Chapter 13:
Color chords
About color chords
To increase tension, add “color” and express a range of emotion, diatonic chords of Western harmony can be enriched by adding one or more tones from outside the chord.
This leads to a bewildering variety of guitar chords that can seem endless, disorganized, and confusing. And there really are quite a lot of wonderful chord voicings and grips to be explored.
But all of these chords can be organized into a few families, and clarified by understanding a few conventions of chord naming and construction.
Chord families
Color chords can be grouped into three main families: major, minor, and dominant.
- major chords have a major third and a major seventh.
- minor chords have a minor third and a minor seventh.
- dominant chords have a major third and a minor seventh.
Suspended chords are neither major nor minor, so they fit into both families.
Color chords can be used in a progression to replace any chord from the same family (ex. C major could be replaced by C6 or Cadd9, C7 could be replaced by C13 or C7#9, etc.).
Understanding chord names
Chord names follow a basic convention.
- add: a non-chord tone added to a major or minor chord. Ex. Cadd9
- 6: Shorthand for “add6”. Ex. C6 or Cm6 (aka “Cadd6” and “Cm add6”)
- 7,9,11,13: An “extended” dominant seventh chord, with additional thirds stacked up to the given interval. Ex. C13 is technically
R-3-5-b7-2-4-6(akaR-3-5-b7-9-11-13), but in practice some of the inner notes are usually left out. - 7 #/b 5,9,11,13: A dominant seventh chord with the given tones altered as specified.
Compound intervals
Chord intervals bigger than 7 indicate compound intervals, an octave above the simple interval.
In order to focus on how the chord tones fit together in the overall harmony, rather than on what they are named, it can be useful to think of compound intervals as reduced to their simple intervals, ex. “2” rather than “9”.
- 9 is an octave above 2
- 11 is an octave above 4
- 13 is an octave above 6
Chords in this chapter
This chapter does not include a comprehensive list of chords and voicings.
Rather, it’s a curated list aiming to include the most common chord grips for some of the most common chords.
Major chords
6th
add9
add11
6add9
6add9 chords are also known as “6/9” chords.
Minor chords
Minor 6th
Minor 9th
Minor 11th
Suspended chords
Suspended chords contain no third interval, so they are considered neither major nor minor, and can be substituted for chords of either quality.
These chords are often created as side effects of a melody line, or in short riffs and flourishes.
sus2
sus4
Dominant chords
Dominant 9th
Dominant 13th
Altered dominants
7b5 (aka 7#11)
7#9 (aka Hendrix chord)
The 7#9 chord is also called the “Hendrix chord”, because it was favored by Jimi Hendrix.
7b13 (aka 7#5)
7b5b9
These chords are often played without the root note.
7b5#9
These chords are often played without the root note.
7#5b9
These chords are often played without the root note.
7#5#9
These chords are often played without the root note.
