Chords Archives - Page 7 of 15

How to Play Captivating Diminished 7th Chords

How to Play Diminished 7th chords The diminished 7th chord is used a lot in jazz music but also in pop music you keep bumping into them. Songs like “Michelle” by the Beatles, “Who says” by John Mayer, “Friends in low places” by Garth Brooks, “Road trippin'” by the Red Hot Chili Peppers, “My sweet lord” by George Harrison and “God only knows” by The Beach Boys are just a few of many popular compositions using diminished chords.

Diminished chords are considered “dissonant” because of their tonal instability. They create a sense of tension and drama, and have a strong drive toward tonal resolution, meaning that, they want to move to a more final and stable sound (consonance). This is why they are often used in music, they can make a song more captivating, stirring, and charismatic.

The Dim Chords
There are different types of diminished chords: There is the diminished (dim) chord, the half diminished chord (m7♭5) and the diminished 7th chord (dim7). The diminished chord itself is not used very often, the half diminished and diminished 7th chord are more commonly used.

Dim Chord Analysis
Compared to a minor chord (1 – ♭3 – 5), the diminished chord has a flat 5th (♭5), the half diminished chord adds a flatted 7th (♭7) on top of that, and the diminished 7th chord adds a double flatted 7th (♭♭7).

Here are the chord formulas:
Major chord = 1 – 3 – 5
Minor chord = 1 – ♭3 – 5
Diminished chord = 1 -♭3 -♭5
Half diminished chord = 1 -♭3 -♭5 -♭7
Diminished 7th chord = 1 -♭3 -♭5 -♭♭7

Let’s take C as the root for example:
C major = C – E – G
C minor = C – E♭ – G
C dim = C – E♭ – G♭
Cm7♭5 (half dim) = C – E♭ – G♭ – B♭
C dim7 = C – E♭ – G♭ – B♭♭ (or simply “A”)

How to Play Diminished 7th Chords
The diminished 7th chord is made up of minor third intervals. That means all the notes are three semitones (3 frets) away from each other. This specific feature of the chord makes it possible to move the chord 3 frets up the fretboard each time and the chord will remain the same.

We start with a dim7 chord shape played on highest four strings. As you can see below from left to right, we move the diminished chord shape 3 frets up each time. Start the chord shape on the 1st fret, then move up to the 4th fret, the 7th fret and finally the 10th fret. Of course, you can move it up as far as you like. Continue Reading

New Website: YourGuitarChords

By Klaus Crow 16 Comments

Also known as C chord – C major chord

C – Cmaj – Cmajor – C chord

Today I’m happy to announce the launching of my new website YourGuitarChords.com

YourGuitarChords is a simple, clear and Easy-To-Use website that focuses on the most essential chords you need to know to build your chord vocabulary!

Each chord is shown in 5 different positions using the most practical, common used and best sounding chord shapes.

Whether you need simple easy chords for beginners or more challenging blues rock & jazz chords, it’s all there. And the best thing is, it’s free. :)

Let’s take a look how the website works:

Easy Navigation
The website has a top menu displaying all keys for every chord. Scroll over a key and you will see two submenus for major and minor chords. Click or scroll over these submenus to see all chord types. Chords with an arrow-down icon have an extra submenu with more related chord types.

The Chords
When you choose a chord in the menu it will appear BIG on the screen. This will give you a clear view for every chord. For each chord you can choose five different chord shapes / variations. These are shown below the main chord.

Each of the five chord shapes are played in a different position on the neck. Each time you click on one of the smaller chords it will be shown Big, Plain, Simple and Clear.

Fret Numbers
A green number next to the chord diagram indicates the fret number. For example, a “5” next to the chord diagram means that specific fret is the 5th fret on the neck. The fret below that is the 6th fret and so on.

How to Read
If you don’t know how to read a chord diagram there’s a link in the right sidebar on the website How to Read a Chord Diagram and other chord notation

YGC Help Kit
The sidebar on the right shows several posts that will help you out on your journey learning new chords.

The Essentials
I have chosen to build a website that doesn’t have a zillion chord types (which most of them you will never use), but one that contains only the most essential chords that you’ll need for the songs you want to learn, chords with beautiful sounds that will inspire you to play, practice, study and create your own music.

Updates
I will continue to update the website with more essential chords along the way and of course you’ll be the first to know. This website is build for you “The eager student”.

I hope you like YourGuitarChords and may it be a valuable tool to improve your guitar playing.

Enjoy!
YOURGUITARCHORDS.COM

Let me know what you think about the website in the comments below. I appreciate it.

Warm regards,
Klaus Crow

How to Play and Apply Dominant 7th Chords

By Klaus Crow 2 Comments

The dominant 7th chord is a chord that you will find in a lot of popular songs and many styles of music. In fact it’s the most essential chord type in blues music and one of the defining characteristics that defines the blues sound. But even if you’re not into blues, you want to make this chord part of your guitar vocabulary.

The dom7 chord comes in various shapes and sizes. We start with the “open” dom7 chords which are great for beginners and work our way up to more intermediate level dom7 chords: “The moveable chords”.

We’ll first take you through some basic dominant 7th music theory, we’ll show you the different types of dom7 chords and shapes, and then apply the chords to the song.

Let’s dive in!

Chord Analysis

The Dom7 chord is simply a major triad with a flatted seventh (b7).
The major triad consists of the root (1), the major third (3) and the perfect fifth (5).
So the Dom7 chord formula = 1 3 5 b7

Let’s take a Cdom7 (also called “C7”) chord as an example.
We look at the C major scale: C D E F G A B C and we take the root (1st), 3rd, 5th and b7th note of that scale and you get the notes: C-E-G-Bb. So a Cdom7 (C7) chord consists of the notes: C E G Bb

Three Chord Songs – C major, G major, and F major

By Klaus Crow 4 Comments

When you are at the beginning of your guitar learning journey, one of the best ways to practice is by learning songs you like and playing them until they sound perfect. This approach is fun and allows you to perform in front of your friends as soon as possible. You just need to know a bunch of chords and some simple strumming patterns.

In an another tutorial I listed 10 songs that you can play with just the C major and G major chords. The next chord to learn is F major. Why? Because F major is the fourth chord in the Key of C and one of the most common chord progressions is I-IV-V, or C-F-G. There are thousands of songs that use these simple three chords.

F major barred “133211” is not always easy for a beginner so we can always play F major like this “XX3211” if necessary. The I-IV-V progression is known as the “Rock N Roll progression” so many of the examples below will fit into the rock and pop rock genre.

When dealing with two chord songs we are actually a little limited, especially when using only C and G, however by adding F major in a whole world of new music is opened up to us. One thing not mentioned in the last article was transposition. If we have a song in the Key of D using the chords D major and A major, it is easy to transpose that song to the Key of C were the chords will be C major and G major.

Since we are sticking to the Key of C some of the songs below may be slightly transposed, it all depends if it was possible. Sometimes a song just doesn’t sound right when transposed. So below are 10 songs that are perfect for knowing the chords C, F, and G.

KUMBAYA

Another simple traditional spiritual song, first recorded back in the 1920’s. This simple folk song is a perfect example of how these three chords work together. The fourth (F major) and fifth (G major) are used to create a musical tension and bridge before returning back to the root (C major). It is truly amazing how much western music is based off of how these three chords sound together!

TWIST AND SHOUT

This song was not written by the Beatles, but they are certainly the band who made it popular. This was the last song recorded on their album Please Please Me because their producer George Martin knew John Lennon’s voice would take a beating. He definitely gave it is all while singing this song!

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