How To Build Confidence In Playing Barre Chords

Confident Guitar Boy. Photo Credits

A good way to build your comfort and confidence in playing barre chords is by practicing a progression, which is a series of chords. The image below shows the exercise. Take note of the correct first-finger fret placement for each chord.

For this exercise, you must only use barre chords. It can be very tiring at first to get all the strings to ring out clearly. Try to release the pressure on your left-hand fingers when sliding from one chord to another. You may sometimes feel that your left-hand is starting to cramp. If you do, try to keep at it and feel the burn in order to develop the stamina and strength you need to play barre chords.

Playing All 12 Major Chords Using The Barre F Chord Form

Knowing how to play an Playing all 12 major chords using the Barre F chord form as a barre chord allows you to play every major chord by simply moving up the neck.

Barred F Chord Form.

That's amazing, right?

To determine the name of the chord that you are playing, you simply need to know the name of the note that you are playing on its root string, the 6th string.

For your quick reference about the notes of the 6th string on specific frets, see the figure below:

FRET

1st

2nd

3rd

4th

5th

6th

7th

8th

9th

10th

11th

12th

NOTE

F

F#/Gb

G

G#/Ab

A

A#/Bb

B

C

C#/Db

D

D#/Eb

E

"#" symbol denotes a sharp (F# is read as F-sharp)
"b" symbol denotes a  flat (Ab is read as A-flat)

How To Play Major Barre Chords Based on E

1. Play an open E chord, but instead of using the normal 2-3-1 left-hand fingering, use fingers 3-4-2.

2. Lay your first finger down across all six strings on the other side of the nut (toward the tuning pegs).

How To Raise The BARRE Of Excellence

Raising the bar of excellence. Photo Credits

After spending a great deal of time learning the basic open position chords, we move on to the world of barre chords. It is already an achievement to be able to play the open position chords since almost all kinds of songs use them. However, open chords have limitations because you are only confined in playing chords up to the third fret. But there will be instances that you need to play chords which do not include open strings. In these situations, guitarists will often resort to playing "barre chords" or simply "bar".

What makes the blues "Bluesy" and jazz "Jazzy"?

An example of a jazz music sheet. Photo Credits

MINOR 7TH CHORDS

In contrast to the dominant 7th chords, the minor 7th chords are characterized as a little bit softer and jazzier.

Fingering minor 7th chords

Dm7 Chord diagram and left-hand fingering

 

7th Chords: What's Hidden In The Number 7

7up Signage. Photo Credits

In this section, we're going to continue our exploration to the basic(open position) 7th (seventh) chords. Just like the simple chords presented in my previous posts, seventh chords are also easy to play. 7th chords are made up four different notes instead of three, and that's what gives the 7th chords its distinct sound. The different 7th chords (dominant 7th, major 7th, and minor 7th) can make the blues sound “bluesy” and jazz sound “jazzy.”

Let's start with the Dominant 7th chords.

More To See With The Chords In The C Family

Of course everyone knows the happy birthday song, right?

Birthday Party Celebration. Photo Credits

When I was a kid, I was taught by my father to play the happy birthday song in the key of C. Basically, you can play it in any key you like provided that you already know how to transpose the chords. When I grew up, I learned to play the song starting from different keys like D or G.

The last chord family that we will be learning is the C. In musical theory, everything starts with C or the "Do" in "Do-Re-Mi". The key of C is basically the center of the tonal universe and most musicians would agree that it is the easiest key to play in. Maybe, that was the reason why my father taught me to play common nursery rhymes in the key of C including the happy birthday song.

I chose to tackle the C family of chords last because it's so easy to play and it also has lots of chords in its family. But don't worry, you already learned most of the chords when we explored previous chord families (A, D, and G).