Guitar chords high on the neck

Question

Apologies, this is an incredibly vague question, but any help would be appreciated.

When watching skilled acoustic guitar players, I regularly see them playing chords high on the guitar neck (ie around the 5-8th frets). I'm still pretty new, and looking at various chord charts I haven't found any fingerings in that range.

For clarity's sake, these aren't bar chords (at least not any that I recognize) and they're not using a capo. Does anyone have any ideas on where I can find out how to play chords like this?

Answer 1

There are three kinds of chord you can play high on the neck.

Barre chords: You mention these in your question, but I mention it for completeness.

  %5/1.5/1.7/3.7/4.6/2.5/1

In this example you barre across the 5th fret, and use fingers 2,3,4 to form the rest of the chord shape.

Chords containing both high fretted notes, and open strings

  %0/1.7/2.7/3.6/1.0/2.0/1

In this example you play open E, B, E strings, while fretting notes on the others, on the 6th and 7th frets. It can result in some full, complex chords.

Chords in which some strings are not played

 %X/X.X/X.7/2.7/3.6/1.X/X

In this example, the E,A,E strings are not played, and a triad is played on the remaining three strings. Of course, if you finger a 6-note chord, you can strum wildly, but when you play a chord like this one, you need more precision. You can either suppress the unwanted strings with various muting techniques, or you can just make sure you don't pluck/pick those strings.

Most guitar parts more sophisticated than strum-the-chords, involve playing chords of fewer than 6 notes, most of the time.

---

There are lots of ways you can construct 2-3 note chords.

One way is to shift shapes you already know, up the neck. For example, a "D major shape"

%X/X.0/0.0/0.2/1.3/3.2/2

Don't play the open strings, and move this up 2 frets, it's an E. 1 more fret, it's an F. 2 more frets, it's a G:

%X/X.X/X.X/X.7/1.8/3.7/2

Try playing that shape, then the G chord you already know, to see how they sound harmonically alike.

This means that you could play chords for any song, using just the D major and D minor shapes, at various positions on the neck. Try it!

You can do this with all the shapes you know.

Another way is to imagine a barre shape for the chord you want to play, choose the strings you want to play, and make a simpler fingering that only frets those strings.

Yet another way is to get familiar with intervals. For any root note, you can work out (and, with experience, instinctively know) where the fifths and the thirds are, on the nearby strings. Then you can construct a chord out of any combination of those.

Or, you can simply learn the note name of every position on the fretboard, and the note names that make up every chord, and use that knowledge to construct chords. For example, C minor is made up of C, Eb, G. If you know where all of those are on a fretboard, you can make up the chord.

Different people prefer different ways of thinking. I prefer thinking in terms of intervals (F minor is "F, 3 semitones up from F, 7 semitones up from F"), whereas some people prefer thinking in terms of absolute notes ("F minor is F, Ab, C"). Find your own preference.

Finally, don't be afraid of just trying shapes to see how they sound. If it sounds good, it is good.

Answer 2

They are chords like any others, but they aren't the two bar chords you have learned. Don't get intimidated though... There are not very many chords to learn at all.

I think this exercise will appropriately blow your mind given your level: Take a C major chord (C, E, G) and draw every single C, E, and G on the fretboard. Now circle anything that is close together and can be played with your fretting hand at the same time. There's your chord.

See if you can find the two barre chords you have learned.

This picture should give you the right idea - http://vincelauriamusic.com/blog/assets_c/2012/12/C%20major%20Pentatonic%20Scale-thumb-500x224-113.png

Answer 3

It would be helpful for you to start learning the names of the notes and their positions on the fingerboard, and think less about chord shapes from a chord chart. For instance, you know the F chord? It starts with the note F on the third fret of the fourth string, and then goes up a major third, then the fifth, then the octave. If you move the entire fingering two frets higher, the lowest note, on the fifth fret of the fourth string, is G, and then up a third, then the fifth, then the octave. That's not in your chord charts in your book, but it's another way to play a G chord. Now move the same fingering up two more frets, and that's an A chord. Are you getting the hang of it? Move the same fingering up two more frets, and that's a B chord.

In other words, don't concentrate on memorizing shapes from fingering diagrams. When you do that, you aren't really learning how the music works. Rather, learn how to spell the notes in the chords. Find the root note and figure out how to play the chord you want from spelling out the intervals between the pitches, and the fingering and the shape will come from that. Learn how to recognize and play intervals above your root note; major and minor third, fourth and fifth, seventh and octave. This way you'll learn how to make chords anywhere on the neck without having to resort to a book with chord fingering diagrams, which is a crutch. These guitar-chord-shape-diagram books are very popular, but I believe using that approach is counterproductive.

Answer 4

First thing to know is that a chord shape in one place is the same chord 12 frets up. Second thing is, you don't have to play all six strings when you play a chord. You just need three notes, and you can often get away with two. (Strictly speaking, that's an interval, not a chord, but if it sounds good, that's fine.)

There's more fun stuff, like inversions, but if you start playing around with those two points, you'll open up your playing.

Answer 5

One common thing I've seen (and do myself) is that if you play an A shape on the 7th fret, it's an E (frets = 07999x) . Leave the lowest open E string open, and play all 5 strings bar the highest one (normally it's too tricky to leave un-muted). You get a great, huge sound.

Because you're playing an A shape, a lot of familiar patterns emerge as well and there are a lot of nice licks etc to be played around that area while letting the E string ring. Also, around the 7th/9th fret you have the advantage that there is a kind of "sweet spot" of resonance in the string while still easy to play (frets haven't got so small up the neck yet). Or at least there is on my guitars (electeic & acoustic), so I assume all/most others behave similarly.

Answer 6

Try the book "Joe Pass Guitar Chords" by jazz guitarist Joe Pass. A teacher recomended it to me and it has a wealth of chord shapes all over the neck - well worth exploring. A quick search on google should find it and it's not expensive. Good luck!

Answer 7

I'd definitely recommend MaxRunFast's suggestion:

I think this exercise will appropriately blow your mind given your level: Take a C major chord (C, E, G) and draw every single C, E, and G on the fretboard. Now circle anything that is close together and can be played with your fretting hand at the same time. There's your chord.

To specifically answer the part of your question:

Does anyone have any ideas on where I can find out how to play chords like this?

There are several chord dictionaries online where you can find out how to play any standard chord higher up on the fretboard.

For instance, if we wanted to find all the places to play a Gmaj chord between frets 5 and 8, we could do something like this: http://songwritingtheory.com/bazzle/Gmaj/tab-using-frets-5-to-8/guitar

Then of course we could expand it to show us all the Gmaj tab from frets 3 to 14, for example: http://songwritingtheory.com/bazzle/Gmaj/tab-using-frets-3-to-14/guitar

I hope that helps!

(Full disclosure: I created the linked tool).