Beginning guitarists often learn a first way to play a chord and understandably associate that shape as the way to play that chord. To move beyond this basic understanding of a chord and how to play it on the guitar you have to begin thinking of a chord as a grouping of specific musical notes. Changing the order of notes within a grouping will not change what chord you’re playing but as soon as you change which notes are in the group you begin to fundamentally alter what chord you’re playing.
Each different way of ordering or combining the notes found in a chord is called a voicing and there is no right or wrong voicing to use — you’ll want to choose one that makes the most sense based on the context of the song. Some voicings may be easier or harder to transition to from the chord preceding or following it while others may have a characteristic sound you’re going for. Additionally, because of fingering considerations, some voicings are easier to alter or add melody notes to than others.
Advancing guitarists know at least a couple of different voicings for each chord and they change them up based on context, though everyone has their default and favorite way of playing a chord. Which brings me to my caveat to this whole topic:
It’s not bad to use the same voicing all the time.
Playing a song with a single chord voicing at a steady tempo is preferable to using several different voicings but fluctuating in tempo.
That being said, using alternate chord voicings can open up new possibilities for your playing and allow greater variation within a song. Learning new voicings also deepens your knowledge of the fretboard and presents new dexterity challenges for your fingers.
A New Understanding of Chords
- A chord is a collection of 3 or more notes.
A single note is simply a note, two notes played together are called a dyad, and three or more notes are a chord.
- The three essential notes of a chord are called the triad.
Think of this as the “nucleus” of the chord. The triad is the basic unit of notes that cannot be reduced further without altering the identity of the chord.
- Triads include scale degrees 1 – 3 – 5.
Figuring out what notes a triad includes is as easy as counting through the alphabet. For a G chord, “G” would be 1, “A” would be 2, “B” would be 3, etc. Thus, the triad that a G chord is based on would contain the notes G, B and D.
- Changing the order or combination of notes within a chord doesn’t change its identity.
This means a G chord could be played as G – B – D or B – G – D or D – B – G. Or if we doubled certain notes (since we’re playing a 3 note chord on a six string instrument) we could play a G chord as G – B – D – G – D – G (see voicing 1 below) or B – G – D – G (see voicing 7).
Below are 10 different ways to play a G chord and some notes on each voicing. Note that these are all voicings for a G major triad – I am not including any extensions or alterations here.
1
One of the most common G chord voicings, the fifth on the high end of this voicing sounds great and lends itself to playing a Cadd9, Em7 and Dsus4 with the same D and G notes on top. I associate this G voicing with praise and worship music and I often use this when playing 10,000 Reasons. This tends to be the go-to G chord for most singer-songwriters as well. Check out #2 below for a slight variation that I prefer to this voicing.
2
This voicing omits the low B from the first voicing above. I find that this cleans up the sound and makes the low end less muddy. I mute the 5th string with my second finger by fretting the sixth string slightly more toward the pad of my finger. Note that this voicing is composed entirely of G and D notes – the 1 and 5 of the G chord. Since there is no third this chord is technically neither major nor minor and really could be used as a G major or G minor chord.
3
I use this voicing if I am going to be playing melody notes within the G chord. Your first and second fingers are free here to play the first and second frets of string 2, 3, 4 or 5 which gives you over a full octave of melody notes within the key of G to play without lifting either your third or fourth fingers. I especially use this technique while playing finger style.
4
I like this voicing for strumming basic campfire songs. The first finger here can be hammered-on to the fifth or fourth strings at the second fret for a nice embellishment.
5
This is an E form bar chord and has nice spacing with a fifth on the bottom and a fourth on top. The most common movable G chord shape used.
6
This is a reduction of the full E form shape above. Ascends straight up the chord 1 – 3 – 5 – 1. This voicing leaves the pinky free to add other notes to the shape – common additions would be the ninth on the first string or the sixth or seventh on the second string.
7
This voicing is based on a D shape (actually a D/F# shape) and has wide interval spacing – from bottom to top the intervals are 6th, 5th, 4th. I mute the fifth string with my second finger and the first string with the base of my first finger.
8
Based on a second inversion C shape, this is a lesser-used voicing (actually, I may have discovered voicings #8-10 here as I have never seen anyone else ever use them) that includes both an open string and notes fretted high on the fretboard. I use this shape when playing in the key of C – it works great as a movable shape for playing a C chord (first finger at the first fret), F chord (first finger at the sixth fret) and G chord (as shown).
9
The same as #8 above except with the D moved from the sixth to the first string. Based on a C shape this voicing has wide interval spacing at the top of the chord. Mute the sixth string either with your third finger or thumb.
10
Based on an A shape this voicing features a wide interval at the top of the chord (a sixth) and a ringing open string as well as notes fretted high on the guitar. The Beatles used a reduced version of this shape at the end of the famous first guitar phrase from Blackbird. For me, this shape works well as a unique movable shape for G (picture here), C (first finger at the third fret) and D (first finger at the fifth fret) chords.