Originally published at: ʻUkulele Chord Shapes Ebook and Baritone ʻUkulele Chord Shapes. Comments on this thread will cross-post there.
Discussion for critically-aclaimed chord reference book, ʻUkulele Chord Shapes. Ask questions and share your experiences.
Tell me what you think! Got any questions?
When I first got this ebook I was not proficient enough with the fretboard to get very far into it before I was completely overwhelmed. However now that I have spent a great deal of time and effort learning the fretboard, and a bit about music theory the concepts in the chord shapes ebook make perfect sense. Rather than learning over 1000 chords by name, most of which you will never use or need, I now understand some of the ‘movable chord shapes’ and knowing where the root of the chord is. Understanding how a chord is constructed and what notes make up a scale or a chord has been so helpful in finding alternate voicings without having to constantly look up every chord. This ebook does take some time to fully appreciate its value. Without this book, I doubt that I would ever be able to figure out the fingering of a Ebmin7 or a 5th position F Major.
Hello Brad, long time no see. Bought both eBooks and the printed GCEA. Great books to learn the nuances of how chords morph just by moving them up the next. Well laid out. Expect a few more orders down the line if I pick up teaching Baritone again.
Right on, Moses! Sent your book out on Wednesday. Glad you find it easy to use.
Among the major seventh chord shapes, why is the diagonal “ladder” shape not included, e.g. 5432 for Cmaj7?
Did you run out of space, @bradbordessa? Did you accidentally leave it out?
Is it an ergonomically unsound shape for the hand?
Does reentrant tuning make it too dissonant by placing the root immediately above the major seventh?
I can no longer answer that last question for myself, because I removed the G string from what used to be my high-G uke. Greg Schultz and Daniel Ho have recently gotten me all fired up about playing with only three strings. I find that, at least when the fifth is omitted, placing the seventh and the root only a half step from each other produces a very sour chord. Does the fifth prevent this?