Music Theory: Chords 1-7 (Major and Minor)

As complicated as music can seem at times, it pays to remember that there’s only 7 musical notes. 7 to a key and 7 to a scale.

Once you venture outside of the C Major and A Minor keys, sharps and flats are introduced, but don’t worry about that for now. The rule of 7’s still applies.

In this post I’m going to cover the notes of both the aforementioned keys, how each of the notes correspond to individual chords, and how to break the system down into an easily digestible format…

Chords- C Major and C minor 1-7 (I-VII)

The order of chords in the Major and Minor key is commonly represented by roman numerals. Going 1-7, they are:

I - II - III - IV - V - VI - VII

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

If you’re unfamiliar with roman numerals, just familiarise yourself with numbers 1-7 above, each one corresponds to the number below it. I’ve put it all together in a diagram above to help you make sense of it, but we’ll stick to focusing in the individual elements for now. Later on we'll introduce chords 1-7 in the relative Minor key (A Minor) and you can get a feel for how each of the chord shapes interact..

Now this might sound like a fairly obvious statement, but as with many obvious tips it tends to hide in plain sight for many of us: The 1-7 system is how chord progressions are built. Whether you know what you're playing or not, you're still subconsciously employing it.

If you've ever heard somebody talk about a '1-4-5' for example, this is what they're referring to. Many of the most effective chord progressions in music have become known by their corresponding numerals.

Two of the most popular progressions are the 1-4-5 (popular in blues) and the 2-5-1 (popular in jazz). There are really too many to count, so we'll stick with these two for now. keep them in mind and I'll introduce them in exercise form later on.

The C Major Scale (I-VII in C Major)

As usual, we’ll start in C Major, the notes of which are:

C D E F G A B C

Each of the notes in the scale acts as a root note for each chord in the sequence. The order of the chords is as follows:

Major, Minor, Minor, Major, Major, Minor, Diminished

Exercise 1

I’ve provided 2 diagrams below. One illustrates how to play the 7 chord shapes starting from the E string- D String, the other from the A string.

Both the Minor and Major chord progressions utilise several Major chords, several Minor chords, and a single diminished chord.

Chords I-VII (C Major) (From the E String- A String- D String)

Chords I-VII (C Major) (From the A String)

Now to finish, play a 1-4-5, and the a 2-5-1 progression once through from both positions. If you get lost, just double check which chord you should use. Be patient and take your time, it may take a little while to get the shapes under your fingers first, but you'll get it...

Edit: There's a slight oversight in the A-string diagrams. I've used the standard Major and Minor chord shapes in place of there 7th chord equivalents. Just remember that you can easily swap out the standard shapes for the 7th equivalent when following these examples, as long as you keep the order of chords Major and Minor as they apply to the order. You can also swap the Diminished shape out for a minor chord shape.

I've provided an example for switching out the Major chord shapes below. If you want to do the same thing with minor, just apply the same principle to the two different shapes and you're good to go...

The C Minor Scale (I-VII in C Minor)

While the order of chords is different from the Major, the structure is very similar. I’ve provided some more diagrams below which show you how to play each shape in sequence, starting from the E or A strings.

Exercise 2

Play the C Major scale, starting at the 8th fret on the E string (C), play through the E string- A String- D string positions, and then work out the same root notes of the scale across only the A String.

Play the root notes of the C Major scale using only the A String, starting at the 3rd fret (C). Each root note acts as the first note of each of the 7 chords. If you get lost, just check the diagrams for guidance (I’ve put the fret numbers in too).

Chords I-VII (C Minor) (From the E String- A String- D String)

Chords I-VII (C Minor) (From the A String)

Now play the 1-4-5 and 2-5-1 progressions through using the C Minor shapes. The order of shape/ chords in the Minor key is slightly different to the Major, so try to to confuse them.

Exercise 3

Use the same system as before: Play the A minor scale, starting at the 5th fret on the A string (A), play through the E string- A String- D string positions, and then work out the same root notes of the scale across only the A String.

Conclusion

So that’s it! You now know all the Minor and Major shapes for chords 1-7. Great work. Now to practice them…

Play though all of the shapes until you’ve gotten them under your fingers. Play through chords I-VII from the E String- D String positions, and then the A string positions. Repeat this until you know each shape off by heart.

Exercise 3

If you've read my post on pentatonics, you might remember that each and every Major and Minor Key has it's enharmonic equivalent key. Since you now know each of the chords in C Major and C Minor, here's shapes I-VII in A minor (and C Major again, just below).

I've also included a diagram of the A Minor and C Major pentatonics connected (the starting positions for both scales are again coloured red). Each of the notes in both scales act as a root note for each chord shape.

Time to take your chord knowhow a step further: Play each of the 7 chord shapes in both keys and notice how they connect up. Instead of just playing each of the chords in either key, start on the E string, and play through each of the shapes, moving from A minor through to C Major. Repeat this process again on the A string, and then the D string.

If you get lost, check the diagram above again and make sure you know where each of the root notes lie.

This exercise will help to give you a more complete knowledge of the relationship between the different chords and keys, and give you a more flexible chord vocabulary.

Great work!