Learn Jazz chord shapes on the guitar (With PDF)!

1. Welcome!: Hi, My name is Jacob Lam. I'm a musician and a teacher. Have you ever wanted to play jazz or neo soul like the guitarists that you're hearing online. Well, in this class, we're going to cover the basics of jazz chords. By the end, you should be playing like a master. We're going to cover not only what makes a jazz chord, but also the individual shapes, and most importantly, the application where the cords fit into the overall key and what chords they replace. Then the next time you're playing a chord progression or writing a song, you'll know how to bring these cords in and use them effectively. Just like the masters do. Jump on in with me and we'll start learning today. 2. How Chords Work: Now, before we jump into the actual shapes, we need to understand how chords are built. Seat chords pull from modes. So for major chords, you're going to be pulling from a major mode, which is called Ionian. So we have a major mode. And the major chord. Minor chords are pulled out of a minor mode. So we have the minor mode, people and the minor chord. So cords are borrowing notes from these mode shapes and the notes, each of them are borrowing whether major or minor, is the first, third, and fifth note out of the mode. 3. What Are Chord Tensions?: We've just learned how to make basic chords. We pull notes 13.5 from a major or minor scale to make a major or minor chord. But what about jazz chords? How do we build those? Well, we need to understand something called tensions or extensions. Chord tensions further, the counting we're already doing. E.g. if we wanted to play a seventh chord, well, we would add in the seventh note of the major or minor scale. So if I wanted to play a major seven chord, I'd play 135.7 from my major mode or scale. If I wanted to play a minor seven chord, I would play 135.7 from my minor mode. Now, tensions are important. They add a lot of character to accord, but not a lot of substance. You have a base root chord. And then on top of them you have tensions that change the way that they feel. So I could play a C major chord. I could play a C major seven, or I could play a C Major nine. The cords all sound similar because the root things that make a cord are still there. They start from the same note and they have some variation of the three or the five in them. But we're adding in tensions that add character. Now, if you're at this point, you may already know that a mode has seven unique notes and then starts back over at one when we hit the octave of the root node. So you may be asking, well, how do you get to a 9.9 is simply the two of the next octave up, e.g. from the start of a scale, we could play one. If we jumped that up by one octave, we're jumping it up by seven notes. And what's two plus seven? Well, that's our nine for the chord. So a nine is just the two in a mode raised by one octave. We're adding seven notes of the mode to it. 4. Types of 7th Chords: Let's start by looking at seventh chords together. Now, we're going to be looking at fifth and sixth string shapes. And we're going to be looking at four types of seventh chords. In later classes. We'll look at more types of seventh and ninth. But these are the four most common. And the four that we'll be using in our scales to replace other chords. We're going to be looking at major seventh chords, minor sevenths, minor seven flat five chords, and augmented seventh chords, which are also just called sevens. Major seventh chords have, of course, a happy sound to them because they're major. Minor seven chords have more of a sad sound to them. As a minor chord. The minor seven flat five has a little bit more grit to it. It's a little more severe or has tension and wants to resolve. Here's a minor seven, flat five. Finally, we have augmented seven chords and these sound a little funny. I explain them to my students as kind of carnival chords and I'll show you why. Here's what the Augmented seven sounds like. Explain them as carnival cords because they sort of remind me of a carnival, a big top with clouds. 5. Major 7th Chord: Let's start with our major seventh shape. We're going to learn them from the fifth string and from the sixth string as a root note. Now something really important to recognize is that a seven is a half-step lower than our octave. So e.g. if I'm playing a major chord, all I need to do is identify the seven and move it down by a half step. Now, we'll talk about the individual shape note by note. But let's take a look at identifying that seven. If I run through my mode, my Ionian 1234567 and the octave. So I've got my Octave right there. Hit that seven. I know I need to just drop it by half. Let's take this shape starting from the fifth string, one note at a time. I'm going to use my C as an example. But like power chords or bar chords, all of these shapes are movable, just starting from different route notes. So I'll put my first finger on the third fret of the fifth string for my C. Now I'll play my fifth with my ring finger. Just like I'm playing a power chord. My middle finger will grab the fourth fret of the third string, and that's where that seven is going to be. You can hear the tension with the root node. So I've got my router, my five, my seven, and with my pinky finger, I'm going to hit the fifth fret of the second string. That's going to be my third. So root, Perfect fifth, my major seven, and my major third. Let's learn this shape from the sixth string. So again, I'm going to start on the third fret as an example, which in this case will be G. So I'll take my first finger and stick it on the third fret of the sixth string. Now I'm going to take my ring finger and place it on fourth fret of the fourth string. So I'm skipping over the fifth string entirely in right away. That's my seven. Now on top of it, I'm putting my pinky also on the fourth fret. That's going to be my third. Now my middle finger will grab the third fret of the second string. Same fret as my first finger. So I've got my root, seven, third, and fifth. So where does a major seventh chord fit into a key? Well, when we look at the notes in a key, we can apply major or minor chords to each one. And that looks like the first being major, second being minor, the third being minor, the fourth being major, the fifth being a major, the six being minor, seventh being minor as well. You may have covered this already in another course, which means we have major, minor, minor. Major. Major, minor, minor. Back to your roots of major. Now when we apply seventh chords, that means we can play a major seven over the major chords. So number one would be a major seven. Number four would also be a major seven. Number five is interesting when we bring in 7's. It's not exactly a major seven, it is a major type, but it's actually going to be dominant. Number five will be a dominant seven. So this major shape, when we're playing a key, we can play it as the first tone or the fourth tone of that key. This is really important to note because now we realize that we could land on a seventh chord, which adds a really nice character or quality to the note. Maybe I'm playing a chord progression of C, E minor, D minor and landing back and see, well now I can land on a C Major seven, since it's the one of my key. Let's see how that sounds. I think that's a really nice ending. 6. Minor 7th Chord: Next, let's take a look at our minor seventh shape. We'll use our same frets as an example. So once again, I'll start from a C. Note, the third fret of the fifth string. I'm going to take my first finger and place it on the C. That will be my route. And just like with the major seventh chord, I'm going to take my ring finger and again put it on the fifth. Remember that for major and minor, your root and fifth don't change at all. It's the third and the seventh that changed from a major chord to a minor chord. So my route and my fifth stay exactly the same. Now I need a minor seven. This is going to be a whole step down from the octave. You may remember that our major seven was a half-step lower than the octave. Now we want a whole step down from the octave. So I'm going to find my Octave and move it down by a whole step. Finally, I want my minor third on top and my middle finger is already there to do it. I'm just going to put it on the fourth fret. Second string is very similar to just a minor bar chord. We're just, if we're playing a bar, we're taking our pinky off. One of my favorite things to do when I'm playing a minor seven is to actually start with just the bar and put the other fingers on top. It adds a nice flair to your chord. So instead of playing a minor chord, starting with just my bar, and then hitting the other fingers on like a hammer on. Let's learn the minor seven shape starting from the sixth string. This one is surprisingly easy. It's a bar chord and we just need one other finger. There are two ways to play this chord, and we'll start with the bar chord way. I'm going to take my first finger and again put it on the G. Now everything else is going to be a bar. So I'm going to lay my finger flat across all the frets. And the only other thing that all changes with my pinky, I'm going to hit the fifth fret on the fifth string. Now, what was the other variation I talked about? Well, there's another way to play this minor seven. That may be easier if we're having trouble with the bar. Again, we're going to stay on the same frets, but we're not going to bar our fingers. I'll put my first finger back on the G. Now I'll take my middle finger and I'll use it to hit the same fret on the fourth string. My ring finger will hit the same fret. On the third string. My pinky will hit the same fret on the second string. So we're in the key. Does the minor seven chord fit? Well, we'll come back to our image here. We know the majors fit on number one and number four. Now we can see where the miners are, so we know our minor chord fits on numbers 236. And then once again, the seventh tone is actually a little bit different. This is a minor seven with a flat five, and we're going to learn that shape later. So we still need the augmented shape for the fifth tone of our key, and the minor seven flat five for the seventh tone of our key. But we can already use major and minor to play a lot of chord progressions. Like if I want to play 14, 6.3, for playing in the key of C, That would be C. Six would be a minor. I'll take from the sixth string. The number three would be an E minor. 7. Minor 7 (b5) Chord: We just figured out our minor seventh chord. So it might make sense next to look at the minor seven with a flat five. The nice thing about this cord is that it actually just tells you what it wants you to do. This would be a minor seven chord with a flat five. So if we take our minor seven shape again, I'll play it from that. See, I'm going to start by identifying the five here, which I know is my ring finger. So to make a minor seven with a flat five, I want to take my five and make it flat. So maybe I'll move it down by a half-step. I've got my minor seven flat five shapes. Now, this might be easier if I reverse my fingers here, I'll switch to get my second finger on top and my ring finger on the bottom. Again, if you're having trouble barring, we could always use the first, third, second and pinky to make this little box shape. Let's also take this shape looking at the sixth string as our root. So I've got my minor seven and we'll use this shape with all fingers. I've got my roots, my seven, my three, and my five on top. So to play a minor seven, flat five, maybe I want to lie down. So I've got my middle finger now where my first finger was, my third finger and my ring finger. Pinky. And my first finger. I'm just going to grab that flat five. Now on the key, the minor seven flat five fits in the seventh position. So we've got major, minor, minor, major, major seven minor, and minor seven flat five. This is something that's really important to keep in mind. The minor seven flat five fits perfectly and resolves really well if we're walking back up. One, Here's my one. Say we're playing in the key of D. Also got my, so my seven would fit right between these and I'm going to play that minor seven flat five shapes. So from here, then it resolves to the one. 8. Dominant 7th Chord: Let's take a look at our augmented seven as our last seventh shape. Now, you may see the Augmented seven in a couple of different ways. It may have an AUG, short for augmented, or it may just have a seven next to it. The major sevens show the m, a j. The minor sevens show an M, or sometimes a minus sign. And the augmented sevens show AUG or just a seven. So remember if you ever come across a C7, we're not looking for a major shape. We're looking for this augmented shape. This shape is called augmented because we're augmenting the status quo. We're augmenting the usual, see with our major seven. All the notes were major. We add a root fifth, major third and a major seven. Minor seven. All of our notes were minor. We had a root or fifth, a minor third, and a minor seven. Now, for the augmented seven, we're mixing it up. We're blending the two. We've got a root, a fifth, and a major third. So we've got a happy sounding chord. But on top of that we're putting a minor seven. So we've got a happy sounding major chord with a minor seven on top of it. Now to play this shape, I'm going to start once again from the third fret of the fifth string and keep my fifth exactly the same. This time through, I'm borrowing my first finger to hit that minor seven, just like we were playing a regular minor seven chord. Difference is that my pinky is going to grab the fifth fret of the second string. So now I can use my middle finger to help the first finger bar. In the same way on the sixth string, there are two ways we could do this. One of them is a bar and one of them is not. We'll start with the bar variation about my first finger on my G there. And again, my ring finger on the fifth. Now again, I'm going to bar everything like I'm playing a minor seven chord. But my middle finger is going to grab the major seven, which in this case will be the fourth fret of the third string. If I wanted to play this chord without the bar, well, I grabbed the G. My middle finger will grab the same fret of the fourth string. My pinky will grab the major seven, which is a fret above on the third string. And then my ring finger will come through and grabbed the same fret on the second string. Now again, in the key, this fits perfectly from the fifth position, the fifth tone. So we've got major, minor, minor, major, major seven, minor, minor seven flat five, back to our root major. Now that we have all of those shapes, Let's pick a key. We'll say the key of C, and try working up that scale using the fifth string shapes. So I'll start from a C minor minor major. Now I'm going to play the augmented back to minor, minor seven flat five to major. Let's try it one more time, starting from a G, and we'll practice our sixth string shapes. So I have major. Welcome back to another minor. Major. This is augmented. By now we have a minor seven flat five. Back to major. This is how we can make some really nice chord progressions using sevenths. A really common one in jazz is called the 251. We'll practice that next time. 9. The II - V - I Progression: Let's take a look at a really common theme in jazz or neo soul music. This is the 251, meaning whatever key we're in. We're playing the two and the five to resolve to the one. That augmented fifth resolves really well to the root chord, the first tone of our key. So e.g. let's say I'm in the key of C. I'm going to play my C from the sixth string. Really common progression is a 251. What if we're in a different key? What if we're in the key of say, a? Well, we have our a right Here. Are two. In the key of a would be a, B minor. Five in the key of a would be E. So we'd play E augmented or E seven. Back to our one of the a. As you listen to this style of music, look around and use your ears or as you practice, see with your hands, where the 25 ones fit in there, maybe more than you think. One quick note that you may have noticed here is that I was sliding up to my route, was taking the shape of the root and playing it a fret down and sliding up. Which is another common theme in the neo soul music. It's a nice way to lead into that route, especially when it's paired with something else that leads into it like the five or the minor seven flat five. So again, I can play my to my five, which is already wanting to land on that one and then work my way up to it. 10. Types of 9th Chords: For our ninth chords, we're going to be covering two types, major ninths and minor ninths. Now, again, major ninth sound very happy. Minor ninths of course sound very sad. But what makes a ninth chord a ninth chord? We know the sevens. What about the nines? Well, we include the nine, which we talked about in one of our first lessons. Ninth chords typically omit for guitar, the fifth of the chord. You'll often find the root, the third, the seventh, and the ninth. The fifth is omitted just so the notes don't get too jumbled together or it's too difficult for our fingers to play. But we still have a strong major and minor feeling or character to the court. 11. Major 9th Chord: Let's start with our major ninth shape. Now, we know already that major will fit in the first or the fourth tone of our key. And that's no exception here. So we're going to have to make a decision when we're playing. If we'd like to play seventh chords or ninth chords, of course we can combine. But in each individual scenario, we'll have to pick whether a seventh or ninth fits best there to our ears. So I'm going to start again on the third fret of the fifth string, but this time I'll use my middle finger. Take my first finger and put it on the major third behind it, 123, which is in this case the second fret of the fourth string. My pinky, who's going to grab the major seven? And my ring finger will reach behind and grabbed the third fret of the second string. And in this case, that's our nine. Now what about our sixth string major shape? Well, again, I'll grab with my middle finger, starting from a G, and my first finger will grab the third, nothing different there. My ring finger even will grab the major seven. Now, I'm going to borrow my first finger to grab my nine. So I've got root 37.9. 12. Minor 9th Chord: Let's take a look at our minor ninth shape. Now. The minor nine we know looking at the key fits in the second, third, and six positions perfectly. We're not going to look at things quite yet, like an augmented nine or a minor nine with a flat, anything. We're going to stick with major and minor in this course and then cover the other ones and some other extensions are tensions in later courses. For now, let's take a look at the minor nine shape, and this is my personal favorite shape to play. I think it sounds so nice. I'm going to start with my middle finger, and this time as an example, I'll use the fifth fret. So I'm starting on a D. My first finger is going to reach the minor third, two frets down on the next string, which in this case will be the three. Now my next two fingers, my ring finger and my pinky, are going to grab the same fret as my starting note on the second and third string. So I've got root, third, minor seven. And then my minor nine. From the sixth string on, grabbed my ring finger and put it on the fifth fret. My first finger again, we'll grab that minor thirds and starting the same way. And my pinky will grab the minor seven. So I've got threats from here, 535. My middle finger is going to grab the nine, the minor nine. Fourth fret on the third string. 13. 9ths in a Key: Now, when we look at a key, we know we have major, minor, minor, major, major seven, minor, minor seven flat five. We can use any combination of sevens and nines when we're playing a progression. And I think that they're best used in unison. E.g. maybe I want to play 1231. Really simple, or will even say 1,235.1. For my first one, maybe I'll use a nine. Maybe I'll use a nine for two. By the time I get to three, I'll take seven. Same for my five, I'll use another seven augmented, send it back to one, which could be a seven or nine. In fact, using them together, sevens and nines really bring out a unique feel and sound and can even keep the same chord interesting when we have to play it for a long period of time. 14. Final Project and Congratulations!: You've made it to the end of the course, well done. For our final project, we're going to do what we've been doing so far. First thing is we're going to pick a key, can be any key that you like. Then we're going to pick some numbers out of that key. Then we're going to play through the progression. We can use any combination of standard chords without tensions, seventh chords and ninth chords. Use your own ear and judgment to pick what you think sounds best. In its case, if you play through the progression a couple of times, maybe you can make different decisions each and every time. You can upload your submission in the project section of the course or in the final project community room. I'm really excited to hear. And if you need to contact me for anything, questions, comments, or just to say hi, you can reach out at Jacob at lamb lessons.com or go to lamb lessons.com and I'll see you there soon.