Step 3: Learn Power And "Flower" Chords.

GO HERE TO START FROM STEP 1 Due to how Blogger is structured, the last post always becomes the front page.
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Chords are the main ingredient of music. As a guitar player, especially a backup or rhythm guitarist, chords should definitely be one of the first things you really try to learn. Not only will learning them first help you with your fret-hand technique, but also with your strumming and even rhythm. It will also put you on the fast track to learning scales and music theory.

"Power chords" are the easiest to learn. All you have to do is learn where your fingers are positioned, and it's the same all over the neck of the guitar.

"Flower chords" are more detailed in their hand and finger positioning, but are still easy to learn. By the way, I call them "flower chords" because they sound all pretty and "flowery."

Scroll Down for a complete list of all 12 Major and Minor Chords.

For me, the hardest part of learning the major chords was training my hands to accurately shift between them and immediately put my fingers on the right strings and the right frets in an instant. If your favored style of music involves playing songs with a sequence of these chords, you will definitely need to practice this.

Power Chords

Like I said, the easiest thing ever:

This is an Open E Power Chord. The Open E string is the root. If you think of an open string as being the "0th fret," then the finger positions on power chords down the strings make more sense.



This is a Power Chord with the root on the 2nd fret:



This is essentially a "3 note" Power Chord with an Open E string involved. In this particular example, I would like to point out that the only reason that the Open E works with this power chord is because the 7th fret is an E note, too. It's just one octave higher than the Open E. I'll discuss this in a later lesson.



In this example, I want to show you both how the 1st and 2nd strings are tuned differently in relation to the 3rd - 6th strings and how you fret them to accomodate:

Flower Chords

These chords are dominant in the guitar world. They also require a lot of music theory to put together and explain, so I will spare you all the boring specifics.

There is actually a pretty huge list of chords, although there is really only 12 root notes. Now remember, roots are the individual notes from which the chord is based on. When you see a chord listed by name, an "A chord" for example, the root is the "A" note.

The types of chords and how they are listed in chord diagrams and in music notation are as follows: (Along with the Flat or Sharp Note Equivalent for A Chords)

• Major: A -or- A#


• Minor: Am -or- A#m


• Augmented: A+ -or- A#+


• Suspended Fourth: Asus4 -or- A#sus4


• Added Ninth: A(add9) -or- A#(add9)


• Minor Added Ninth: Am(add9) -or- A#m(add9)


• Fifth: A5 -or- A#5 (These are actually power chords)


• Sixth: A6 -or- A#6


• Minor Sixth: Am6 -or- A#m6


• Sixth, Added Ninth: A6/9 -or- A#6/9


• Minor Sixth, Added Ninth: Am6/9 -or- A#m6/9


• Seventh: A7 -or- A#7


• Diminished Seventh: Aº7 -or- A#º7


• Seventh, Suspended 4th: A7sus4 -or- A#7sus4


• Major Seventh: Amaj7 -or- A#maj7


• Minor Seventh: Am7 -or- A#m7


• Minor, Major Seventh: Am(maj7) -or- A#m(maj7)


• Major Seventh, Flat Fifth: Amaj7(b5) -or- A#maj7(b5)


• Minor Seventh, Flat Fifth: Am7(b5) -or- A#m7(b5)


• Augmented Seventh: A+7 -or- A#+7


• Seventh, Flat Fifth: A7(b5) -or- A#7(5)


• See if you can name the rest of these by comparing them with the chord types listed above:
  
  1. B7(b9) = Seventh, Flat Ninth
  
  
  2. D#7(#9) = ?
  
  
  3. A+7(b9) = ?
  
  
  4. C9 = ?
  
  
  5. F#maj9 = ?
  
  
  6. Em9 = ?
  
  
  7. F#11 = ?
  
  
  8. Bm11 = ?
  
  
  9. B#13 = ?
  
  

Answers provided below

There you have it. All 30 different chord types and variations. Don't worry though, you don't have to memorize all of them. (most of them don't even sound that good) I'm just going to give you the majors and the Minor chords, which are the popular ones.

Now remember, there are 12 notes. 7 of which are the "letter notes" (A-G) and there are 5 sharp/flat notes between the A#B C#D#E F#G#A. Refer to Step 1: Tune Your Guitar for that information if you need to.

Here are the Major Chords for all 12 Notes

Here are the Minor Chords for all 12 Notes

Remember that "0" is an open string, and "X" are strings that are not picked

Here's a video where I show you the 7 Major Chords, and link them together to show you how to make a song.



There you have it, folks. Chords are actually pretty easy.
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Answers.
2. Seventh, Sharp Ninth
3. Augmented Seventh, Flat Ninth
4. Ninth
5. Major Ninth
6. Minor Ninth
7. Eleventh
8. Minor Eleventh
9. Thirteenth

Step 2: Learn How To Read Tablature

Now that you have learned how to tune your guitar, you are ready to learn how to read tablature. Upon learning tablature, you can get started right away playing your favorite songs without putting forth all the time and effort of learning how to read sheet music.

But don't be foolish. If you want to get very far in the music industry, you will need to learn how to read music. Tablature alone won't cut it forever as far as music careers go.

The chances are good that you don't know how to read music. I'll be the first to admit that even I didn't know how to read sheet music when I first picked up a guitar. But that never stopped me from becoming really good thanks to the awesome guitar learning tool called tablature. Let me show you how it works:

(Sweet Child O' Mine by Guns N' Roses)

The LINES in the Tablature represent the strings.
The NUMBERS represent which fret to press.
Playing Tip: Never press on the fret bars! (The vertical stripes you see on the fret board) Always press between the fret bars! I've seen a lot of people I teach start out by thinking they have to press on the bars to sound the notes.

The guitar is actually "upside down" in the above illustration because the bottom string (the thinnest string) is actually the 1st string, and the top string (the thickest string) is the 6th string. The tablature represents this.

In this video I walk you through a real tablature sheet and show you some important details you need to

To put this into perspective

As an analogy, hold a book directly in front of you with your arms extended. Now take that book and lower your arms so that the top of the book points directly at the ground. See how the top is now at the bottom as you look down on it from above?

Now take your guitar and hold it in the regular playing position. Now grab it by the body and flip it so that the strings are facing you, then extend your arms. Now do what I told you with the book analogy and you will see that it all makes sense.

Now, since you don't know how to read music, but still want to play along to your favorite song, the only advice I can give you is to listen to the particular song over and over. If you have bought a tablature book, you can open it up to the song you're listening to and follow the tablature visually as each note is played which will give you a sense of timing, rhythym, and also learn some of the music symbology as you go. (Guitar hero is also another good way for learning this.)

This video puts it all in perspective and with more details.











This Video teaches you how to read chord diagrams and how they are listed in tablature and music sheets.