Most Important Beginning Chords To Learn On Guitar

Learning to play chords on guitar is an essential part of the instrument.  For acoustic guitar players, strumming chords is probably one of the things you will do most often when playing the guitar.  For electric guitar players, in between those killer leads you are playing most of the time you will be playing chords in a band.  Learning chords will also familiarize you with the fretboard on your guitar.  With practice, you will be able to play some great chord progressions and your favorite songs will become much easier to play.  Today I will go over the first essential chords to learn on the guitar, introduce you to beginning barre chords, and even suggest some of the more popular beginner guitar songs to learn.

To begin it's easy to learn to play these essential beginning guitar chords by looking at a chord chart.  I found one that supplies a very easy-to-read visual chord chart here at http://www.fretjam.com/beginner-guitar-chord-chart.html.  Follow along with the chord chart and start playing some of the most popular guitar chords.

Beginner guitar chord chart print sheets 

These are the basic open position chords most guitarists learn as beginners. They are divided into major, minor, 7th (major 7th and dominant 7th) and minor 7th chord forms. Don't worry what these names mean if you're unsure - as time goes on you'll either learn more about the theory behind their construction or you'll just associate the names with the sound and shapes they form on the guitar fretboard. 

Major and minor beginner chord chart 

E major	A major
C major	D major
G major	E minor
A minor	D minor

Major 7th chord chart

Major 7th chords add depth to the basic major chords above. All we're doing is adding an extra note (the major 7th). This means you'll need to alter the fingering slightly to accomodate this new note. Try and see how the major chords above have been modified to create the major 7th chords below. 

Emaj7	Amaj7
Cmaj7	Dmaj7
Gmaj7	Fmaj7

Dominant 7th chord chart

Like major 7th chords, dominant 7th chords thicken up the basic major chord. When playing the chords in the chart below, experiment with using them in a chord progression, along side standard major/minor chords and major 7th chords.

E7	A7
C7	D7
G7	B7

Minor 7th chord chart

Build on the basic minor chord forms from earlier.

Em7	Am7
Gm7	Dm7
Bm7

The chords listed above will get you started on a great pace to play many of your favorite songs.  Now I will give you an introduction to barre chords.  Barre chords will seem difficult at first until you build up your finger muscles on your fretboard hand.  But with practice, you will get these down too and it will advance your guitar playing to the next level.  Here you will find an introduction to barre chords and the first of several barre chord shapes at http://www.fretjam.com/guitar-barre-chords.html.

Barre chords are just a special type of movable guitar chord. These are chords you can shift up and down the fretboard in their fixed formation. This in turn allows you to use those same familiar chord fingerings in any key, simply by positioning them at a new fret. 

The "barre" refers to positioning one of your fretting fingers (most often your index finger) flat across more than one string. You'll see how different types of "barre" are used in different chord shapes throughout this course.

In these lessons, we'll be looking at 5 main chord shapes. Why shapes? Well, the five main barre chords are derived from the shape of those 5 open position chords most of us learn as absolute beginners - you know the ones - E, A, D, G and C, down at the first few frets.

These are our foundation chord shapes, and we refer to these same basic shapes as we move them up the fretboard and create barre chords from them.

 So, in a nutshell, here's what you have to look forward to learning:

• Automatically knowing how to play several voicings of the same chord in several different positions over the fretboard. This is about expanding your creative options.

• Knowing how to modify the standard barre chord shapes to create tons more interesting chords, almost as second nature. 

• Having the physical confidence and the muscle memory to change between what would otherwise be awkward chord shapes! 

So, let's get stuck in, starting with the E-shape barre...

E shape barre chords - First, the theory

Time and time again, I hear people simply refer to the E shape barre chord as the dreaded "F chord". It's seen as a major milestone after learning your first chords.

So, what makes it the "E shape"? The sequence below starts off showing us the E major open position chord that I'm sure you're familiar with. This "shape" simply gets moved up, meaning we have to barre our index finger to represent where the nut (or capo) would be.

   

...and that shape can be positioned anywhere up the fretboard depending on what key you're playing in.

Now take a look at a similar diagram below... 

 

The lowest root note of the E-shape barre (the fretted red dot) is always on the E string, so if that root note was positioned at fret 5, it would build an A major chord, since the root note would be the note A.

There are higher root notes positioned on the D and high E strings, but at this stage, it's easiest to identify the key of the barre chord by looking at that lowest root note, as the rest of the chord is built from this point in this particular shape. 

The E-shape also has a minor chord shape taken, like before, from the open E minor shape we're already familiar with. 

Just like before, your barring finger acts as the nut, or capo, so you can position that whole shape wherever you need on the fretboard.

Now, the physical side - Building up those finger muscles!

At first, ouch! You'll find that barring your index finger across all 6 strings like that is difficult to begin with.

With only your index finger barred, try picking each string - does each one sound cleanly? Is there any buzzing? If there is buzzing, it means the string isn't being fretted properly. Adjust your barre finger position, and try again, until each string sounds cleanly.

Notice how the barre finger is placed as close to the fret wire as possible, without actually being on the fret wire itself. The non-barre fingers stand tall and arch down onto the strings without collapsing back. Fret with the finger tips.

Be patient - it won't feel comfortable at first, but judge it based on whether all 6 strings sound cleanly... if they do, it's simply a case of physically getting used to it, and trust me, you will!

TIP: Give that index finger a workout! Barre the strings, like above, for 10 seconds, play all 6 strings, then release the barre, barre for 10 seconds again, then release etc. This will help the muscle memory set in.

Like I said before, just make sure each note sounds cleanly when you're barring.

When you're confident with your barring strength, apply the other fingers of the E-shape major chord, and once again make sure each note in the chord rings cleanly.

Here are some more pics to help, starting with the major shape...

And now the minor shape (all we do is remove the 2nd finger)...

Once you're confident with the above, try changing from an open position chord to an E-shape barre chord. Try the below exercise for reference (the barre chords are underlined)...

With all this information on essential guitar chords to learn, you should be well supplied to starting practicing effectively.  A great way to make practicing these chords and have fun doing it is to apply them to songs.  Here you will find a few great suggestions of beginning songs to learn that will give you a good idea of how these chords can be built in chord progressions at http://www.guitarworld.com/ask-andy-best-beginner-guitar-songs#slide-0.

One of the first things people should learn when they begin playing the guitar is all of the open-position major chords, also often referred to as “cowboy” chords, like E, A, D, G, C and F, plus B7, just for good measure.

Believe it or not, just learning these seven chords will enable one to play hundreds (thousands?) of popular songs. And once you learn these chords, it’s very simple to learn their minor or minor seventh counterparts (Em, Am, Dm, or Em7, Am7, Dm7, for example), which opens the door to even more songs. 

A great place to start is the immortal “Hey Joe,” written by Billy Roberts in 1962 and recorded in the mid-'60s by many different bands, such as The Leaves, The Standells, The Surfaris, Love, The Music Machine, The Byrds, Tim Rose and, most notably, Jimi Hendrix.

“Hey Joe” is great for beginners because it 1) can be played using all first-position “cowboy” chords, and 2) repeats the same five-chord cycle over and over, C-G-D-A-E, which is known as a “cycle of fifths.” Jimi also created a very cool, but easy to play, intro for the song, so learning his version allows beginners to play something that sounds cool but is not overly challenging.

Another great song for beginners is “House of the Rising Sun,” a very old song whose origins have been disputed. The English rock band The Animals had a big hit with the song in 1964, and their keyboardist, Alan Price, claimed it was originally a 16th-century English folk song.

Like “Hey Joe,” “House of the Rising Sun” is made up a simple first-position chord progression, Em-G-A-C, Em-G-B7, which repeats over and over. 

In more recent times, a great song I’ve taught to many beginners is “Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)” by Green Day. The song consists of only four different first-position chords and is easy to learn very quickly, even for a staunch beginner. 

When I first started to play, the very first songs I learned were “On Top of Old Smoky” and “The Streets of Laredo;” great songs but maybe not as much fun for many people as “Hey Joe” and “House of the Rising Sun.”  

And — must I say it? — if you don’t feel compelled learn “Smoke on the Water” within the first week of picking up a guitar, you’re probably playing the wrong instrument.

If you start applying these chords early in your guitar playing, you will advance very quickly.  One of the most important lessons you will ever learn when playing an instrument is to never stop having fun with it.  Make sure you enjoy playing the instrument and also learning new things on the instrument. With that attitude, you will go far.

Have fun and stay tuned for more!

Mike