When you’re diving into guitar chords, you’ll quickly encounter terms that go beyond the basic major, minor, and seventh chords. Understanding how to Name This Guitar Chord, especially when it comes to extensions and slash chords, can significantly expand your musical vocabulary and comprehension. This guide will break down the concepts of extended chords and slash chords, ensuring you can confidently identify and play them.
Extended Chords: Adding Depth Beyond Sevenths
Extended chords are built upon the foundation of 7th chords by adding higher intervals from the major scale. These extensions are the 9th, 11th, and 13th. Think of it as layering even more harmonic richness onto your chords.
Looking at the C Major scale:
C – D – E – F – G – A – B
And numbering these scale degrees from the root (C):
1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 7
To get the extended intervals, we continue this sequence into the next octave, effectively renaming the 2nd, 4th, and 6th as 9th, 11th, and 13th respectively:
1 – 3 – 5 – 7 – 9 – 11 – 13
These numbers – 9, 11, and 13 – are your standard chord extensions.
The Rule of Lower Numbers
A key principle to remember when name this guitar chord with extensions is that you must include all the lower extension numbers when naming a chord. This is different from “add” chords, where you only add the specified note.
For example, if you see a “13th” chord, it inherently includes the 9th and 11th as well.
Major 9th Chords
A major 9th chord is built upon a major 7th chord and includes the 9th interval. Therefore, a Cmaj9 chord uses the 1st, 3rd, 5th, 7th, and 9th notes of the C major scale:
C – E – G – B – D
Major 11th Chords
Major 11th chords expand further, incorporating the 11th interval in addition to the 9th and 7th. A Cmaj11 chord contains the 1st, 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th, and 11th notes:
C – E – G – B – D – F
Major 13th Chords
Major 13th chords are the most extended of this group, using intervals up to the 13th. A Cmaj13 chord includes the 1st, 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th, 11th, and 13th notes – essentially encompassing the entire major scale within one chord:
C – E – G – B – D – F – A
Minor and Dominant Extended Chords
To create minor or dominant extended chords, you modify the 3rd and 7th intervals of the major extended chord, just as you would when forming minor or dominant 7th chords. The 9th, 11th, and 13th intervals themselves remain consistent.
Extended Chords on Guitar: Practical Considerations
You might realize that playing all these notes simultaneously on a guitar, especially for 13th chords, is often impossible without extra strings! To make these chords playable and musically effective on guitar, we often omit certain notes.
Commonly, the 5th is the first note to be omitted. Following that, lower extensions like the 9th might be left out, especially in a 13th chord voicing. Sometimes, even the root note can be omitted depending on the musical context.
For example, when encountering a Cmajor13 chord in a song, a guitarist might choose the extension that best fits the musical passage. Sometimes, even playing a Cmaj7 might be a more practical and musically suitable choice if a full Cmaj13 voicing is too cumbersome or doesn’t fit the arrangement.
Slash Chords: Identifying the Bass Note
Slash chords introduce another layer to name this guitar chord by specifying the bass note. Often referred to as inversions in other instrumental contexts, slash chords on guitar indicate the chord being played and the desired bass note.
A slash chord is written with the chord symbol on the left of the slash and the bass note on the right.
Chord / Bass Note
For instance, D/F# signifies a D major chord with F# as the bass note.
D (chord) / F# (bass note)
It’s crucial to understand that this is still a D chord; we haven’t added any notes from an F# chord. The slash notation simply dictates the lowest note to be played.
On guitar, you might achieve a slash chord by either adding the specified bass note to a standard chord voicing or by playing a chord voicing that naturally places the desired bass note as the lowest pitch.
Understanding both extended chords and slash chords is crucial for any guitarist looking to expand their harmonic knowledge and confidently name this guitar chord in diverse musical situations.
