Guitar chord tutorial

If you are using a screen reader, you should set it to expand abbreviations to get it to read the note names correctly.

Without chord charts, many guitarists are lost. There is no reason for this: with a little background knowledge, anyone can work out the fingering for chords like G#m7(#5). You need to know what notes are in the chord, and where to find them on the guitar. Then all it takes is the finger skills to actually reach them! This tutorial will give you the first bit, not the second…

A warning, though: I cover a lot of ground in a little space, so take your time and absorb all the information well.

Contents

Jump in where appropriate! You need to know the stuff on the music theory, chord theory and tuning pages before reading further on this page.

Chords on the guitar

Guitar chords are simply finger patterns that result in the chords described on the chord theory page, or variants thereof. Because of the restricted number of shapes you can make with four fingers and a thumb, notes are often not in strict sequence; because of the way the guitar is tuned, the chord will usually span more than one octave.

Notation

I’ll be using the notation below to show fingering and represent the fretboard. The chord shown is an open E major chord (E-G#-B). The “grid” shows the strings going horizontally with the highest string at the top, with the frets going vertically. The “0” at the top left indicates that we are at the nut of the guitar neck (the “0th fret”). The notes down the left are the standard string tunings. The “O” by the bottom E and top B and E show that these strings are to be played open (unfretted). An X in this position would indicate that the string is not to be played.

The numbers on the grid are finger numbers: T is thumb, 1 is index finger, 2 is middle finger, 3 is ring finger and 4 is little finger. The chord chart below shows E major: open E, ring finger on second fret of A string producing a B, middle finger on second fret of D string to produce an E, index finger on first fret of G string to produce a G#, and open B and E strings.

For visually-impaired users using a screen reader, each chord is (or will be, when I finish the job) preceded by a “skip” link that allows them to jump over the diagram. The chord shape, although not fingering, is given just before the skip link.

(022100) [Skip text chord diagram]

   0   1   2   3   4
E O|---|---|---|---|  E
B O|---|---|---|---|  B
G  |-1-|---|---|---|  G#
D  |---|-3-|---|---|  E
A  |---|-2-|---|---|  B
E O|---|---|---|---|  E

[Show me!]

Below almost every chord chart is a [Show me!] link, which is a link to a photo of me playing the chord, so long as your browser supports images. Do not use this as a technique guide, as I’ve often moved unused fingers out of the way to make it easier to see what fingers I am using.

Bar chords

Bar (or barre) chords are used when there is no convenient “open” chord, and/or a full, six-string sound is needed. A finger is used as a “bar”, to hold down multiple strings like a capo does. Let’s look at an example: F major (F-A-C) can be played open like this:

(XX3211) [Skip text chord diagram]

   0   1   2   3   4
E  |(1)|---|---|---|  F
B  |(1)|---|---|---|  C
G  |---|-2-|---|---|  A
D  |---|---|-3-|---|  F
A X|---|---|---|---|  
E X|---|---|---|---|

[Show me!]

The brackets indicate that the finger covers more than one fret—so even this chord is a partial bar. However, as a four-string chord, it is not very full-sounding. Try this instead:

(133211) [Skip text chord diagram]

   0   1   2   3   4
E  |(1)|---|---|---|  F
B  |(1)|---|---|---|  C
G  |---|-2-|---|---|  A
D  |---|---|-4-|---|  F
A  |---|---|-3-|---|  A
E  |(1)|---|---|---|  F

[Show me!]

The index finger is held across all of the strings behind the first fret, and must be held down properly on the bottom E and top two strings.

Standard chord shapes

There are a few standard chord shapes that are worth learning by heart, which form a good starting point for working out more complex chords. I’m not going to show these on this page for space reasons. If you don’t know open A, C, D, E, F, G, Am, Dm and Em; or how to form any major or minor chord based on the open chord shapes, go to the Standard Chords page.

Finding a chord from a name

This is the “heart” of the tutorial. but is too long to include on this page. If this is the bit you’re looking for, go to the separate chord-finding tutorial page, and come back when finished!

Naming a chord you’ve found

You’ve been playing your guitar, and stumbled across an excellent chord—but you don’t know what it is! Let’s look at how to find out with an example:

(X07600) [Skip text chord diagram]

   4   5   6   7   8
E O|---|---|---|---| E
B O|---|---|---|---| B
G  |---|-1-|---|---| C#
D  |---|---|-2-|---| A
A O|---|---|---|---| A
E X|---|---|---|---|

[Show me!]

OK—this is clearly some form of A chord. It has the second or ninth (B), the major third (C#) and the fifth (E). Looking at the list on the chord theory page, this must be Aadd9 (aka A2). It’s not Asus2 because of the C#. It could also be an ambiguous form of A9, A11 or A13.

It does contain just notes found in B11, but it is clearly not intended as a B-based chord. This isn’t always the case—there is often more than one possible “name” for a chord. It’s a bit far-fetched, but the G#m7(#5) above could be called E6/9 / G#.

Capo use

If you have followed the tutorial to this point, you are in a position to understand how a capo works. Go and buy one, then read the instructions on this page.

End of tutorial

That’s the lot. You should now have enough information to work out arbitrary chords for yourself. You can return to the main guitar page, or go and check out some of my home-grown chords.