How to Play Triads on Guitar - String Set 123

hi uh in this video we're going to go over how to play the four major kinds of triads on string set one two three of the guitar and so what that means is we're going to use strings 1 2 and 3 of the guitar to play major minor diminished and augmented triads so let's begin so as you can see on the screen i've got the wrong slide up here let me change that we're going to start with root position triads so as you can see on the screen we've got the four different kinds of triads in root position and so they each have their own unique shape but they're all related too and so i want to show you the relationship between how they're related and how to apply them on the fretboard so let's just go over how to play them so we're going to just use c as an example so we're going to play c major c minor c diminished and c augmented so the way you begin is put your third finger your ring finger on the fifth fret of string number three that's the note c this is the root of the chord now with finger number four your pinky finger on string number two of the fifth fret you're going to play the third of the chord which is the note e on string number one you're going to use your first finger and put and push on fret number three that's the fifth of the chord that's the note g so when you play them all at once you get a c major triad it's spelled c e g the c is the root the e is the third and the root is the fifth now if we want to change this major triad to c minor all we have to do is lower the middle note on string number two by a half step and so the way you do that is you push down with your second finger on fret number four of string number two and then you let go of your pinky finger and so what that does is it lowers e to e flat so you go from here e to e flat and so now when you play the notes together you get a c minor triad good so the only difference is that one note okay let's change this c minor triad into a c diminished triad so currently we have root minor third and fifth now to make it a diminished triad we need root minor third and flat fifth or diminished fifth so the way you do that is by lowering the fifth so we take this note and lower it by one half step now you we're going to use a different fingering to play it so it's going to be fourth finger on fret number five of string number three then third finger on fret number four string number two and first finger on fret number two string number one so you can see now we have root minor third flat flat five and that will give us our diminished triad okay let's move back to c major back to one uh root three five now if we raise the fifth which is this node g if we raise it to g sharp we get an augmented triad so the way you play that is third finger on c fifth fret of the third string pinky finger on fret five of string two and then second finger on fret four of string one and you have root three sharp five good you can also play it like this using fingering two three one that's also helpful good so those are the four different kinds of root position triads on string set one two three four now if we apply these to a major scale here's how that works so the first note of the major scale is c and the chord that you get uh the try that you get on a on uh starting on c is c major [Music] now the next chord is d majors which is a whole step away so what you want to do is take this shape and move it a whole step up which is two frets stop there and then you want to use the minor shape so put your second finger down on fret number six string number two and lift that pinky up and that gives you the minor shape so now you have d minor so if you play c major to d minor it sounds like this [Music] now the the next chord is going to be e minor that is a whole step away from d minor so all i have to do is move this shape up two frets one two because it's also a minor chord i don't have to change the fingering or anything at all so now let's go c major d minor e minor [Music] now the next chord is f major so that's just a half step away so just go up a half step put your pinky down lift that second finger so now you're back to the major shape [Music] the next chord is g major which is a whole step whole step away so just go up two frets keep the same shape and you get g major so when you put that all together you [Music] get [Music] okay now let's descend so if uh if we go below the root we're gonna get to the seventh degree of the scale which is uh b and so the triad that's built on b is b diminished so we're here on c let's go down a half step so that our third finger is now on the note b now we just have to apply the diminished shape so the way we're going to play that is fourth finger on the fourth fret of string number three second finger excuse me third finger on the third fret of string number two and then our first finger on fret number one of string number one so the middle finger is not being used [Music] and that will give us our diminished triad so from c to b diminished and then we can go down to a minor right here which uh uses an open string but you can kind of see the minor shape right there if we were to pretend that's a fret you can see the shape there and so that gives us all the triads in uh the key of c major so if i were to kind of play them all in a row we'll start as low as we can play a minor b diminished c major d minor e minor f major g major a minor and so on all right let's move on to first inversion chords so uh first inversion simply means that the third of the chord is the lowest note that we hear and so now the order of the notes will always be third root excuse me third fifth root and so let's do uh we'll use uh c chords again so we'll do c major c minor c diminished and c augmented in first inversion and so what we need to do um is we need to find the third of c on the g string so the c chord is built c e g so that means a first inversion c is going to be built or spelled e g c so we need to find e on string number three so e on string number three is going to be at the ninth fret put your second finger on the ninth fret of string number three that's the note e now g is going to be first finger on the eighth fret of string number two and then c is also on the eighth fret of string number one and you're going to use what's called a bar to play two notes with one finger [Music] so that's our c major and first inversion now if we want to make this a minor chord all we have to do is lower the third so there's the third if we lower it by lifting up our second finger and using our first finger to play all the notes across fret number eight we get a c minor chord so from c major to c minor now if we want to play c diminished we take the note on string number two which is g that's the fifth of the chord and we want to lower it by a half step so this note needs to go here so the way we're going to play that chord is second finger on string number three fret number eight first finger on fret number seven of string number two and then third finger on fret number eight of string number one all right let's go back to our major triad [Music] now if we want to play an augmented triad all we have to do is raise the fifth so the fifth remember is that middle voice it's on string number two so to raise it simply put your third finger uh on fret number nine of string number two so that's played e g sharp c so you've got finger number two on fret number nine of the third string then finger number three on fret number nine of the second string and then finger number one on fret eight of the first string and you'll notice that this shape is the same shape as the root position [Music] so all the augmented triads will have the same shape good now we can play our c major scale using all these shapes these first inversion shapes to play a c major scale so what we want to do is we want to start on c and we want to try and see the roots of the chords on the top string so this is the note c so that means if we want to play d minor the two chord we need to go up a whole step so that our finger first finger is on the note d and then we need to lower the third so we get our minor shape using a bar or uh fingers two three four there's two ways to do it yeah now the third chord is also minor that's e minor so that's a whole step away all you have to do is raise this two frets [Music] and back down and then back down to c so let's keep going descending so now we need to play b diminished because that's the chord that's built on the seventh degree of the scale so that's a half step below so go a half step so now we are more or less in the right spot that's the note we need to apply the shape to so we have to lower the third and then lower the fifth that gives us our b diminished chord now below this is the sixth chord a minor chord so a we need to go down two frets so now our third finger is on a [Music] but we need to raise the fifth back up so we get our minor shape and then next keep going uh descending would be g major so go two frets down this uh gets us in the right position and then we have to change the shape to make it g major if we go down again we'll be on the chord f major which is also a major chord so we don't have to change the shape all we have to do is move it down two frets [Music] and then we come back up to g to a minor to be diminished and to see so all together it sounds like this [Music] good all right let's move on to second inversion chords so triads in second inversion means that the fifth of the chord is the lowest note so you can see there in the shapes the chords are all spelled five root three so now the root of the chord is going to fall on string number two every time so for this one we're gonna work with the the chord f uh because it falls uh in the middle of the guitar and it's easy to see that way so an f chord is spelled f a c so if we're going to play an f chord in sec second and version it's going to be spelled c f a so um we already have learned where the note c is so that's where we're going to start so to play f major and second inversion or any major and second version we're going to use this shape listed here so to play that put your first finger on fret number five of string three that's the note c now put your third finger on fret number six of string two that's the note f and then put your third finger on fret number five of string one that's the note a so we've got five root 3 or c f a it kind of has this little triangle shape if you can see that good now let's make this chord minor so the way we make it minor is we take the third of the chord which is here on string number one and we lower it by a half step keeping everything else the same so then it looks like this the way you play that chord f minor second finger on fret number five string number one fourth finger on fret number six string number two and first finger on fret number four string number one and that gives you the minor chord but it's important that you see even though there's a lot of changing happening only one note is changing that top note is being lowered by half step so now we have the fifth the root and the minor third let's now change this into a diminished triad so we need to lower the fifth so remember the fifth is on string number three so to lower it what we're going to do is we're going to use a bar across fret number four so you can have first finger on fret number four in this barring position your fourth finger on fret number six of string number two and then your first finger is also playing fret number four of string number one so that becomes f diminished so this shows uh yeah how to play that diminished shape in second version all right let's move back to f major now to play f augmented all we need to do is raise the fifth so remember the fifth is the lowest note so we're going to raise it by using our second finger to play fret number six of string three use your third finger to play fret number six of string two and your first finger to play fret number five of string one so you have sharp five root major third and again you might take notice that it's the same shape the augmented shapes are always the same all right let's play a major scale with triads in second inversion so we're going to go back to c major to keep it consistent here so if we take this major shape this is f and we move it all the way down here so we have open g first finger on c and open e and you can see it remember if we pretend we have frets uh below the nut of the guitar you see how it would still follow that same shape so [Music] now let's uh ascend through the scale so this is c major with the root on string number two so the next chord is d minor so we want to go up two frets and then we want to lower the third which is the top note and that gives us our d minor shape the next chord is e minor so it's the same kind of chord so it's going to have the same kind of shape so all we have to do is raise this two frets now our pinky is on the note e and we're playing the minor shape so we have e minor now we'll go up a half step to f so our pinky is now an f and so we can change the shape now by rearranging our fingers so then our the fingering is 1 3 2 for the f chord so all together that sounds like this the next chord is g major so it's going to have the same shape simply move up two frets [Music] the next chord is a minor which is a whole step away so move up two frets and change the shape to minor [Music] b diminished is a whole step away so move up two frets so our pinky is now on b but we have to lower the fifth here so we're going to use a bar and then because we're high like this it becomes a little bit easier to use our third finger on b [Music] to play it properly and then that brings us back to c major um at the octave so all together that sounds like this d minor let's start over again c major d minor e minor f major g major a minor b diminished and then c major back down b diminished a minor g major f major e minor d minor c major nice so those are major minor diminished and augmented triads in root position first inversion second inversion now to practice these i recommend doing the major scales like i just did you can also just kind of cycle through the different inversions so for example you could play c in second inversion then to root position and then to first inversion [Music] so you're playing the same chord in different places on the guitar using all those shapes uh let's do another one how about d minor so d minor there's your second inversion d minor and i'm just trying to start as low as possible so i find the lowest d minor and then work my way up [Music] let's do e minor so e minor would be all the open strings that would give us our e minor e minor second inversion root position [Music] uh first inversion and so on you can continue f [Music] g a minor be diminished then you're back to c [Music] all right i hope that helps this is uh really important stuff for guitarists to know um it really is uh game changing as a guitar player to understand this so that you have full command of your instrument you know where all the notes are you know uh how the intervals are arranged how to change from one chord to another so definitely take the time to work on this and i'll see you in the next video you

Channel: Gary's Guitar Tips

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Id: T_s7KWAKEZU

Length: 26min 42sec (1602 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 05 2021