Chords on the Guitar

Chords occur when you play three or more sounds simultaneously, or consecutively, as an arpeggio.

Chords are used to accompany songs, or as a background when another instrument is playing a solo melody.

With the guitar, you have 5 fingers and six strings evenly distributed across a wide audio spectrum, so this instrument can produce some beautiful and complex chords.

To produce a chord, you have to press the right strings on the right frets, in such a way that only notes from the chord produce a sound.

For example, if you want to make a C major chord, which has the notes C, E, and G, you would proceed as follows:

• 1st string is E, when played open, and E is part of the C major chord, so this is fine;
• 2nd string is B, but when pressed on the 1st fret, it produces a C, so we place a finger there;
• 3rd string is G, when played open, and G is part of the chord, so this is fine too;
• 4th string is D, but when pressed on the 2nd fret, it produces an E, so we place a finger there;
• 5th string is A, but when pressed on the 3rd fret, it produces a C, so we place a finger there;
• 6th string is E, we can play it open, as it is, or press it on the 3rd fret, to produce a G.

The following image shows this chord:

The previous position is not the only way you can do a C major chord on the guitar. In fact, there are several ways, all valid.

For example the following two are alternative positions, and also sound like a C major chord:

The following table shows the notes required to build some basic major and minor chords:

The important thing is to understand the theory behind intervals, and chord formulas, so you can easily make major, minor, 7ths, 6ths, augmented, diminished chords. Following this logic, you can construct all chords.

This is fine when you have plenty of time in your hands, but not when you want to play a song with some friends.

Fortunately, now you have the DG Guitar Chords application for Android, which will show you how to make chords quickly, including alternative positions.

We recommend you learn by memory the basic major, minor, and seventh chords. The rest comes with practice as you need them.

After you learn some chords, learn to follow along some basic rhythms such as the waltz, and rock. For lovers of Latin music, you need to know, at least, the bolero, and the bossanova.

Also learn some basic chord progressions.