Learn How to Create Moods Using Different Guitar Chord Types and Guitar Chord Sounds

Today we are going to learn how to use guitar chord sounds to create different moods and textures with the guitar. One of the first things we usually learn about chords is that major chords tend to sound “bright and happy” and that minor chords tend to sound “dark and sad.” The basic major and minor guitar chord sounds are going to be our basis for creating more interesting sounding chords and chord progressions.

We can take simple open guitar chord types for major and minor chords to add to their sound. This is very simple to do—in most cases it involves adding or subtracting a finger or two from the simple major and minor chords you may already know.

Let’s look at the Em chord:

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We can add notes to the simple Em chord to create variations. If we add the F# note on the second fret of the first string, we now have an Em9:

Em9

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Play the Em followed by the Em9. How does adding the F# note change the sound? Hear the difference that adding a note makes to the guitar chord sound?

We can also change the sound of the Em chord by adding the D note on the third fret of the second string to create an Em7 chord:

Em7

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Notice how both of these guitar chord types retain the overall sound of the Em chord and add further sound “color” to the guitar chord sounds? This gives us two simple options to modify the sound of the Em chord that are easy to play and remember.

Now let’s look at some ways we can modify a simple C major chord. Here it is:

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If we lift the index finger, we get a C major 7 chord:

Cmaj7

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Changing the C major chord to a C major 7 really changes the sound of the chord. It changes from the “bright” major sound to a bit more “dark.” Major guitar chord sounds become darker when we change them to major 7 chords.

We can hear the effects of changing these chords by creating a chord progression using the ordinary major and minor chords and using the variations in the guitar chord types we just learned. Play the following chord progression—strum each chord 4 times and end with a single strum on the Em chord:

| Em / / / | C / / / | Em / / / | C / / / | Em

Now let’s change the guitar chord types. Change the Em to an Em9 and the C to a Cmaj7:

| Em9 / / / | Cmaj7 / / / | Em9 / / / | Cmaj7 / / / | Em9

Quite a difference in the sound. You can still hear the underlying Em and C major chords, but the new progression is much more “emotional” sounding.

Let’s look at two more chords we can modify. We will start with the A major and D major chords:

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And modify these guitar chord sounds by changing them both to major 7 chords, like this:

Amaj7

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Dmaj7

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Once again, by changing the guitar chord types from major to major 7 chords we have changed the sound of the chords while still keeping the original letter names of the chords intact.

The best way to become familiar with different guitar chord types and their guitar chord sounds is to experiment with them on your own. There are many variations for almost every chord. Learning to use these simple chord modifications will add a new dimension to your guitar chord sounds and help you break out of just playing ordinary major and minor chords all the time.

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