Easy Chords for beginners:
A, A minor, A minor 7, A 7, B, B minor, B7, C, D , D minor, E, E minor, F major, G major.
Major, Minor & Minor 7 chords
Don’t play the X strings
Golden rule: don’t press too hard ! don’t tense up !!
28 easy chords for beginners to learn!
Talk like a pro ! Use the fact that musicians do not mention the major chord like C major,
we only say: C, however the “minor”, “seventh” and others are still listed.
Exceptions for seventh chords:
for major seventh CM7 (pronounced C major seven)
for minor seventh: Cm7 (pronounced C minor seven)
and C minor chords: Cm (pronounced C minor).
Exercises with easy chords for beginners
Blues:
E – A – B7 (3rd chord is a seventh chord ! )
or C – E – G ( for G7 the yellow finger is moving up 2 frets )
or A – D – E ( E7 to remove the finger from the blue note) + INFO
Other sweet tortures:
Am C – G – E ( Am back to the blue finger one)
Am – Em – Dm – G…
Important: be curious ! remove, add, move a finger and play a minor chord
then a seventh chord etc…Note: Minimum time to pass each chord without catching… a few weeks !
FOR BEGINNERS
$3
About major, minor, seventh chords
A major chord consists of 3 notes:
- the first note is the tonic e.g. the first note of the scale : it gives the general tone of the chord.
- the second note is the third e.g. the third note of the scale.
- the third is the fifth e.g. the fifth note of the scale.
Examples for C chords:
Major chord : play C(1) – E(3) – G(5) The seven notes of the C scale are = C(1), D(2), E(3), F(4), G(5), A(6), B(7).
Minor chord: play: C(1) – E flat(3) – G(5) the third of the chord, is lowered = E dropped a half ton = E flat (shift one fret to the top from E).
See another example with the D and D minor chords above (the green finger is moving up in D minor).
Seventh chord: play C(1) – E(3) – G(5) – B flat(7) B flat is added ( B(7) yes… the seventh !).
CAUTION: B lowered by one semitone = B flat (shift one fret to the top from B)
Learn the abreviations
Note: chords Eb are prononced E flat, chords G# are prononced G sharp.