C major scale has no Sharp or Flat notes so it the easiest scale to remember. C D E F G A B
E Major scale has 4 sharp notes E F# G# A B C# D#
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Iāve been spending some time getting familar with these shapes and swapping between A, E, C and D shape chords (Iām not bothering much with G shape). However apart from the general benefit of teaching my fingers new positions, Iām not sure how beneficial it is to learn the C D and G shapes, rather than sticking with E and A shapes plus open chords. I can see that if I get very slick at the changes it will be quicker to move between chords because I can stay on the same part of the neck rather than having to move up and down it. But is that it? Itās going to take quite a bit of practice time for me to get that fast with the changes.
Late reply time ā¦
At a guess, for playing full chords I would say that 90% of barre chord play is E-shape and A-shape with the C-shape will accounting for about 9% - often as a partial on strings 1-4 only. The D and G shapes are seldom used in full, if used they will also be played as partial shapes on a small group of strings only.
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Thanks @Richard_close2u , thatās very helpful. Iāve got the C shape āunder my fingersā now for the occasional song in which it features (intro to Under the Bridge is the one that Iāve come across) and the D shape with an additional 3rd on the low E string because it sounds nice, but I doubt I will ever use anything but E and A shape barre chords for writing.
Greetings from Montreal - I have a guitar over here and iām practicing diligently. Progress slow but steady! See you in a few weeks.
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Glad itās helpful @john90
Enjoy Canada, see you in a bit.
Who among us has not struggled to tame the C-A-G-E-D Beast?
What are positions (or is it patterns)? Iām not seeing the shapes. Why is position 1 also pattern E also the Ionian mode? Recognize and feel the chord underneath the scale or arpeggio? Find all the root notes all over the neck and know what shape to play? Itās all too much!
Then, one day or maybe over several, you find yourself moving seamlessly from one position to the next. Your fingers start to know where to land to make play the notes on the page or in your mind. The shapes are becoming hard-wired. Youāre making music!
Justin has solid lessons on CAGED, but I came across this well designed tutorial on a jazz guitar website that really helped me tame the CAGED Beast! Well worth a read.
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Iām a little stuck with this myself. Is it the CAGED system reliant not just on knowing the rules for moving up the strings, but on also knowing the theory for what notes are in each key?
The basic rules are stated: move the fingers down a string (in other circumstances would we say up, aligning by pitch?), move anything on the B string up one fret, and anything that falls off the end is erasedā¦ But in order to use all the strings Justin plays A over E, and the D chord gets the F# added just because E is not in the chord (so theory rather than system of moveable shape). Adding these low notes onto the shape then get moved along for the next chord, so they are a vital step.
Moving from D to G again involves adding a note to the low E, which again is theory-based and not to do with the moveable shape. If it werenāt explicitly stated that we āadd the bass for this chordā my ignorant guess would have been that the notes that fall of the high e string get put on the low E one fret along.
The B string gets moved along one like usual, but to make the system work for the next shape it just gets reset to an open B, although that shape would still have worked when moving down a string to make the C chord, since a C chord is CEG.
So I guess my question is: is there a rule to the added bass notes that has to do with the shape, outside of key theory, which I have not picked up on? And is the seemingly arbitrary removal of certain string positions (eg the removal of the high D in the G chord) also based on a shape rule?
[I have removed the next part of my confusion, pertaining to moving notes up on the B string. It seemed inconsistent whether it was moving the note along one fret, or moving the finger along one fret - the movement of C to F was bewildering to me with regards to that. But Iāve realised itās *move the note along one fret **after** youāve moved your shape down and seen how it lands*. Iām leaving this realisation in my question in case it helps someone else, or until I get told itās wrong, in which case Iāll just delete this paragraph. (I only realised upon typing out the inconsistencies I had found and rewatching several times trying to answer my own question before posting.)]
I have yet to watch the rest of the lessons, so if this is covered in those, please let me know. Iāve erred on the side of asking instead of waiting out the whole course, again because it may address questions somebody else has.
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For me, the CAGED system is simply a way of dividing up the neck using the CAGE and D chord shapes (barred). Easier to consider when beginning with the open C chord. I know the root note (C) is on the 2nd string 3rd fret and on string 5 1st fret. The 5th of a chord is one string lower than the root, and the 4th, one string higher (string 3 being the exception due to tuning). 3ārds and 4āths are next to each other. So R35 gives us the triads up and down the strings. Following with the A barre chord āshapeā now places the root note C on string 3. The 5th sitting on string 4 and the 3rd on string 2. Continuing the process with G barre, E barre and D barrre shapes shows the remaining C chords along the neck. Knowing the 5th and 4 are above and below makes it easy to determine chord shapes.
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I believe you have your string numbers backwards. The C is on the 5th string 3rd fret, counting from the thinnest string, which is 1.
But pointing out that the 5th in a 1-3-5 chord is always one string above the root, and the 4th is one string below (then just slide over to get the 3rd) blew my mind! Great tip!
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Hi Justin, good pickup, youāre correct. I hope I havenāt confused too many people.
I should have looked more closely at the diagram I added as it shows a D chord using the C shape. I assumed it was a C and on the 3rd fret.
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Worth noting too that each position of the caged shape encompasses two triads making it easier to find the triad inversions of each chord.
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