chords.yottanami.com

Chord Nebula is a falling-note game for learning piano chords and progressions on a MIDI keyboard. Notes and chords drop from the top of the play area, and you play each one on your keyboard before it reaches the bottom. Match it in time and it pops; let it hit the bottom and you lose a life. Run out of lives and the game ends. The pace increases as your score climbs.

The core loop

1. A note or chord appears at the top of the play area and falls downward.
2. You play what's shown on your MIDI keyboard before it reaches the bottom. For a chord, you play all of its notes at once.
3. Timing decides the outcome. Match it in time and it pops. Let it reach the bottom and you lose a life.
4. Lives are finite. When you run out, the game ends.
5. Difficulty scales with you. As your score climbs, the pace picks up.

What you see on screen

Note names are displayed on the orb at first, so you can find your footing. Once you are scoring, the note names drop away, leaving the chord name and its scale degree. This is the game's built-in progression: early levels support you with labels, later play expects you to read the chord itself.

Setup choices that shape the run

Before playing, you pick your genre, scale, key, and level from the setup screen. The genre determines which progressions you get and which scales they are drawn from:

Levels and what they cover

• Levels 1–3 are free and cover scale notes and basic chords.
• Levels 4–8 add note ordering, root-in-bass voicings, seventh chords, and more. These are unlocked with a one-time purchase from the setup screen.

What you need to play

A MIDI keyboard, or a MIDI-capable app on your phone. You connect it to your computer, select it from the list on the setup screen, and press Continue. The game is built around the order music itself is structured: the notes of a key one at a time, then the chords built on those notes, then the common progressions those chords make in real genres.

If you're new to Ahrefs and want to run your first SEO audit, the fastest path is: open Site Explorer, enter your target URL, review the Overview for a health snapshot, then dig into Organic Keywords, Top Pages, and Site Audit to find specific problems. From there, build a short prioritized to-do list instead of trying to fix everything at once.

This tutorial walks through that workflow using a realistic starting scenario, explains what the numbers mean, and shows how to turn findings into actions.

Before You Start: Pick a Narrow Scope

A common beginner mistake is auditing an entire large website on day one. The reports become overwhelming, and you can't tell which issues matter.

Instead, choose one of these starting points:

• A single important page (your homepage or a key product/service page)
• A small site (under ~50 pages, e.g., a personal blog or small business site)
• One section of a bigger site (e.g., /blog/)

For this tutorial, assume you're auditing a small business site with about 30 pages. The same steps scale up later.

You'll need an Ahrefs account to follow along. Ahrefs offers paid plans, and pricing and feature limits change over time, so check the current Pricing page for what's included in each tier before committing.

Step 1: Enter Your Target in Site Explorer

Site Explorer is Ahrefs' core tool for analyzing any website or URL.

1. Open Site Explorer from the top navigation.
2. In the search box, paste your domain (e.g., example.com).
3. Choose the Exact URL or Domain mode depending on scope. For a full-site view, use Domain or Prefix; for a single page, use Exact URL.
4. Press Enter.

You'll land on the Overview report. Don't try to absorb everything — focus on four numbers first.

Reading the Overview Snapshot

Important caveat: Ahrefs' traffic and keyword numbers are estimates based on its own data. They won't match Google Search Console or your analytics exactly. Treat them as directional, not absolute.

Step 2: See What You Already Rank For

Go to Organic Keywords in the left sidebar. This shows queries where your site appears in search results.

Sort by Traffic (descending) to see which pages bring the most estimated visitors. Then look for:

• Keywords ranking in positions 4–15 — these are often the easiest wins. A small content or on-page improvement can push them onto page one.
• Keywords with high volume but low position — potential opportunities if the topic is relevant.
• Irrelevant keywords — if you rank for something off-topic, it may signal thin or mismatched content.

Write down 5–10 of the position 4–15 keywords. These become your first optimization targets.

Step 3: Find Your Best and Weakest Pages

Open Top Pages. This ranks your URLs by estimated organic traffic.

Look for two things:

1. Your top performers — understand what topics and formats work. Can you create more content like this?
2. Pages with traffic but poor rankings — these may need on-page fixes (title, headings, internal links).

If a page gets zero traffic and targets a topic you care about, it's a candidate for a rewrite or consolidation.

Step 4: Run a Technical Site Audit

Now move to Site Audit. This crawls your site and flags technical and on-page issues.

1. Click Site Audit → New project.
2. Enter your domain and set crawl settings (default is usually fine for a small site).
3. Start the crawl and wait for it to finish.

Once complete, you'll see a Health Score and a list of issues grouped by category.

Which Issues to Fix First

Not all issues are equal. Prioritize in this order:

Ignore low-impact warnings (like minor meta description length) until the big items are handled.

Step 5: Turn Findings Into a To-Do List

You now have raw data. Convert it into a short, actionable list. Example:

1. Fix 3 broken links found in Site Audit.
2. Rewrite title tags on 5 pages with duplicate titles.
3. Improve 4 pages ranking in positions 6–12 by adding missing subtopics and internal links.
4. Remove or update 2 thin pages with no traffic.

Keep the list to 5–10 items max for your first audit. Finishing a short list beats starting a long one.

Common Beginner Mistakes

• Chasing every red flag. Site Audit flags many minor issues. Fix what affects rankings and users first.
• Trusting estimates as exact numbers. Ahrefs data is modeled, not measured from your analytics.
• Auditing a huge site too early. Start small to learn the interface.
• Ignoring search intent. A page can be technically perfect but still fail if it doesn't match what searchers want.
• Forgetting to re-crawl. After fixes, run Site Audit again to confirm improvements.

Where to Go Next

Once your first audit is done:

• Compare with competitors using Site Explorer's Competing Domains and Content Gap reports.
• Track keyword rankings over time with Rank Tracker.
• Explore backlink opportunities in the Backlinks and Link Intersect reports.
• Set up recurring Site Audit crawls so new issues surface automatically.

Your first audit isn't about perfection — it's about building a repeatable habit: enter a target, read the key reports, pick the highest-impact fixes, and act. Do that once a month and your site's health compounds.

Levels 1–3 of Chord Nebula are free and cover scale notes and basic chords. Levels 4–8 are unlocked with a one-time purchase made from the setup screen, and they add note ordering, root-in-bass voicings, seventh chords, and more. No subscription is mentioned for level access — the site's Subscribe section is a mailing list for release updates, not a paywall for content.

What the free levels cover

The free tier is not a demo that cuts off mid-concept. It maps to the first two stages of how the game teaches:

• Scale notes, one at a time — you play the individual notes of a chosen key until the shape of the scale is under your fingers.
• Basic chords built on those notes — how each chord is stacked, what it is called, and which scale degree it belongs to.

If your goal is to stop hunting for notes and start recognizing the chords that live inside a key, levels 1–3 are the part that does that work.

What the paid levels add

The progression is deliberate: the free levels give you the raw materials (notes and chords), and the paid levels move toward how those materials are actually used — ordering notes, changing which note sits in the bass, and extending chords into sevenths. The site describes the final and most important stage as drilling common progressions across keys, scales, and genres until moving between chords "stops being a calculation and becomes something you hear."

How to unlock the paid levels

1. Connect a MIDI keyboard (or a MIDI-capable app on your phone) and select it from the device list.
2. Pick your genre, scale, and key from the setup screen.
3. Choose a level from 4–8. The unlock is a one-time purchase initiated from that same setup screen.

You do not need to buy anything to evaluate the teaching style — play levels 1–3 first and judge whether the note-name fade-out and increasing pace suit you.

Deciding whether to pay

• Stay free if you are new to the keyboard and still building scale and basic-chord fluency. Levels 1–3 cover exactly that ground.
• Consider the one-time purchase if you already know your scales and basic chords and want the game to push you into voicings and seventh chords — the material that separates "I can name this chord" from "I can move through it in real music."
• Check your hardware first. The game requires a MIDI keyboard or a MIDI-capable app; without one, no level is playable regardless of tier.

One thing the site does not state: the price of the one-time purchase. It is described only as a purchase from the setup screen, so treat cost as something to confirm at the point of unlock rather than assume.

Chord Nebula is a browser-based game for learning piano chords and chord progressions. You play falling notes and chords on a connected MIDI keyboard (or a MIDI-capable app on your phone), and the game drills you through scale notes, the chords built on them, and the common progressions those chords form in real music. It suits keyboard players who already have a MIDI setup and want to build chord fluency by playing rather than reading theory.

How the learning is structured

Chord Nebula teaches in the order it says music is built:

1. Notes of a key — one at a time, until the shape of the scale is under your fingers.
2. Chords built on those notes — how each is stacked, what it is called, and which scale degree it belongs to.
3. Common progressions — the part the site calls most important, since chords are rarely played alone. The game drills moving between them across keys, scales, and genres until it becomes something you hear rather than calculate.

How to play

• Connect a MIDI keyboard to your computer, or use a MIDI-capable app on your phone.
• On the setup screen, pick your genre, scale, key, and level.
• Notes and chords fall from the top of the play area. Play the note or chord shown — all its notes at once — before it reaches the bottom.
• Match it in time and it pops. Let it reach the bottom and you lose a life. Run out of lives and the game ends.
• The pace picks up as your score climbs.

Note names appear on the orb at first and drop away once you are scoring, leaving the chord name and its scale degree. That fade is deliberate: it pushes you off reading labels and onto recognizing shapes.

What genre, scale, and level change

The genre decides which progressions you get and which scales they are drawn from:

Levels also gate content:

• Levels 1–3 are free and cover scale notes and basic chords.
• Levels 4–8 add note ordering, root-in-bass voicings, seventh chords, and more. These unlock with a one-time purchase from the setup screen.

What you need before starting

A MIDI keyboard connected to your computer, or a MIDI-capable app on your phone. The game asks you to select your device from a list and press Continue before you reach the genre and scale setup. Without a MIDI input, there is nothing to play the falling notes on.

Is it for you?

Chord Nebula fits you if you want to practice chords and progressions by playing them in time, across genres and keys, and you already have a MIDI keyboard or app. It is less suited if you have no MIDI input, or if you want a reading-first theory course rather than a game that assumes you learn by playing.

You can try levels 1–3 at no cost to see whether the falling-note format works for you before deciding on the one-time unlock for levels 4–8.

In Chord Nebula, the genre you pick on the setup screen determines two things at once: which chord progressions the game throws at you, and which scales those progressions are drawn from. You don't choose a scale independently of a genre — the setup screen pairs each genre with its matching scale, so selecting "jazz" means you're working in dorian territory, and selecting "EDM" means phrygian. Pop and classical stay strictly in major and minor.

The genre-to-scale mapping

The game's own description lays out the pairing directly:

Two patterns are worth noticing. First, major and minor are the baseline for every genre — the modal scales are additions, not replacements. Second, the modes are grouped by genre family: mixolydian for the rock/blues pair, dorian for jazz/funk, phrygian for EDM alone.

What the genre actually controls

The genre is not just a label on the scale. According to the game, it "decides which progressions you get and which scales they are drawn from." So the genre is doing double duty:

• Progression selection — a jazz session serves up different chord movements than a pop session, because the progressions are the ones common to that style.
• Scale selection — the notes and chords falling down the play area come from the scales associated with that genre.

This matters because the game's stated goal is drilling "the common progressions those chords make in real music, across keys, scales, and genres." The genre setting is the mechanism that keeps the practice material idiomatic rather than generic.

How to pick genre and scale

From the setup screen:

1. Connect a MIDI keyboard (or a MIDI-capable app on your phone) and select it from the device list, then press Continue.
2. On the genre/scale screen, choose your Genre.
3. Choose the Scale that goes with it.
4. Continue to pick your key, then your level.

The scale list you see is tied to the genre you selected, so the pairing described above is enforced by the interface rather than left to you to assemble.

Why the modes are added where they are

The three modes in the table aren't arbitrary. Mixolydian, dorian, and phrygian are the modes most associated with the harmonic language of blues/rock, jazz/funk, and electronic dance music respectively — which is consistent with the game's framing that it teaches "in the order the music itself is built." If you're practicing jazz progressions, you'll encounter dorian because that's the mode those progressions live in; the same logic applies to the other pairs.

Practical implications for practice

• If you want modal practice, pick the genre that carries the mode. There's no separate "dorian mode" toggle — you get dorian by selecting jazz or funk.
• If you want to stay in familiar territory, pop and classical keep you in major and minor with no modal content.
• Levels 1–3 are free and cover scale notes and basic chords. Levels 4–8 add note ordering, root-in-bass voicings, seventh chords, and more, and require a one-time purchase from the setup screen. The genre/scale choice applies across levels, so the material you drill at level 5 in jazz will be jazz-flavored rather than generic.

A note on what the game shows you

While you're still finding your footing, note names appear on the orb. Once you're scoring, the note names drop away, leaving the chord name and its scale degree. So the scale you selected stays visible as a degree reference even after the individual note labels disappear — which is the point at which the genre/scale pairing starts doing real work for your ear rather than your eyes.