Major 7th Chords

Music Theory Quadad Chord Theory (4 Note Chords)
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You've encountered Major 7th Chords before - but what does that 7 actually mean?


View the full lesson at Major 7th Chords | JustinGuitar

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I started Justin’s Practical Music Theory book a while ago and I’m in grade 4 of the theory course, but I started to dip into quadads already.

I’ve been playing around with major 7, dominant 7 and minor 7 chords, and something occurred to me with which I’d need your help. The chord formulas are the following:

Major 7: 1, 3, 5, 7 – e.g. A maj 7: A, C#, E, G#
Minor 7: 1, b3, 5, b7 – e.g. A min 7: A, C, E, G
A (dominant) 7: 1, 3, 5, b7 – e.g. A7: A, C#, E, G

Here comes my dilemma: what if I flatten only the 3rd of the major 7? It sounds somewhat weird, but what would that chord (1, b3, 5, 7) be called when minor 7 is already used for a different type?

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From my understanding it would be a minMaj7 chord. ie. a minor triad with a major 7.

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Shane just plumbed it into to SmartChord and it does show an Ammaj7. Yeah and a whole host of slash chords, How you playing it x02110 ? Never heard of that before but just hit PMT 4.2 this afternoon.
:sunglasses:

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MinorMajor7 is a fairly well known chord for folks who push beyond the usual every-day path.

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Yes, x02110 would be it. It seems to be a case similar to when we use parentheses in mathematics then :smiley: like minor(major 7).

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Thank you. Sometimes it feels good to take a little detour off the beaten track. :slight_smile:

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It sound interesting in theory, getting late but will have a little dabble with this tomorrow!
:sunglasses:

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Does it fall into any particular genre or used generally across the board ? Not something I’ve encountered before.

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Toby
Check Justin’s lesson on Rocking Around The Christmas Tree - at 3 minutes.
There is a sequence
Fm, Fminmaj7, Fmin7 Fmin6
He references jazz, rockabilly The Beatles song Michelle.

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Ok my non audible brain, suggests that would sound like a form of walkdown, looking at the chord sequence. One to pursue with hands and ears.
:sunglasses:

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Just wanted to note the existence of the C shaped maj7 chord. It might come up in another lesson and I imagine it’s used a lot less which is why it wasn’t in this lesson but it’s a shape I really like when it comes to that maj7 sound.

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Welcome to the community @Noa1
Cmaj7 is a lovely chord.
In C shape it is easy at the open position.
It can be playedxasca barre across three strings to make it a movable shape too.

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Hello everyone!

Question about the D maj 7 chord? In my head it should have the notes D, F#, A and C#; but on a lot of instructions online (one even by Justin on the rocky raccoon video), the chord is made by:
open D string,
G string: 2nd finger 2nd fret (A note),
B string 1st finger 1st fret (C???),
and top E string 3rd finger on the 2nd fret (F#).

Why is it a C instead of a C#? Am I making it wrong from the D major scale? The chords sound different but I have a hard time connecting a feeling to each.

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This is a D dominant 7 or D7 not a Dmaj7. The difference is the Dmaj7 has a Major 7 note and the D7 has a flat 7. C# is the 7th note of the D major scale and C is the flat 7.

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For some reason this dredged up an old memory of Joseph Heller’s “Catch 22”.

To bad we don’t have a Major Major Major Major chord…

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You can the Root is Major, the 3rd is Major, the 5th is Major just add a Major 7 and you have a MMMM chord. :wink:

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That is Dmaj7 100%.
You are confusing two different chords.

D7 and Dmaj7 are not the same.

Dmaj7 = 1, 3, 5, 7
D7 = 1, 3, 5, b7

The flat 7 explains why D7 contains the note C.

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Thank you for clearing it up so quickly! That’s a simple explanation. I thought D7 and Dmaj7 were interchangeable names :sweat_smile:.

I still have a lot to study.

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