Subject: Getting a Feel For Minor Chords...
You are getting this e-mail because you subscribed to it on www.learn-to-play-rock-guitar.com. If you don't want to receive these e-mails any longer, go to the bottom of this message and click on "unsubscribe." Hey there Friend, Well, I've got to keep this week's lesson pretty quick. There's a pretty large home project demanding my attention that I've got to get done, so whatever I don't happen to cover today we'll come back to...So last week we had a chat about the biggest problem facing guitar players - learning and playing guitar chords. If you weren't able to read that message, I told you the best place to start is to learn the five basic major chord shapes - C, A, G, E and D. They can be found on these pages: Again, these aren't the only chord shapes you will need, but if you can train your fingers to memorize each of these shapes, you can literally use them to play every major chord up and down the guitar neck. These shapes will force your fingers into weird contortions they're not used to. You need to be diligent and practice them until you can pick up your guitar and play each chord on command. The Minor Chords That leads me to this week's lesson - Minor chords. These chords are the darker, more mysterious sister to the happy sounding major chord. In order to play minor chords, I'm going to fall back on the same suggestion I made regarding the major chords. Learn the shapes. For example, if you go back and look at D major, a little further down the page I've shown the D minor chord. If you look at each chord diagram, you'll notice the note on the first string (e) has moved from the second fret down to the first. This movement of one fret down has shifted the note from a major to a minor note in the construction of the chord. Without going into too much detail today, this slight shift in pitch has created completely different harmony between the notes that make up each chord. What's more important to realize, though, is that that little shift has changed the feel of the chord. We have gone from a happy sounding chord to a sad sounding chord - with the simple shift of one note. That change in how the chord feels is what music is all about. If you think about it just a little, you'll realize that music is the language of emotion. We use notes and chords to make the listener feel a certain way. When you hear a sad song, you will feel a sense of sadness. It's very likely the song was written in a minor key, using a lot of minor chords. If the next song you hear happens to be in a major key, you'll likely feel your mood change to more happy vibes. We'll talk more about this idea of music and emotions later... Start Learning The Shapes Go back to each major chord in the list above. Each of these pages has examples of minor chords - again, not all the different shapes are shown, but at least there are diagrams to show you the chord fingering for a minor chord. Take a look at these and make note of the finger patterns you see. You should recognize that playing the E major chord shape will give you the A minor chord if you shift your fingers to the strings that you would play A major on (fourth, third and second strings). If you are a rock or blues guitar player, most of the time you'll play minor chords in positions up the guitar neck as barre chords. Don't worry too much if your fingers aren't quite strong enough for barre chords yet. We'll come back to them. For now, keep practicing your major chords, and try the minor chords that are in the open neck position (E minor, A minor and D minor). Memorize those chords by practicing them until your fingers can automatically form the shape. I'll provide more open position minor chord shapes at a later time. Next week I'm going to explain how we build these chords. Once you understand how these chords are constructed, you'll be able to figure out how to make all sorts of cool chord voicings. Alright, back to the manual labor for me... Rock on! Peace~ Dave Dave "Eddie" Vance is a rock guitar enthusiast and gear nut. He has been playing guitar for over 30 years and enjoys tormenting the neighbors every chance he gets. When he's not slaving for the man, you can find him rocking out with his B.C. Rich Bich guitar, a cold beer and some sweet tunes. He also runs Learn-To-Play-Rock-Guitar.com, but you knew that already! Follow Learn To Play Rock Guitar:I welcome your feedback! Did you like today's message? What other topics would you like to see covered in my e-mails? Please let me know at: dave@learn-to-play-rock-guitar.com As always, please feel free to forward this email to a friend! I review products before recommending them. If you buy a product based on my recommendation, I will receive a commission. However, my emails also contain links that don’t require any investment on your part and are jam-packed with "juicy, guitar learnin' tastiness". 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