Seventh Chords.

By Morten Gjermundsen (trollstjerne@yahoo.no)

In the first Chord lesson you learnt how to form Major and Minor triads Chords (if you didnŽt read it you can take a look here ) In this lesson we will take it one step further by adding one more note.And as the title of this page indicated we are going to take a look at the Seventh Chords.If you remember from the first Chord lesson we created Major and Minor triads by adding a Third and a Fifth to the Root note.To create Seventh Chords we simply add the Seventh.Then we have these notes Root,Third,Fifth and Seventh. But to find these notes we need a Scale and since we used the C Major Scale in the first Chord lesson we will use it here too.

Here is the C major scale.

C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C

Listen 

|--------------------------|
|--------------------------|
|-----------------2--4--5--|
|--------2--3--5-----------|
|--3--5--------------------|
|--------------------------|
Or like this(same thing) 
                            
|--------------------------|
|--------------------0--1--|
|--------------0--2--------|
|--------2--3--------------|
|--3--5--------------------|
|--------------------------|
The first note (in this case the C note) is called "Root" note the third note is called "Third" and the fifth note is called "Fifth" and the seventh note is called "Seventh".If you play these notes together youŽll have a Cmaj7 Chord.

Cmaj7 
||-------------------||
||--5----------------||
||--4----------------||
||--5----------------||
||--3----------------||
||-------------------||
Of course there is several ways to play this Chord hereŽs a few of them 
||--------------------|-----------3--------|
||--0-----------------|-----------5--------|
||--0--------0--------|--4--------4--------|
||--2--------9--------|--2--------5--------|
||--3--------7--------|--3--------3--------|
||-----------8--------|--3-----------------|


                                              
--7--------7---------|--12-------------------||
--5--------8---------|--12--------12---------||
--5--------9---------|--12--------12---------||
--5--------10--------|--10--------14---------||
---------------------|------------15---------||
The next Chord weŽll take a look at is the C7 Chord. In this Chord we find these notes : C (Root) - E (Third) - G (Fifth) - Bb (Minor Seventh)

Here is the C7 Chord. 

||-------------------||
||--5----------------||
||--3----------------||
||--5----------------||
||--3----------------||
||-------------------||
Of course there is several ways to play this Chord too so hereŽs a few of them 
||--0-----------------|--6-----------------|
||--1--------1--------|--5--------5--------|
||--3--------3--------|--5--------5--------|
||--2--------2--------|--5--------5--------|
||-----------3--------|-----------7--------|
||--------------------|-----------6--------|


                                              
--8--------8---------|------------12---------||
--8--------8---------|--11--------11---------||
--9--------9---------|--9---------12---------||
--8--------8---------|--10--------10---------||
-----------10--------|--10-------------------||
-----------8---------|-----------------------||
Minor Seventh Chord.

Now we will take a look at the Minor 7 chord. To form a Minor chord you simply lower the Third.So instead of having a Root,Third,Fifth and Minor Seventh we have Root,Minor Third,Fifth and Minor Seventh.In the Key of C the notes of the C Minor 7 chord are C - Eb - G - Bb

Cm7 
||-------------------||
||--4----------------||
||--3----------------||
||--5----------------||
||--3----------------||
||-------------------||
In my first Chord lesson i showed you how to form Minor Chords using the Minor Scale instead of just lowering the Third.I recommend you learn both ways.So here is how it looks like from the Minor Scale.

C Minor Scale & C Minor Seventh Chord. 
||--------------------------|-------------------||
||--------------------------|--4----------------||
||--------------------3--5--|--3----------------||
||-----------3--5--6--------|--5----------------||
||--3--5--6-----------------|--3----------------||
||--------------------------|-------------------||
What i did here is simple.I put together the Root,Third,Fifth and the Seventh and youŽll have the Minor 7 Chord.

As im sure you notice i didnŽt show you more than one way to play the C Minor 7 Chord.This is because i want you to find them yourself YouŽll learn alot more that way.Try to figure out at least 10 Chord shapes for every Chord you know or learn.And when you are done try to learn 10 new ones.More Chord lessons will come soon but until then Good luck with the Seventh Chords.And be sure to check out the rest of my

GUITARRPAGES.