Don't play your Major chords this way (play them like this instead)

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In this lesson, I'm showing you Major chord shapes that are way better than the typical barre shapes that we all learn.

To understand why they are better, we are talking about 'voice leading' in this lesson.

- Voice leading = treating each note of your chord as an individual voice, and make sure that it moves as little as possible to make smoother transitions.

The 2 shapes of Major chord that we're using in this lesson are perfect for that!

I'm showing you how smoother a chord progression like Bb - Gm - Eb - Cm can sound with those shapes.

Hope you'll learn a thing or two!

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This is the Ambient Guitar youtube channel of Canadian multi-instrumentist Antoine Michaud. Through original ambient music, chordal guitar lessons and tips on guitar pedals, Antoine is looking to educate and inspire aspiring ambient musicians to learn everything about the world of ambient guitar and chordal voicings on guitar.

[gloomsdoom]

I feel like this fits for some genres and moods but not all. For harder rock or more “fun” riffs like in Punk and Grunge, the big jumps in barre chords and power chords fit very well. It gives them an edge.

[patandmacmusic]

Your definition of voice leading was the first time I've heard it explained where it makes sense. Thank you!

[Humr]

I also wish I had a Tim Burton character fingers so that I could play fancy chords.

[jansimmelman]

What he teaches is the same as I got to learn in school for 9 years about how the parts in a choir should move !

[hanserikkratholmrasmussen]

Excellent lesson. Being retired I finally have to take up my guitar playing again, and it's just stuff like this I work on for the moment.

[ThirteenMusic]

You can get a lot of milage out of a chord progression just by mixing up the voicing of the chords it can take something really predictable and just make it sound totally different. For me personally just learning some different basic maj/min voicings rooted on different strings really did a lot for my playing.

[jumpkeys]

This is the something I learned due to getting old. And it simply made me a better more versatile player.

[randycornejo]

As an old timer who has been stuck in the same old same old for more years than I care to admit I’m grateful to have stumbled upon this video. Beautifully explained and demonstrated. The timing couldn’t have been better as I have recently been tapped for a worship lead spot and I feel like a fish out of water as almost nothing is chorded the way I’m used to. I hope these techniques come quickly to me. I’d love to hear some comments of the free course as it pertains to the worship genera and whether it might be as useful as what I find this particular bit to be. Reinventing my playing seems to be a daunting task but I long to serve with what gifts I have. Thank in advance for any help.

[Meshuggapeth]

I knew about voice leading, and I knew about the CAGED shapes. Now I can apply them together for my own purposes. Thank you!

[KarlSharicz]

I found this lesson inspiring and informative and it has broadened my perspective on playing chords in a unique way. And, as a few have pointed out, using these suggested chord voicings is dependent on the context of the song. I don't think Antoine really meant to say, as his title suggests, that you should play chords just one way and not any other way. He was just offering up some alternatives to consider. Anyway, that's the way I look at it. There's nothing within this lesson to agree or disagree with. I just took it as a musical idea to play around with and consider using at times. Nothing more. For that, I commend Antoine for an inspiring video.

[Maltloaflegrande]

If you look at traditional English church music, the four parts rarely move in a particularly correlated way; they interweave, often collide for a note here and there, and even sometimes cross over. Alto parts often have the same note consecutively when the soprano (melody) line changes its note and then the opposite happens. David Crosby understands this which is why he enjoys singing the middle part between Nash and Stills where he can introduce movement separate from the melody.

[callawaycass]

I've been doing stuff like this for years! The other thing about the C shaped barre chord is that it is a close voicings (that is, the main triad is in order and in the same octave.) I usually make the G a close voicing by adding the 3rd on the A string as well.

Thank you for trying to break this down for people! To those that think this is nonsense, just try it. Experiment with trying to play a chord in as many different ways as you can. You will soon realize the melodic power this unlocks in rhythm playing and especially chord-melody playing.

One particular voicing I liked for a I-V is to play an E shape barre then a C shape. For example, B to F# can be played with E shape at 7th fret followed by C shape at 6th fret (root note on 9th fret of A string.)

[TheCitizenmax]

Essentially, you're playing a variety of moveable chord shapes rather than just root 5 and root 6, so it resembles how you'd play a song which uses only open chords. Like others here, I don't see that that this necessarily makes it sound better but it's certainly good to increase your chord vocabulary and options.

[iamroberty]

This is how I've played for 20 years because I'm too lazy to play full barre chords. It makes it really easy to transition back and forth between lead and rhythm too.

[ircro]

If you have short fingers like me, just ditch the low note. That's why you have bass player in the band

[tommyhugh]

It's strange that I taught myself this method years ago out of the struggle of trying to be a better musician. Thanks for the confirmation of this video.👍👍👍

[timshelfer]

His Bb and Eb chord shapes are quite useful in fingerstyle acoustic guitar, which I play. Regardless of key, those chord shapes position you nicely to find the pentatonic notes & play melodies within the chord.

[truescotsman]

For me doing full barre chords is about how you strum them. If you use lighter picking pressure and an even stroke with the right amount of left hand finger pressure you can make them sound much more subtle and "musical".

[pw]

Efficiency of finger movement is one thing, but it results in a different style of sound, which is pure preference. Play the chord inversions which give you the sound you like best. I'm not convinced there's any such thing as 'bad' voice leading.

[astrodadmusic]

It’s fair to say this approach would apply only to certain styles or genres of music. The standard barre chord approach is what helps punk rock sound the way it does.