An exceptional guitar chord book! Covers all twelve basic guitar chord types shown with photos, notation and diagrams for easy reference. Also contains a special section displaying these essential moveable rhythm guitar chord forms!
Discover how guitar chords are constructed – unveiling the fretboard in a whole new light! Also discover how guide tones can quickly create any type of chord type anywhere on the fretboard!
Basic Chords
Every beginner guitarist should familiarize themselves with some basic chords known as open chords – these basic chords are used in 90% of songs so it is crucial that beginners start playing them right away! To become successful at guitar, learn them early.
Each guitar chord consists of at least three distinct notes, and this determines its “chord quality”. Most basic guitar chords contain three notes; however, more complex chords can include more than three notes to vary their sound. Enharmonic notation allows musicians to alter chord sounds further by using flat or sharp notes within them to alter how a chord sounds.
As part of our effort to help guitar players build chords, we offer a Guitar Chord Builder tool. Simply select your Root and Chord Type criteria, and the Guitar Chord Builder will present a selection of chords that meet this criteria – with an “More link” showing even more chords that might fit.
Intermediate Chords
Beginners to intermediate guitarists will find this book invaluable. It provides an introduction to various new chord shapes, including those featuring the lowered third note (or diminished note) which produces an atmospheric or melancholic sound, as well as different voicings of those same chords which can take songs in new directions.
Your guitar lessons will also include instruction on bar chords – an indispensable chord type when playing jazz music – as well as suspended chords that add an atmospheric sound to any tune.
Finally, you will learn major and minor 7 chords to add depth to rhythm voicings. In addition, this book will teach you how to read chord progressions using slash chords which follow bass line movement on fifth and sixth strings; these slash chords, often called block chords, help maintain tight and smooth chord movements that stay tight against one another. Furthermore, each page’s grids show where these intervals exist on the fretboard so it becomes easy for instant construction of any type of chord you come across in a song!
Advanced Chords
Once you’ve mastered the fundamental chords covered by beginner and intermediate sections of this guitar chords book, it’s time to explore more advanced forms. Here you will discover how to construct chords using more than four notes like major 9th chords and augmented 13th chords; inversions will make them easier for bassists who occupy frequencies similar to that of their root chord.
Clicking either Root or Type links will load a selection of chords (or voicings) that match those roots and types, each displayed with various inversions so you can choose what best fits for your acoustic or electric guitar playing situation. As you experiment, your understanding of chord creation will grow deeper; this is one way of quickly developing musicianship skills.
Bonus Moveable Rhythm Chords
One defining characteristic of guitar chords is their non-linear construction using perfect intervals like piano or vocal chords. Instead, guitar chords often rely on flexible shapes – particularly dominant seventh chords – which allow left hands to avoid crossing several frets at once. This bonus lesson showcases some movable chords available in standard tuning as well as how you can move them across the fretboard.
Movable chords feature a fixed root note while their other notes can be adjusted on the fretboard to create different keys or even octaves of music from different genres of music. Our bonus lesson also shows how you can use chord shapes as guides to guide where fingers should go on your guitar neck for instantaneous chord construction anywhere on the fretboard – an extremely useful skill for any guitarist enabling them to confidently play songs from all genres with confidence!