How to Learn Chords: Core Concepts

A C Chord, one of the few chords where the lowest note is
not the root.

Chords are a group of notes played on one instrument at exactly the same time. They are usually played rhythmically and are the foundation of a song.
Chords serve to give the melody a container to stand out in. Melodies are like the tasty liquid in a cup. To most people they are the most important aspect of music, in the same way everyone will say they are drinking a cola, but if they didn’t have the cup there would be no way to enjoy the cola! It is the same with chords. You need them to carry the tune.
I always try to approach the guitar from the most functional view point. I want every student to be able to sound good if they want to perform. That’s it! This means theoretical learning is not drilled as hard as conceptual frameworks. Here I will explain good concepts when learning chords!

If you have ever seen Futurama, there is an episode where it is revealed the spaceship they use does not travel. Instead, it moves the whole universe around the ship. If we look at chords a bit like this, we could say we are moving the guitar into the right place for our hands! It might seem strange, but if you can see things from this perspective, learning chords will go so much faster.

It is very important to remember, the guitar can already do everything! Your hands are just unlocking what it is already able to do. The guitar is limited only to the ability of the practitioner.

It is possible to say that there are hundreds of chords. But at the end of the day, the shapes used to make the chords are often the same or similar, they are just on a different place along the neck. There is a great saying “Learning is remembering!” When we learn a chord shape, I am certain there are at least 4 to 7 other places on the neck the chord will work. Thus, when you learn a new chord, you will often feel a sense of remembering “Oh yes, I made this shape before in another part of the neck.”

One example of this are the open chords E major and A minor. As far as your fretting hand is concerned, it is the same chord. You simply lower your hand shape down one string. In many ways, this makes chord learning more of a muscle memory skill than anything else.

I would say about 90% of guitarists don’t know the technical name for the chords they use, yet they can still play them very well. It is like trying to bottle a moment if we always want to know what the name of a chord is. If you have an encyclopaedic knowledge of chords, that may be a good thing (if you know how to use them) but don’t make the mistake of being a train spotter!

Itemising and using information is a very different process. They do not always go hand in hand! So my core strategy for learning chords is firstly the intuitive aspect, “Does it sound right?” Knowing what the chord is comes second.

For example, if I were to play a chord, I will always know what the root note is, then I would explain to someone else, “It is an E, but like this.” Now we will look at some concepts to help understand chords.

Every chord is known after its deepest note (apart from a few)
The simplest way of naming chords is by calling it after its lowest note. There are very few exceptions. Though we can reverse in a car, I am quite sure that 99% of driving is going forward. Everyone who drives knows about the reverse gear! In the same way, the few chords that are the exception are so obvious, you don’t need to worry about them. The general rule is this, the lowest (deepest) note of the chord is what the chord is named after. A chord with E as the lowest note is a kind of E, a chord with C as the lowest note is a kind of C.

It is like the material clothes are made from. You can have trousers, shoes and coats all made of leather. Therefore even if the leather shoe has plastic eyelets, the shoe is never known as a plastic shoe! This is how we know a C chord is C even if it has a few other notes in it, the C is the dominant material in the chord! It’s just like how we describe a table as wooden even with some metal screws.  Chords can be minors, majors, 7ths etc, but the material the chord is made of is determined by the lowest note. This note can be referred to as the tonic. It is the most important note in the chord and often occurs multiple times within any one chord.

Learn Chords as an Array, Not as a Name
If from the beginning we accept that chords are an array rather than a static shape, we understand that there will be more and more possibilities for any one root note. When we learn that there is something called E major, we are accepting there are also many variants. An E can be made high pitch, minor, major or a 7^th. It is however always E! We don’t need to be a librarian of chords, what we can instead do is see chords as something malleable like putty or a rubix cube. The various constellations of how we shape our hands and where we place them is the practical skill we need to acquire, labelling what we have done afterwards is a distinct skill that should be developed as necessity requires. Most composers do not come in like an architect and make a design for a song before it exists. Instead contemporary music is often more like map making, we note down what has been done as we find it.

Shapes Work in More than one Position
Just like a table can be moved around a room without being taken apart, the hand can move the shape around the neck without being disassembled and put back together again. This is most true for barre chords, but there is not one open chord shape that can’t work in less than four places along the guitar neck.

This means practically, if you learn one guitar chord you are learning at least four!

Reduce the Names You Use!
Chords are quite complicated, but you can always reduce them! So in the beginning, just learn two variations of a chord, the major and minor. When you then add an embellishment to the chord, you can simply say “This is an A minor with this extra bit...” and show it to anyone you are playing music with.

Chords Sound Good When...

Chords sound good when combined with other chords that have the root notes contained in the first chord. For example, G major has B in it, therefore B works after G. If you a struggling for a chord change, just work out some of the notes in the chords you are using and then learn the chords from these notes. Sometimes a minor will work better than a major, so try both types of chords you know and see what sounds best!

For guitar lessons contact Evan@Cirencester-Scene.co.uk and get more info!