Put a nickel in the graveyard machine

C(#9/#11)

X3X042

This chord is from Bottle of Blues, off Beck’s album Mutations. Beck plays the song in an alternate tuning that makes this chord a snap, but I’ve never been a fan of alternate tunings. Unless you really commit to them (or you’re in a studio cutting one of the great alternative albums of the 90s), they’re a hassle. So I arranged Bottle of Blues in standard tuning. To replicate the jarring initial riff, I play a regular C chord, muting the E note on the 4^th string

C

X3X010

Then I hammer the #9^th on the 2^nd string with my little finger and the #11^th on the first string with my middle finger at the same time. This chord is played for the first half of a beat of each measure in the verse. A note on the name: if I were to name this chord (to be clear, I mean C(#9/#11), not C) with no context at all, I would call it a D11(♭9 no root) or an A-13(♭5 no root). Yuck. Those are the best tertian descriptions I can come up with for this chord. However, in this context it's clear that we're just adding bluesy color notes to a C major chord. We're not changing the tonality of the passage to minor, despite swapping out a major third for a minor third, or #9.

When Beck moves to the chorus, there’s another jarring section, only this time it’s in the chord progression itself, i.e. the juxtaposition of chords and their function in the key, rather than within a single chord:

              D9                       A♭

I get higher then lower

              D9                       A♭

I get higher then lower

D9

2X0210

A♭

46654X

This is a well voice-led passage; it has one whole-step jump in the bass, one fixed note (though it does jump a string—C) and the rest moving only a half-step, one up and two down. It will take your ear some getting used to, but the notes are very close to each other.

FΔ7(9/13 no 3rd)

Take four consecutive white keys on a piano and see what chords you can make. Sorry to be anticlimactic, but here are the answers. They can each be named by the second note:

C, D E, F:            D-9

D, E, F, G:           E-7♭9

E, F, G, A:           FΔ9

F, G, A, B:           G9

G, A, B, C:          A-9

A, B, C, D:          B-7♭9

B, C, D, E:          CΔ9

None of these contains a 5^th degree, but that’s OK since the natural 5^th is the least important degree there is. Notice that they group into four categories based on the pattern of whole and half steps:

W, W, W:           G9

H, W, W:            CΔ9, FΔ9

W, H, W:            E-7♭9, B-7♭9

W, W, H:            D-9, A-9

One more pattern, allowed by the harmonic and melodic minor scales, is possible:

H, W, H:             A-Δ9 (for instance) = G#, A, B, C

H, H, H would be a 4-cluster, e.g A#, B, C, D♭. This is not easily played on the guitar and not super useful musically, outside of atonal concert music. My favorites of the chords from this list are the minor7♭9s, e.g.

D, E, F, G = D-(9/11)

     = E-7♭9

     = FΔ7(9/13 no 3rd)

     = G13 (no 3^rd)

Though they're all the same chord, most of the voicings below will have F in the bass, so I'll use that third name from here out. This chord type sounds phenomenal in the close voicings permitted by the ukulele. Two close voicings are fingerable on the guitar (these will be an octave lower than their versions on the uke):

FΔ7(9/13 no 3rd)

X8575X or

X(10)(12)(9)(6)X

That second one, with a 6-fret stretch, is not a beginner chord. Try exploiting an open string to make it easy, e.g.

E7(9/13 no 3rd)

X(9)(11)(8)X(0)

It helps if you play fingerstyle. Sorry about that one! These denser chord types tend be either quite ergonomic or maddeningly difficult to fret. Here’s an moderately difficult drop-2 form:

FΔ7(9/13 no 3rd)

X(8)(12)(9)(8)X

And a lovely drop-3 form

FΔ7(9/13 no 3rd)

(13)X(14)(12)(15)X

E-7♭5 with two different tensions

On page 238 of the greatest guitar chord book ever written, "Song Example #7," begins thus

E-7♭5_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
E-7♭5(11) E-7♭5(9)

The E-7♭5 is from some imagined chart, and the two chords below it are what Bret Willmott suggests you actually play. They are accompanied by top notes determining the position at which you play them. These are also the defining colors of the chords: A above middle C for the first chord and F# above middle C for the second. Per the prescription of the book (and this blog, for the most part) we will only consider 4-note voicings on strings 2-5. First, here's an E-7♭5 that's would work perfectly had Willmott not fancied it up:

X7878X

Starting from here, it would be easy to just move the top note up to A, and then back down to F#

E-7♭5(11, no 3rd) [= B♭Δ7♭5 = F#7#5#9 (no root)]
X(7)(8)(7)(10)X

E-7♭5(9, no 3rd) [= F#7#5]
X7877X

There's one problem. Neither of these chords has the minor third degree which is a defining characteristic of E-7♭5. With 4-note chords, you could define a "Two Tension Principle"

The characteristic voicing of a a four-note chord with two tensions is determined.

This means that, as soon as you've added two tensions to a regular 7th chord (in our case, ♭5 and 11 or ♭5 and 9) you are limited to a single characteristic voicing and its inversions. That voicing will consist of the two tensions and the two guide tones, 3rd and 7th. For a regular 7th chord, the un-altered 5th and the root can be sacrificed in order to add tensions like 9, 11, and 13. Once you try to add a third tension, you have to remove one of the guide tones, resulting in a non-characteristic voicing. That's what we did above; we removed the minor third (G), in order to preserve the root note E. If we choose only characteristic voicings, we have to play the G in place of the E, resulting in an E-7♭5 with no E note. That's fine--the guide tones are more important than the root. Here are the only characteristic voicings I've found that will meet all our criteria. In both examples, the first voicing is a drop-2 and the second is a close voicing.

E-7♭5(11) [= G-(9) = B♭Δ13 = E♭Δ7#11 (no root)]
X(10)(8)(7)(10)X or
X(13)(12)(12)(10)X

E-7♭5(9) [= G-Δ7]
X5537X or
X(10)(8)(7)(7)X

D-/?

A coworker inspired this post, and that means that I now have a reader. Let's see if I stay on point. No, I choose now at the outset to go off point all over the place as usual. Look!

D-
X[0]0231

OK, you may have seen this one before. The hyphen should be pronounced as "minor"; this is a standard minor chord that you can find in any book. That zero in the brackets indicates a semi-optional note; it might be fine to let that fifth in the bass ring, depending on the context. It gives a grittier sound and should be called a D-/A.

You may already know the chord; now you have to decide on a fingering. Your choice of fingering should depend on what you want to do with the finger you have left. Using your index, middle, and ring fingers leaves your little finger, and allows for an easy

Dsus4
X[0]0233

but not much else. If you're playing, "What It's Like" by Everlast, then index, middle, ring is the fingering for you. I haven't found many other uses for it. Another option is to use your index, middle, and little fingers, leaving you to do what you like with your ring finger. I've always played D- this way ever since my guitar teacher Greg Norgaard called it the more "professional" way sometime back in 2002. Here are the chords you can play easily with this approach, by merely placing your ring find on the third fret of strings 4, 5, or 6.

D-/F
X[0]3231

This is the first inversion of the original D minor. It's not terribly interesting by itself, but if you take your index finger off and let that open first string ring out, you get this:

D-(add 9)/F = FΔ13 = B♭Δ7#11 (no root)
XX3230

And I *love* that chord. OK, placing the ring finger on the 5th string, you get this:

D-7/C
X3X231

This is just the third inversion of a D-7 chord. I left out the open 4th string in order to make a clear statement in the bass. I prefer not to have two bass notes ringing at the same time unless they are octaves or fifths, i.e. a power chord. Hammering on that C note from the open 5th string get's you the first beat or so of the unplugged version of "Layla" (I still haven't heard the third version) Finally,

D-/G = G9 (no 3rd) =F6/9 (fourth inversion) = B♭Δ13 (sixth inversion, no root)
3X0231

This is a "modal" dominant 9th voicing, meaning it has a root, ♭7th, and 9th, but no third. It could be played in place of a G-9 or a G9, but not a GΔ9 or G-Δ9, should you have misfortune of seeing G-Δ9 (e.g. X(10)(8)(11)(10)X) on a chart. The F6/9 and B♭Δ13 are more theoretical names for the chord, both being profound violations of the low interval limits on their respective bass notes. In short, you usually don't play a 9th or a 13th in the bass of a chord.

Good luck with "Layla" and "Time in a Bottle"

COTD 18: E11♭9

There are a few voicings that don't have simple tertian descriptions, and are easier to conceive of as "add" chords: just some note added onto a major or minor triad. Here's one:

B-13♭5, E11♭9, or D-(#11)
X8779X

Again, not exactly inspiring. However, in the right context it might be just what you need. When I get a moment, I'll play a true E11♭9 in an A minor progression and see how the ♭9 and 11 degrees interplay with the dominant tonality:

E11♭9
08779X

COTD 17: A9

Play "Rocket Man". I don't mean the whole song, just the bar where Sir Elton first sings the words "rocket man." This tab will help. OK, got it? Great. That's an A9 chord, and it contains probably the most important 9th voice in all pop music. The tune just doesn't sound right with just a normal A7. I tend to play standard voicings for the other chords in this song, and then this:

A9
X05600

I think it sounds perfect in this context. The two fretted notes are the guide tones. The open strings, low to high, are the root, ninth, and fifth. This means you can play the other three flavors of ninth chords with minimal effort:

AΔ9
X06600

A-9
X05500

A-Δ9
X06500

COTD 16: FΔ7

A close voicing has all of its notes constrained to an octave. Close voicings are not easy to play on the guitar generally because of its linear tuning. By contrast, the ukulele’s re-entrant fourth string makes close voicings very easy to play; it’s hard to play anything else.

If you find a close voicing that uses one open string, then you can find more inversions of that voicing in close form by just playing the inversions of the fretted notes and leaving the open string to ring out. Here’s an FΔ7 ("F major seven") close voicing that you may know:

XX3210

The fretted notes form the F major triad, and the open string is the seventh. Try playing that F major triad in its next inversion up:

XX7560

And the next up from that:

XX(10)(10)(10)(0)

And finally:

XX(15)(14)(13)(0)

These are all close voicings, with the open string ranging from the highest to the lowest voice. Here’s that same concept applied to C#-7

X4210X

X7660X

X(11)(11)(9)(0)X

X(16)(14)(13)(0)X

COTD 15: A-Δ9

This chord is from Chet Atkins' version of Walk, Don't Run, a tune you may not know the name of but will probably recognize if you google it.

A-Δ9
X(0)(10)(9)(9)(7)

It's a nice dramatic ending for this tune, originally written by Johnny Smith and made famous by the most successful instrumental band of all time: The Ventures.

COTD 14: The Hendrix/Gretty Chord

Sorry about the long pause. Perhaps it will soon be "Chord of the Fortnight."

D7#9
X5456X

This is used in the Beatles song Taxman, and as such should be referred to as the Gretty chord, after Jim Gretty, who worked at a music shop in Liverpool and taught the chord to the Beatles. Hendrix used this fingering often, and sometimes added a raised fifth:

E7#9#5
X76788

Both have their place, but good luck if you're hoping for other ergonomic voicings that are similarly bluesy without becoming too dissonant. Swapping out the root note for a 5th gives you this:

D7#9
X(9)(10)(10)(10)X

Which is an F#^oΔ7, and pretty ugly out of context. Note the spelling is exactly the same as D7#9. From low to high, these notes are F#, C, E#, A. The E# is because that note functions as a #9 in D7#9 and a Δ7 in F#^oΔ7. Neither of those degrees is an F note in their respective scale.

Here's a list  of D7#9's for you completists:

Substitution	Form	Root inversion	1st inv.	2nd inv.	3rd inv.	4th inv.*
Root	Close	X(17)(15)(11)(13)X	X8453X	N/A	X(9)(10)(7)(6)X	X(15)(12)(10)(7)X
Root	Drop-2	X5456X	X(9)(12)(10)(13)X	N/A	X(15)(15)(11)(15)X	X(8)(10)(7)(7)X
Root	Drop-3	(10)X(10)(10)(7)X	2X353X	N/A	8X476X	(13)X(12)(11)(13)X
5th	Close	N/A	X8421X	X9756X	X(12)(10)(10)(7)X	(15)(15)(11)(10)X
5th	Drop-2	N/A	X(9)(10)(10)(10)X	X(12)(15)(11)(13)X	X3426X	X8757X
5th	Drop-3	N/A	2X321X	5X456X	(8)X(7)(10)(7)	(13)X(10)(11)(10)X

* The 4^th inversion has the #9 in the lowest voice. In drop-2 and drop-3 voicings, this creates a ♭9 tension with the major 3^rd. Play the chords and see if you like them. Close forms are always constrained to an octave, making ♭9 intervals impossible. So they don't have that problem, but good luck playing them!

COTD 13: E♭7♭5 again (more of the Joe Pass ii-V-I)

Joe Pass recommended that you learn everything you know in all 12 keys. So I'll give the ii-V-I progression I've named for him in a few more forms, which you can move around the neck all you need in order to follow his advice. These will be named according to the "drop" form and inversion of that final major seventh chord. We already did the drop-3 root form, #2 on the list below. I've grouped them two at a time so that the highest note will be consistent within each pairing, and you can switch between drop-2 and drop-3 voicings while preserving the voice-leading in the top voice.

I hope Virgie likes the spooky colors!

Inversion	Drop form	ii (B♭-11)	V (E♭7♭5)	I (A♭Δ7)
1st	2	X4634X	X4524X	X3514X
Root	3	6X664X	5X564X	4X554X
2nd	2	X6869X	X6768X	X6658X
1st	3	9X889X	9X788X	8X688X
3rd	2	X(10)(12)(9)(11)X	X(10)(11)(8)(10)X	X(10)(10)(8)(9)X
2nd	3	(11)X(11)(13)(11)X	(11)X(11)(12)(10)X	(11)X(10)(12)(9)X
Root	2	X(13)(13)(13)(14)X	X(12)(13)(12)(14)X	X(11)(13)(12)(13)X
3rd	3	(16)X(13)(15)(14)X	(15)X(13)(14)(14)X	(15)X(13)(13)(13)X

Note that you're only seeing four distinct fingerings for the V chord, E♭7♭5. Like the rootless 13#9 chord, the dominant 7♭5 chord type, with the root, has tritone symmetry. So if you take one voicing and slide it up 6 frets, you get the same notes in a different order. The diminished 7th chord is the only other four-note chord with this property, but it is perfectly symmetric and repeats every three frets.

COTD: E♭7♭5

 The greatest dead fingerstyle player I know of is a guy named Joe Pass. There are a couple signature guitar models named for him, which is not usually done for fingerstyle players. Here's what I've come to call the "Joe Pass ii-V-I"

B♭-11
6X664X

E♭7♭5
5X564X

A♭Δ7
4X554X

Please vary the rhythm as much as you see fit. If you like this sound, buy the book which best documents Mr Pass's style, Mel Bay's Complete Joe Pass.

COTD 13: D5(#4) from Poor Man's House

You know you've done enough
When every bone is sore
You know you've prayed enough when you don't ask anymore
You know you're coming to some kind of understanding
When every dream you've dreamed has passed and you're still standing

-Patty Griffin, "Poor Man's House" off Living with Ghosts

I should write more about that song, that album, and that artist, but for now I'll just talk about the chords she uses in the verse, in order:

D5/A
X00235

I think Patty hits that open 5th string also, not certain. This isn't a chord but a dyad consisting of root and fifth: a extended power chord with both notes doubled in octaves on the top, and the fifth doubled in the bass.

D5(#4)/A
X00234

Precisely the dissonance this song needed. In fact many extended power chords like the one above lend themselves to this diminished fifth awesomeness. I'll list them at the end. This is not a standard chord name in my strict tertian sense, but it is the best description of the chord as it functions in the song. An acceptable tertian name would be B-13, with a "(no root)" if you're so inclined.

Dsus4/A
X00233

D/A
X00232

These round out the chromatic line on the top; then it starts again. This song is deceptively difficult to sing and play; even fretting it is a little tricky because you have to decide when to swap out your middle finger for your ring finger on the second string. I typically do it between D(#4) and Dsus4.

Here are some more 5(#4)'s for you sowers of discord.

C5(#4)
X3401X

E5(#4)
022300 (Yowza! This is my favorite.)

G5(#4)
3X002X (I guess Jimmy Page used this on...Hhouses of the Holy? Not sure)

A5(#4)
X02240

COTD 12: B-Δ11

I don't know what this chord should be named. I generally think of chords as falling into four types based on their guide tones, the third and the seventh:

Major: a major third and major seventh
Minor: a minor third and minor seventh
Dominant: a major third and minor seventh
Minor Major: a minor third and major seventh (I know, that's a terrible name for it)

The only chords that get just a plain number are the ones that follow the dominant path, e.g. C9, a dominant chord, a major third (E) and minor seventh (B♭). The other three paths all need a modifier before their number to say what they are. In this case, I present a dreaded "Minor Major" chord, but I'll abbreviate "Minor Major" as -Δ.

B-Δ11
X2233X

I guess it's just a C9 with a flatted root. It's evocative of the last chord of the song New Machine by Chris Whitley.

Now that I mention it:

My Favorite Chris Whitley Albums in Rough Order
1) Dirt Floor
2) Living With the Law
3) Perfect Day
4) Din of Ecstasy (which has New Machine)

Other essential songs include Silhouette from Hotel Vast Horizon and his cover of When I Paint My Masterpiece from Dislocation Blues, released posthumously.

COTD 11: D-7♭9

One of my hopes with this blog is to name and popularize cool chords that very few people play. Could this be one?

D-7♭9
X5354X

Now that doesn't sound like much, but the other inversions are interesting. I hope it's more legible when I set off all numbers with parentheses wherever parentheses are needed:

D-7♭9
4th: X(6)(10)(7)(6)X
1st: X(8)(12)(8)(13)X
3rd: X(15)(13)(10)(15)X

I ordered these inversions so they would climb up the neck, not so they would be in order. The inversions are named by which note goes in the bass:

Root in bass: no inversion (or zeroeth inversion, if you like)
Third in bass: first inversion
Fifth in bass: second inversion
Seventh in bass: third inversion
Ninth in bass: fourth inversion
Eleventh in bass: fifth inversion
Thirteenth in bass: sixth inversion

Since this chord has no fifth degree, it doesn't have a second inversion and skips straight to the third and fourth. Alright, enough of that inversion crap.

I promised myself I would lay off the dominant 13ths, but this voicing doubles as a modal F13. Going back two posts, I said the formula for a dominant 13th was 1, 3, 5, ♭7, 9, 11, 13, which we typically abbreviate as 1, 3, ♭7, 13. If we're going for an ambiguous sound, we can swap out the 3rd for a 5th, leaving a chord that is "modal", i.e. neither major nor minor

I'm sorry if you think these sound like crap. I remember geeking out over them when I played them on the uke, so I was excited to see how they sounded on the guitar. The drop-3 versions (which generally lie on strings 2, 3, 4, and 6) might sound better. Someday I'll figure those out and report back.

COTD #10: C-Δ7#5

Why are you reading this blog? If it's to learn academic chord voicings that sound terrible and have no practical use, you're in luck!

C-Δ7#5
X3644X

It's pronounced as "C minor major 7 sharp five". Above is the root position. While I'm at it, I should give you the first, second, and third inversions:

C-Δ7#5
X6959X
X(11)(10)9(12)X
X(14)(13)(13)(13)X or X2111X

When you buy and play through the Wilmott book, it will ask up front that you learn all the seventh chords with C as the root *that you could possibly want to play*. This turns out to be C7(sus4), plus the four standard types of seventh chords: major, minor, dominant, and minor-major, each with both flatted and raised fifth degrees, except this one. He didn't see the need for this voicing, though I imagine it shows up later in some context.

One other factoid about this one before we leave it off forever: it consists of an A♭ power chord, with both the minor and major 3rds forming the other two notes, Swapping the 5th (E♭) for a ♭7th (G♭) makes a much more normal-sounding A♭7#9:

X(11)(10)(11)(12)X

Hey, add a #5 and that's the first chord I shared. I should quit now, having come full-circle.

COTD #9: B13 (five ways)

The formula for a dominant 13th chord is 1, 3, 5, ♭7, 9, 11, 13, which is not playable unless you have a 7-string (which Mick Thomson of Slipknot once called "gay." Do something what that information if you wish. Wait, actually don't.) Typically, we exclude the 5th, 9th, and 11th, leaving 1, 3, ♭7, 13, as in this standard voicing from any chord book:

B13

7X789X

This may be the only dominant 13th form some people know. I'll try to fix that. Keep the ♭7th and 13th degrees where they are, but play the 3rd down an octave on the A string and the root up an octave on the G string. This is the result:

B13

X6749X

Brutal. This is the standard drop-2 form of a first-inversion dominant 13th chord ("first-inversion" just means the third, D#, is in the bass rather than B."Drop-2" I plan to explain in detail later). The 5-fret stretch is enough to put most folks off it. If you're looking for a workaround, remember, the one note in this voicing that you don't need is the root. It's still a plain vanilla 13th chord even if you swap out the root for the 9th, 11th, or 5th. That's what we'll do, and in that order. First, the 9th substitution:

B13

X6769X

This is also a second-inversion AΔ7♭5, and a good choice if you want to play this chord without changing the sound much. Not so with the 11th substitution:

B13

X7789X

This is also an EΔ11, and a serious departure from the plain vanilla B13. You may wonder why I changed the bass note. Swapping the 11th for the 9th in the above voicing (i.e. X6799X) would create a ♭9 tension between the fifth and third strings. I tend to avoid those per Bret Wilmott's advice, but you need not. Anyway, I play the 11th on the fifth string and the 3rd (up an octave as a 10th) on the third string. 

I already covered this shape, but here's the fifth substitution:

B13

X9789X

This is the best substitution if you want the chord to be heard as a dominant thirteenth but are looking for something other than the root substitution.

COTD #8: D♭13#9

I plan to write a rag based on this chord someday. Hold me to it.

D♭13#9
X43300

The rootless form of this voicing has tritone symmetry, which means the figure has the same notes when you translate it by a tritone. So, without the root the chord looks like this:

D♭13#9
XX3300

Don't worry, it's still D♭13#9 even without the D♭. The remaining notes, low to high, are F, B♭, C♭, and E (the ♭7th degree of D♭ is C♭, not B.) Now take this figure and translate it up 6 frets:

?
XX9966

What notes are these? Well, B (or C♭) , E, F, and A# (or B♭). The same notes. The diminished 7th chord has this property also, but the notes repeat every three frets, not just every six. The tritone symmetry means that D♭13#9 and G13#9 only differ by their roots. All the other notes are the same. Observe:

G13#9
3X3300

COTD #7: E-9

Even less time today. This one is from one of the saddest songs I know: Center Aisle by Caedmon' Call. I believe it's also used in The Wrong Man Was Convicted by the Barenaked Ladies*. Both are worth a listen. Note that Center Aisle is capo III. Not sure about The Wrong Man Was Convicted.

E-9
024030

The beauty lies in the tension between the 9th (F#) on the 4th string and the minor 3rd on the open 3rd string.


*Honorable mention goes to another Christian song: Love Song by Third Day. The first chord is an E-(9), the parentheses indicating the absence of a 7th. That chord is also a sixth-inversion GΔ13! The honorableness of the mention is because I no longer consider this song generally "worth a listen," though it certainly is if you're an evangelical Christian, or a particularly emotive individual with nothing against Christianity.

E-(9)
024000

Chord(s) of the Day #6: B♭Δ7#11 and CΔ7#11

No time today, but a couple of voicings that were mentioned in that lost Chord of the Week blog. The first one is the lead-off chord of a Stone Temple Pilots song. I don't remember which one offhand.

B♭Δ7#11
X13230

and the mysterious, slightly ominous Charlie's Angels cut-to-commercial chord:

CΔ7#11
X32002

These are almost identical, except that the the major third is played up an octave as a tenth in the B♭ version, and as an actual third in the C version.

Chord of the Day #5: G13

I haven't done a 13th chord yet, so it's time. G13:

X5345X

Like that D11 from earlier, this voicing doesn't contain the root note. The perspicacious will recognize it as a D-6/9, which is certainly what it should be called when playing it as a D minor chord. It's also a G13, with the fifth degree substituted for the root. The third (B), flatted seventh (F), and thirteenth (E) are what really define G13, so they're all you need to play. Note that those are the defining notes on C#7#9 and CΔ11 as well. If you play in this reductionistic way, your bassist can decide for you what chord you're actually playing.

I'm running out of gas on these. I suspect I'll thin them out to a more sustainable pace, maybe 2-3 a week. I'll consider this a success as long as it's not zero per week.

Negative Ruminations

I'm not feeling as inspired today as during the rest of the week. My 9-5 is killing me slowly, as always. That's not to say that my 9-5 is a bad thing, just that it occupies so much of my time that I sometimes confuse it for life itself, i.e. the thing that's really killing me. And all of us.

Chord of the Day #4: F#11

In my freshman year at Cedarcrest High School in Duvall, WA I took the required word processing/IT class. This would have been 1998 or 1999. It was then that I got my first email address, and started wasting time on the Internet in earnest. I discovered a phenomenal Chord of the Week website that doesn't exist anymore. I may try to recreate some of those entries here, like the one for the B-7 chord in that Beck song Tropicalia. Another of the entries introduced me to this lovely thing, F#11:

244300

Theoretically speaking, this chord is missing one note: a 9th. Here are the generic formulae for the different "number" types of chords:

7th: root, third, fifth, seventh
9th: root, third, fifth, seventh, ninth
11th: root, third, fifth, seventh, ninth, eleventh
13th: root, third, fifth, seventh, ninth, eleventh, thirteenth

Note that under this system, theoretical 13th chords are unplayable on the guitar because they require seven notes. But hey, an 11th chord only has six, so we can play those, right? Wrong. Cramming all six notes of a theoretical 11th chord into a single guitar voicing worth playing is no mean feat, and I've only discovered one voicing that does it. Taking that chord above, if you can manage to stretch your little finger to replace that doubled root on the fourth string with a ninth (G#), you'll get this F#11 voicing:

246300

This has everything. In fact, it's a perfect theoretical dominant 11th, with two minor changes: the guide tones, the third and seventh, have both been raised an octave. That's it. Also, if you want an F major 9 #11, what I would call a Lydian 11th, just drop the figure down one fret and let the two high strings ring out:

135200

These theoretical voicings are not tremendously useful on the guitar. In most cases, we strip a chord down to its elements, usually three, four, or five notes that convey all the necessary harmonic material. Even 9th, 11th, and 13th chords can be stripped down to three notes so long as no other changes (e.g. a #5 or ♭9) are being made.

Happy stretching.

Brandon

Chord of the Day #3: CΔ7#13 (?)

I don't have a good name for this chord, at least not off the top of my head. And not in the context where I suggest you use it. Here's CΔ7#13:

X3X300

It's basically just a C note, a major 3rd (E), and both a major and a flatted seventh degree. In order to avoid having to explain this (somehow) in the name of the chord, I renamed the ♭7 a #13 . This is a cluster voicing, in that it sounds three (or more) pitch classes that are next to each other in the chromatic scale: B♭, B, and C. Though the notes are not played consecutively in minor seconds, the bluesy dissonance it still pronounced. In fact, most other cluster voicings are too ugly for my ears, though I hear Nick Drake used them effectively.

I tend to play it in a turnaround for blues in E. Try this (preferably hammering on that major third note on the E):

E           E7/D     C#-9      CΔ7#13 B7#9
0XX100  X5645X  X4244X  X3X300 X2123X

I just made that up here on the ferry, so it may be garbage. Let me know. Note: I generally play fingerstyle, so you'll notice a lot of in-chord string gaps. Here's a close voicing of the same chord:

X3230X

Enjoy?

Chord of the day #2: D11

"Close voicings" are chords where all the notes are confined to a single octave. They are not easy to play on the guitar, for reasons I'll explain later. Here's one of my favorites, D11:

X9555X

You may wonder, where's the D in your D11 chord? I don't need one. This chord has the three necessary ingredients of a dominant 11 chord: the 11th (G) and two guide tones, the 3rd (F#) and ♭7th (C). The fourth note is optional, and you have one of three options: the root (D), the 5th (A), or the 9th (E). I've opted for the 9th, so from low to high, this voicing consists of a a 3rd, 11th, ♭7th, and 9th. It sounds better higher up on the neck, where the dissonance between the 3rd and 11th isn't as muddy.

A lot of guitar chord books will offer this modal voicing as a dominant 11 chord (here instantiated in G):

3X321X

I don't consider this a proper dominant 11th chord because it doesn't have a 3rd degree. It is therefore neither major nor minor, and doesn't quite follow the standard third-stacking framework of Western harmony. I would rather describe it as an F/G, F(add 9)/G, or A-7#5/G. You could also call it a G11(no 3rd).

Aside! The greatest guitar chord book ever written is Mel Bay's Complete Book of Harmony Theory and Voicing by Bret Wilmott. Buy it.

Chord of the Day #1: G#7#5#9

Hello. A friend of mine has suggested I start a Guitar Chord of the Day blog, so here it is, my old blog recycled as a Guitar Chord of the Day blog.

Generally, I'll choose voicings that can be expressed as a combination of six single digits and/or X's, representing strings 6 through 1, in that order. For example, here's C major:

X32010

Hopefully that's clear. The chord of the day is G#7#5#9. If you're playing in E or C#- it may come in handy:

4X4500

Jarring, eh? I arranged the Sarah McLaughlin song Hold On (in D♭), and used a bunch of bluesy voicings like this one. I also play it on a capo 5 version of Rain Dogs in F# minor.

Note that this is one note off from a nice euphonic E(add 9)/G# (the same as G#-7#5: 4X4400). The odd note out is the B# on the third string. Why B# and not C, you ask? Because I spelled this as a G#, and B#, not C, is the third degree of a G# major scale. (In equal temperament...) this chord is identical to A♭7#5#9; the only difference being the spelling. I chose to spell it as a G# because that is how it is spelled in the keys of E and C# minor, which are much more common on guitar than D♭ major and minor, where the chord would be spelled as an A♭. In fact, D♭ minor is a theoretical key (8 flats!) that you would almost never see.