Chord Construction

In this mega lesson on chord building, we're going to discover what's the behind the chord shapes that are familiar to us.

Then, starting from there, we'll learn how to create new chord shapes, all along the fretboard , matching the rules of music theory with the geometry of the fretboard .

Usually, we guitarists are used to memorizing as many chord fingerings as possible, as static shapes.

There are tons of chord patterns : open strings, barrè shapes, higher positions, and so forth.

The most common way to learn chords is to get a chord dictionary and try to brute force memorize all those diagrams until the muscle memory allows us to play the chords without overthinking.

This kind of practice is a good foundation, but actually, it's just a starting point, from which you should expand your chords knowledge and really learn how chords are built.

If you consider a chord as a static shape to be placed on the fretboard, you will severely limit your options for expanding your sound and fully expressing yourself on the guitar.

What if you are able to modify a chord by adding or substituting notes in its shape, with a purpose?

Or even get able to create chords on the fly in any part of the fretboard, depending on the musical feeling you want to produce at a given moment.

To master these skills, first, you need to know the theory of the chords and how to apply it to the guitar; this guide will help you with this.

• What chords really are
• What intervals are and how to stack them to create harmony
• Why the well-known chords like C major or E minor have those familiar shapes
• Why do different interval combinations create different chord kinds
• How to construct chords on the fly across the entire fretboard

The three main pillars of music theory are melody , harmony , and rhythm .

Melody is created with single notes played one after another, like playing a scale .

Conversely, harmony is all about the rules that dictate what happens when one or more instruments play multiple notes simultaneously.

A vast palette of different feelings and colors lies behind harmony.

In this guide we will focus on harmony, which is directly related to chords.

The classic music theory says that a chord is a sound composed of 3 or more notes played simultaneously .

We can be a bit less rigorous and say that a chord, on the guitar, is created when you play some frets on different strings at the same time, thus more notes that play together.

This is the opposite of playing a scale, in which you play one fret at a time. Depending on the chord shape you play, you can use 3 or more strings.

For example, with a G major chord , first position, you play all 6 strings, while in the case of a D minor chord you play only 4 strings.

We're going to figure out the reason in the following of this tutorial.

A chord is usually identified by its root and its type (or quality, or kind)

The root of the chord is simply the note that gives the name to the chord.

The root of the chord is the most important tone of the chord, as it is the foundation ( home base ) for the other tones that compose the chord.

Often you'll find this note as the lowest string in a chord fingering.

When this happens, we say that the chord is in root position .

If the root of the note is not the lowest, we have a chord inversion ; we'll see later what this means.

For now, you only have to know that a chord in root position has the root note at the bottom and that note gives the name to the chord.

Some examples:

• In the C major chord , the root note is C , and this is also the lowest note of the chord
• In the A minor chord , the root and lowest note is A
• In the E7#9add13 chord , the root note is E . The complicated part is the type of chord (a dominant with a sharp ninth and an added thirteen, don't worry if you don't get it now)

Chord type: the "major" in "C major"

The type, or quality, of a chord, is given by the distance of the other notes from the root and their combination.

Depending on these distances, we can have a lot of different types: major , minor , dominant , seventh , diminished , suspended , and many others.

These distances in music are called intervals...

The most important concept you should understand if you want to master chord theory is called interval .

An interval is simply a distance between two pitches .

This thing translates easily on the fretboard, because we can express an interval in terms of distance between 2 frets.

Before moving on, you should be aware of some oddness of the intervals world:

• The same distance between 2 pitches, can be called with different interval names
• Two intervals with different names can have the same sound

These apparently strange behaviors are the heredity of the development of Western music theory across the centuries.

Having different names or sounds for the same thing could create confusion, but don't worry, with the proper indications, it will be easy to understand intervals and avoid

Let's start with the major scale :

C D E F G A B C

Here are the notes of the major scale laid out horizontally on the fretboard:

Here's a bit of terminology that we'll need

the "unit of measurement" of intervals is the whole-step .

We guitarists have to know that a whole-step is equivalent to 2 frets on the instrument.

What about a half-step? Yes, just 1 fret. So, to recap:

• 2 frets = 1 whole-step (often denoted with W), also called tone
• 1 fret = 1 half-step (often denoted with H), also called semitone

By looking at the picture above, we can make some reasoning.

• The distance between each note and the next is 2 frets ( 1 whole-step ), except for the couples E-F and B-C, which are just 1 fret distance ( 1 half-step )
• From C and D there is 1 whole-step ( 2 frets ), we call this distance a Major Second
• From C and E there are 2 whole-steps ( 4 frets ), we call this distance a Major Third
• From C and F  there are 2 whole-steps + 1 half step ( 5 frets ), we call this a Perfect Fourth
• From C and G there are 2 whole-steps + 1 half-step + 1 whole-step ( 7 frets ), we call this a Perfect Fifth
• From C and A there are 2 whole-steps + 1 half-step + 2 whole-steps ( 9 frets ), we call this a Major Sixth
• From C and B there are 2 whole-steps + 1 half-step + 3 whole-steps ( 11 frets ), we call this a Major Seventh
• From C and the upper C there are 2 whole-steps + 1 half-step + 3 whole-steps + 1 half-step ( 12 frets ), we call this an Octave

So what WWHWWH mean? (you should know the answer now)

It's likely you've already stumbled upon the notation above.

Now you should know that this strange set of symbols is just a way to describe the major scale.

Indeed, WWHWWWH means 2 whole-steps, 1 half-step, 3 whole steps, 1 half-step

C-W-D-W-E-H-F-W-G-W-A-W-B-H

(have a look at the fretboard picture above and you'll notice that between E-F and B-C are only 1 fret apart, or 1 half-step (also called semitone)

Intervals Types

The table below shows the 7 main types of interval of the major scale:

And now the tricky part: we can raise or lower an interval and get a different type of interval.

By "raising" and "lowering" mean increasing or decreasing the distance between the two notes composing an interval.

We can change that distance by 1 half-step up or down (1 fret on the fretboard), or even 1 whole-step (2 frets on the fretboard).

The table below shows you what happens if you lower (by 1 half-step) or you raise (by 1 half-step) one of the main intervals of the major scale

See the potential confusion? We have some intervals that have different names , but the same distance (thus the same sound).

Also, why sometimes an interval lowered by 1 step is called " minor " (e.g. minor second) and sometimes " diminished " (e.g. diminished fifth)?

Well, welcome to the strange world of the enharmonics.

Enharmonic Equivalents

"In modern musical notation and tuning, an enharmonic equivalent is a note, interval, or key signature that is equivalent to some other note, interval, or key signature but "spelled", or named differently

Ok, but why do intervals have the same name?

Well, the answer is.... context !

The same note or interval may have a different function depending on the musical context in which is used.

For example, you can play the 4th fret of the E lowest string and call it G# or Ab depending on the music key you're in.

Drill down: we have a separate tutorial on enharmonics to help you understand perfectly this counterintuitive topic.

So far we have considered intervals as geometric concepts .

But we are musicians and we deal with sound! It's crucial to familiarize yourself with the sound of these intervals .

Take a moment to play some major seconds, major thirds, and perfect fifths on your guitar.

On one single string, select a fret , play it, then go up horizontally 2, 4 and 7 frets and play the second note , on the same string.

Try to focus on the sound of the interval , and sing what you are playing (singing helps a lot in developing the inner ear, as Steve Vai suggests ).

Pay attention to the differences in the interval sounds.

One powerful way to memorize and internalize intervals sound is to associate them to the first notes of a song you already know.

Here are some examples taken from very famous tunes, but you should select songs that you really like .

Memory is all about emotion! (here's a post on memory and practice strategies )

• Major third : first two notes of " When the Saints Go Marching In "
• Perfect fifth : beginning notes of " Twinkle Twinkle Little Star "

There are really infinite options; for example, are you an Iron Maiden fan like me? Well, here are some memory hooks courtesy of The Irons :

• Major third : first notes of the intro riff of " The Number of The Beast "
• Perfect fifth : first two notes of the riff in the polka-style of " Mother Russia ", soon after the arpeggiated section (min 0:54)

Try to experiment with different intervals and find melodies that contain them.

Ok, I hope you have followed me to this point.

Now we're going to learn how to combine intervals to create new chords.

To construct a chord, we start from the root of that chord and add 2 or more notes.

Other fingerings for the C major chord

Now we can try to create new fingering for our C major chord .

As we know now, we have only to find some string configurations that contain at least one C, one E, and one G. Let's have a look at the image below.

What about the two shapes below?

See? All of the chord shapes above contain exactly the same notes C, E and G.

We can use different frets and string combinations , that's the beauty and damnation of the guitar: having too many options could be confusing at the beginning .

It's likely that you already know the bar chord shape at the 8th fret , it's identical to the F major , moved 8 frets upper.

Do you see the logic in this ?

The chord type is always " major ", and indeed the shape of the bar chord for F major and C major is the same, what changes is the root , C instead of F, and in fact, the shape has been moved to the C root.

Drill down: to learn how to assemble chord tones across the fretboard, check my chord tones fretboard map resource.

Seeing the intervals on the fretboard

Now we can go a step ahead in our music theory journey and begin thinking in terms of intervals .

What does this mean?

Well, the guitar is an instrument strongly based on geometry.

Each interval has its specific shape, so we can assemble these geometries to create chords, without overthinking notes names .

Let's see an example.

We have just seen that the C major chord is composed of the root, the major third and the perfect fifth .

What about the A major ?

The A major is composed of the root, the major third, and the perfect fifth .

The same structure of the C major!

The only difference is the root, in the case of C major , the root is C , while in the A major the root is...A (surprised?)

This takes us to our first chords rule:

All the major chords are composed of the root, a major third and a perfect fifth: .

What about minor chords?

All the minor chords are composed of the root, a minor third and a perfect fifth.

To create a chord, major or minor, starting from whatever note on the fretboard, we have to choose the root , and then pick a major/minor third and a perfect fifth .

That's all.

If you want to go beyond major and minor types and explore the structure of Seventh , Ninth , Diminished and so forth, have a look at our complete reference page on chords formulas .

Also, the order of the notes, from the lowest to the higher, has a place. This concept is call inversions.

How to find intervals on the fretboard?

Our mission now is to memorize the shapes of:

• Major third interval
• Minor third interval (that actually is a major third 1 fret below)
• Perfect fifth interval

Once you'll have these intervals under your belt, you can assemble them as you like and create any chord you want.

Major Third Intervals

Here below you find the shape of a major third interval starting from each string.

You'll notice that they have all the same shape, except for the interval between the second and the third strings , that is moved up one fret.

This behavior is due the way guitar is tuned , you'll find more info on this in our full tutorial on guitar fretboard notes .

In the following diagrams, the root note is marked with a black dot.

Other notes are represented by an empty circle.

I hope that now you have a good understanding of how chords are built and apply these concepts to the fretboard.

Here below you find several links to several resources that will help you improve your music theory applied to the guitar.

To help you memorize guitar intervals in a fast and fun way, we've developed an interactive game that is very effective for internalizing the fretboard geometry.

Give it a try, the game is totally free and runs online in your browser.

Launch the guitar interval trainer now.

We have created a free pdf ebook that expands the concept explained in this tutorial.

It contains the fretboard shapes for all the possible intervals and shows you how to create chords of different types: sevenths, augmented, diminished and many more.

You can download the ebook, along with many others, on the free download area.

Get your free access to the download area here .

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