small Python command-line project that takes musical notes as input and identifies whether they form a major, minor, diminished, or augmented chord.

The project currently lives in one main file, chord_finder.py. The goal is not to make a complete music theory tool yet. Version 1 is complete and focuses on clean function design, user input handling, chord logic, and a simple command-line experience.

Why I Built It

I wanted to connect programming with music theory. While learning how chords work, especially intervals and inversions, I used this project to turn that understanding into code.

Instead of only memorizing chord names, I wanted to model the logic behind them: notes become numbers, intervals become patterns, and those patterns can be checked by a program.

I also wanted to spend some evenings away from AI-assisted coding and work through the problem manually. Part of the point was to keep the basic muscle active: thinking through the logic myself, typing the code by hand, making mistakes, and understanding why each piece belongs there.

What Version 1 Does

Accept notes from the terminal.
Normalize user input.
Work with sharp notes.
Convert notes into numbers.
Calculate intervals from possible roots.
Match interval patterns against basic chord types.
Recognize inversions.
Handle invalid notes gracefully.

Example

If the user enters:

C E G

the program can identify the result as:

C major

It also supports inversions. For example, E G C can still be recognized as C major, because the program tests each note as a possible root.

Core Logic

A chord is identified not just by note names, but by the distances between notes. For example, C E G becomes 0, 4, 7, which matches the major chord pattern.

To support inversions, the program tests each note as a possible root. That way, notes like E G C can still be understood as a C major chord, even though C is not the first note entered.

Version 2 Focus

Version 2 is about improving the command-line experience without changing the core chord logic too much.

Cleaner welcome screen.
Clearer input instructions.
Example inputs before the user types.
Better formatting for successful chord results.
Better formatting for invalid notes and no-match cases.
Optional repeated input loop.
Optional exit commands such as q or quit.
Optional help command and supported chord type display.

Current Limitations

Flats are not supported yet.
Seventh, ninth, eleventh, and thirteenth chords are not supported yet.
The project is CLI-only.
There is no Django or web interface yet.
It is still intentionally small and educational.

Roadmap

v1.0: Basic chord finder with major, minor, diminished, augmented, inversions, sharp notes, and invalid note handling. Completed.
v2.0: Better CLI experience with clearer instructions, repeated input, exit/help commands, and better result formatting. In progress.
v3.0: Flats support, including notes such as Bb, Eb, and Ab.
v4.0: Extended chords such as sevenths, ninths, elevenths, and possibly thirteenths.
Future: A simple web app, possibly with Django, for a more user-friendly interface.

Project Status

Status: Version 1 complete. Version 2 is in progress.

This is a small but meaningful learning project. It is intentionally limited, but it already captures the core idea: basic chord recognition can be expressed clearly through intervals, patterns, and careful input handling.