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Randy's Guitar Clinic

The Moveable Chord Concept

In standard guitar tuning, there are five basic chord-forms (or fret-patterns if you please) that make major chords. All the other major chords on guitar are played by moving one of the basic forms to a different position on the neck. By position, I mean to a different fret. The diagram illustrates how the C form can be moved to play a D flat chord (you could also think of this as a C sharp chord) and a D chord.

Please note that although the moveable form is fingered differently than the open form, the position of the fretted notes in relation to each other remains the same.

The guitar does not care which finger you fret any given note with. The guitar will produce whatever pitch that particular fret makes on that particular string.

Forget your fingers for a moment, and study the diagram. Try and understand the similarities as well as the differences between a chord (the chord that we hear), the chord-form (the shape that we use on the frets) and the position (where we put that shape on the neck). Any chord can be referred to by its form, position, and name.

Introducing the C-A-G-E-D method by janeedles@yahoo.com

The following videos use this diagram:

The following diagram shows five different ways to play an F chord. The notation corresponds to the TAB below it, and the TAB corresponds to the chord diagrams below it. The notation, TAB, and diagrams show the same five fingerings. Move the chord-form to the proper position indicated in the text above each respective diagram.

Here are some excellent books on chords.

Barre Chord Basics with CD (Audio) (Ultimate Beginner)
Essential Guitar Chords/ Barre Chords-Best Bet Jazz Chords

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Right-click on the following links, save as file
The B flat Chord
The C-A-G-E-D format
Major Chord Moveable Forms (Barre Chords)
Minor Chord Moveable Chord Forms (barre chords)
Suspended 4 Chords (sus4 chords, sus chords)
2 Chord Moveable Forms (sus2, add2, add9)
7 Chord Moveable Forms (dominant seven)
Maj7 Chord Moveable Forms (Major seven)
m7 Chord Moveable Forms (minor seven)
Applying the E form & A form Moveable Chord Forms (barre chords)
"Slash" Chords explained
Non-Standard Chords

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