Barre Chords - What is a Barre Chord

Barre chords are useful tools for guitarists. Just by knowing a few shapes a guitarist could play many chords in any key. A guitarist just needs to know one major barre chord shape and they would be able to play any major chord in any key.

Same with a minor chord, dominant chord, sus chord, you name it. Just learn the shape and you can play that chord in any key, anywhere’s on the guitar. This is a phenomanal aspect about the guitar, not many instruments have this power.

This is in direct conflict with the basic open position chords. With those chords, you need to learn a new shape for every new chord. Not so with barre chords, because you only need a few shapes and your can literally play any of the most used chords in any key anywheres on the guitar neck. Phenomanal.

The Barre

The barre is a technique where one finger is used to fret many strings on the guitar. It is most commonly used when referring to the 1st finger fretting all the strings on the same fret. When done this way, the barre replaces the use of the nut on the guitar. The following is a barre, done with the 1st finger, located on the 2nd fret.

The diagram to the left clearly indicates that all the strings should be fretted on the 2nd fret with the 1st finger. When played, each string should ring clearly. This will be hard at first, but with practice it will come. The barre will be easier to fret by rotating your index finger slightly towards the nut.

Notice that the barre completely replaces the use of the nut. Most important of all is notice that after applying the barre to the guitar, you still have 3 fingers left to fret other notes to make different chord shapes.

In the next section, we will start to use those extra fingers to make barre chords shapes. Now its going to get interesting.

Part II - Your first Barre Chord

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Your First Scale / The Pentatonic Scale

The first scale most guitarists learn is the minor pentatonic scale. Pentatonic may sound scary but it really isn't, it simply means 5 notes. So a pentatonic scale is just a 5 note scale. The pentatonic scale is extremely useful for guitarists. This is for a few good reasons. - Music that is commonly played on the guitar (rock, blues, country, pop, ect...) use the pentatonic scale in its melodies and improvisation. - The pentatonic scale is easily playable on the guitar with pentatonic 'boxes'. - The licks and riffs from the pentatonic scale sound amazing. With that said, lets get into the minor pentatonic scale. The following is a tab file and a scale diagram of the minor pentatonic scale in the Key of A. Didn't I say a pentatonic scale was only 5 notes. The above tab file and scale diagram feature alot more then 5 notes. Take a look at the red dots on the scale diagram, for example the 5th fret on the Low E string and High E string and the 7th fret on ...

How To Build A Barre Chord

It should be clear by now that the barre effectively replaces the use of the nut on the guitar. If not, then go back and read Part One . Once understanding the barre replaces the use of the nut, it should make sense that you could use the same basic chords in open position and apply them after the barre. Use the exact same chord shape, just replace the nut with the barre using your first finger and refinger the chord as necessary. While this method will work with all open position chords, there are four particular chord shapes, two major shapes and two minor shapes, that are essential for all guitarists. The two basic open position chords that we will be using to build our major barre chords are the E major and the A major chord forms. Let's start with the E major chord. This chord should already be familiar. If not then read up on the basic chords in open position . The two diagrams to the right is an E major chord in open position followed by an F# major barre chord. T...

Tuning The Rest Of The Guitar

The same method is used to tune the next two strings, the D string and the G string. Fret the 5th fret on the A string and that gives the note D, you can now tune your D string in comparison to the 5th fret of the A string. Once the D string is tuned, do the same for the G string. Fret the 5th fret on the D string and that gives the Note G and you can now tune the G string. The B string is tuned with the same method but instead of fretting the 5th fret of the G string, you fret the 4th and tune in comparison to the 4th fret, not the 5th. You should now just have the High E string to tune. In this case, we go back to the original method of fretting in comparison to the 5th fret of the previous string. The following diagram will help illustrate the entire tuning process. You should now be able to tune your guitar. It may take a while for a beginner but you should get it. If your having trouble, read through the material again. The above diagram should illustrate the method clea...

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