A MasterClass on ALL the Minor Chords You're Not Using

Added: 2026-05-05

[00:00:00]All right, no exaggeration. This is one of the most important guitar lessons that I like to teach because it is basically taking every single minor chord that you could ever stand and pairing them together over one root note.

[00:00:12]>> [music] >> And our root note is going to be A.

[00:00:14]So, everything is going to be in A minor today. We're going to have an A minor chord, an A minor 7 chord, an A minor 9 chord, an A minor 11 chord, an A minor [music] 13 chord, and an A minor 6 chord.

[00:00:30]There's a reason I'm saving the 6 for last because we're also going to be talking about the music theory behind this. So, A minor, everybody knows this one. This is the easy one. Open A, 2 D, 2 G, 1 B, open E.

[00:00:44]Now, the important part about this lesson is knowing that the notes that go in an A minor chord are A, C, and E.

[00:00:51]Now, I'm strumming [music] the bottom five strings here as I'll be doing for most of this lesson.

[00:00:57]So, I'm actually playing five notes, but I'm only playing three different notes here. I've got open A, which is an A, two on the D string, which is an E, two on the G string, which is another A, one on the B string, which is a C, and then open [music] E, another E. So, there are doubles of some of these, which is going to get into context later on, okay? So, the easiest way to start adding a different chord would be to make A minor 7 just by lifting up your ring finger and opening up the G string, okay?

[00:01:26]So, now we had another A, a redundant A on two on the G [music] string. And now we've turned that A into a G.

[00:01:33]So, now I have an A, a C, an E, and a G.

[00:01:37]Okay, so before we go on and before we just memorize the cool ones, all of that chord, [music] I want to talk about how we actually build this, okay? We're going to talk about this in relation to the minor scale. Some people will be like, "Oh, well, it's a major scale with the flat."

[00:01:49]This just makes way more sense, okay?

[00:01:51]The notes in the A minor scale are A, B, C, D, E, F, and G. So, seven notes in any scale really. And this is just the alphabet, no sharps or flats. A, B, C, D, E, F, G, okay? We can play them in open position. A, B, [music] C, D, E, F, G, A. 1 2 3 4 [music] 5 6 7. Eight is an octave, another A, okay? So, that would be a A string, open 2 3, D string, open 2 3, G string, open 2, okay?

[00:02:20]So, the way we build chords is we stack thirds, okay? All you need to remember that is we just take a note, we skip a note, we take a note, we skip a note, we take a note. A distance, a third, is going to be from like a one to a three.

[00:02:33]We skip the two, right? So, if our notes are A, B, C, we're going to skip the B, just go A to C. That's our one, our three. We're going to skip the four, which is open E, and our five. 1 3 5.

[00:02:45][music] This would be an arpeggio of an [singing] A minor chord.

[00:02:51]Just an A minor chord played one note at a time, okay? You could actually add the octave and then go [music] forward and backwards and turn it into an exercise.

[00:03:00]You've probably heard stuff like that before, know you're supposed to practice them, but it's boring to you, which makes sense. Now, when we make a seven, we just stack the next third. We skip the sixth note and add the seventh note.

[00:03:10]So, A, C, [music] E, G.

[00:03:15]A minor seven, okay? I'm going to add another chord voicing of an A minor 7.

[00:03:22]This one right here is a closed voicing, so [music] it's movable.

[00:03:25]I'm getting the A on the low E string, fifth fret, and skipping the A string.

[00:03:29]We can add the A string if we want, open, but again, redundant.

[00:03:33]And then my ring finger is grabbing the fifth fret on the D, G, and B strings, okay? So, the nice thing [music] about this A minor 7 as compared to this >> [clears throat] >> A minor 7, they sound similar, but when I try to move this, >> [music] >> it's rough. When I move this, it's still a minor 7 chord that I'm moving around, okay?

[00:03:55]So, I want to really start to add an A minor 9, and then we're going to talk contextually about all this, all right?

[00:04:02]So, again, A minor, if we add a G, we get A minor 7, which seems counterintuitive because we're actually adding a note by removing a finger, but again, we can't >> [music] >> over we get underestimate how much these open strings are helping us. What's the ninth note in A? B.

[00:04:21]Okay? [music] Now, you may be like, "Hey, why don't I just add a B by taking my pointer finger off the B string?"

[00:04:28]Well, what we do here is we took a C, and then now I don't have any redundant Cs to take up for it, right?

[00:04:35]>> [music] >> So, this actually would be an A suspended chord because that C note is what is anchoring that chord between the world of minor and the world of major.

[00:04:46]If there's no C in there, there could be a C [music] sharp hidden behind the scenes if we take it away, which would be A major. [singing] That C is pretty important [music] in determining the class of the A minor chord. So, an A minor 9 >> [music] >> is going to look like this, where kind of goes stretch here, right? My pinky is grabbing the fourth fret on the G string. So, open 2 4, [music] 1 open A minor 9, okay? So, A minor, A minor [music] 7, A minor 9, A minor. [music] We're going to continue on and do this contextually with the chord progression, but first I want to tell you about the sponsor of today's video. And the reason why this sounds so good on guitar today is because I'm rocking a Journey Instruments acoustic guitar preamp {slash} direct box, all right? So, what is this? First of all, you'll notice that it's not plugged into anything.

[00:05:38]I've got my guitar plugged into it, and then this is actually running out into my computer interface, okay?

[00:05:44]This thing is actually really awesome, all right? First of all, what it does is it takes your guitar signal, and then it gives you something that is line level out, or you can go quarter inch out into like an acoustic guitar amp or something. I love the fact that I can go out into my interface with this with an XLR out. The other nice thing about this, if I still wanted to use an acoustic amp, like if I'm doing a live show or something like that, I can use these simultaneously, and it'll sound the same. Actually, uh they're EQ'd a little bit differently, uh because performers kind of prefer one type of sound on the guitar, and you know, if you want a clean DI, this is a little bit different. But, you can also actually affect the tone of the guitar with a three-band EQ right on the front right here, okay? So, you see I have my lows cranked all the way up. My mids are up a little bit, and my highs are back, okay? The reason for that is because I'm playing a very small body guitar. This is a Martin Single O guitar, very small, >> [music] >> and usually lacks in the low end. So, it's cool that I can actually add a little bit of EQ before I hit either my computer or my amp.

[00:06:51]Uh basically, the master here is just the volume out. It also is a way to toggle just the master off and on just by pressing and holding it to conserve like battery or something like that, all right? So, that'll just turn it off, and then I can press it again and turn it on. And then I can also bypass the entire pedal, or what this does, the pedal mutes the signal and [music] then turns it into a tuner, okay? So, it's got a tuner, it's got a three-band EQ, it is converting it to line level, and then also it has a notch section. What that is is if you've ever performed live, especially with acoustic guitar, you know that it's easy to feed back depending on what the room is like that you're in. So, you can scan the frequency that is giving you problems, and then you can cut the frequency to kind of just like take some of that feedback out. So, really, really cool uh thing right here. You can actually also charge it with the USB charger while you're using it. Otherwise, the battery lasts 5 hours, and it's a lithium ion battery, and you can actually replace it if it ever goes bad on you. So, really cool device right here. Everybody needs this. I I think of these more as even like utilities just because like there's always a cool reason to use a DI box, especially one with extra features for this price. It's like the price of a tuner, but you actually get everything else. So, thank you, Journey Instruments, for sponsoring the video.

[00:08:12]Let's get back to these minor chords, right? A minor, A minor 7, A minor [music] 9.

[00:08:19]So, what I want to do now before we get into the other three minor chords that we're going is take a chord progression and use this contextually to see how it sounds, okay?

[00:08:28]Chord progression I'm going to use is going [music] A minor back to A minor.

[00:08:38]Okay, [music] so I'm going to start with the A minor triad, regular A minor, C, >> [music] >> E 7, A minor 7.

[00:08:49]>> [music] >> A minor, C, E 7, A minor [music and singing] 9.

[00:09:02]>> [music] >> One cool way you can even just come up with a progression just all around A minor. A minor, A minor 7, [music] 9.

[00:09:15]Okay? So, we can also arpeggiate these.

[00:09:17]I'm going to do the arpeggios for all of these chords at the end, but I want to get to the next chord. Now, remember we're stacking these in thirds, and the way it works out in a scale, remember one, a third from one is we skip the two, we go to the three. 1 2 3, 3 4 5, 1 3 5 gives us a triad, 1 3 5 7 gives us a seventh chord, 1 3 5 7 9 gives us a ninth chord, 1 3 5 7 9 11 gives us an A minor 11 [music] chord.

[00:09:48]I actually That's That's the wrong chord, okay?

[00:09:51]There's an A minor 11 right here.

[00:09:54]It would be minor. A minor 11.

[00:09:57]This is actually probably the closed shape chord I use the most because anytime I see a minor chord, [music] you can replace it with a minor 11 chord. All right?

[00:10:10]So, the way we're going to play it first is just a >> [music] >> as a movable shape is your middle finger the A on the E string fifth fret and skip the A string 5 5 D and G with your ring and your pinky >> [music] >> and then pointer finger three on the B string. Okay? So, minor 11. A minor 11.

[00:10:30]A sharp or [music] B flat minor 11.

[00:10:32]B minor 11.

[00:10:33]>> [singing] >> C minor 11.

[00:10:35]So on and so forth. Okay? Now, a really cool way up to play A >> [music] >> is this one right here. I think it gives a little bit of extra brightness to it.

[00:10:44]And again, it's the same chord.

[00:10:45]>> [music] >> It's just a different voicing. I've got the fifth fret on the D and G string and the third fret on the B and E string.

[00:10:53]>> [music] >> So, I've got an A and then I've got a G, right? So, again, there's my [music] minor seventh.

[00:11:01]I've got a C right here where my pinky's holding a C note down that is designating it as the minor class.

[00:11:07]>> [music] >> A D on the B string and a G on the high E string. Okay? So, this is a heavy G >> [music] >> A minor 11 chord.

[00:11:19]Okay? Now, again, I can open up that high E string.

[00:11:26]It's the same [music] chord, but just instead of having an E, I'm having another G.

[00:11:31]>> [music] >> So, I'm taking some liberties in this to which of those notes of those again, a 1 3 5 7 9 and 11. That's a six note chord. So, some of these notes are going to start being implied because there's only six strings on a guitar. You could play six totally different notes to make a chord, but eventually we're just taking the notes that are important. Generally, the root note is pretty important if you're playing solo acoustic guitar. If you're If you're playing in a band, you can have the bass player play the root note of the A and then you can play the other notes to kind of as a team make like an A minor 11 chord.

[00:12:07]And then the third, the minor third is also very important because it's designating the class. And then the other note that we're using for color, again, the 11 would be in here, too. So, [music] really cool one right here. So, let's do that chord progression again. A >> [music] >> minor C E >> [music] >> A minor seventh C >> [music] >> E >> [music] >> There's a lot of different kind of sonic stuff going on now because I'm using some of these extensions, which is what we're doing. All right? So, that's A minor >> [music] >> 11.

[00:12:52]Okay? Plus, it just kind of looks fancy.

[00:12:55]So, you can bar strings up top with one finger.

[00:12:58]That's how you play guitar. Oh, get that low A with your thumb. [music] Now, I got a movable shape.

[00:13:03]Look at that guy, huh?

[00:13:05]John Mayer, eat your heart [music] out right there. Get the root there.

[00:13:09]Minor 11 for the win. I'm a sucker for minor 11 chords. We're going to keep going. Minor 13.

[00:13:16]Some people be like, "Why don't you minor six before minor three?" We're going to get It's just all the same.

[00:13:19]This is just how I'm choosing the order of the chords. This is the most mysterious chord you'll ever hear on guitar.

[00:13:25]Mhm.

[00:13:26]I love it. Okay? So, it's open A 4 D [music] 6 G open B open E.

[00:13:37]Probably the easiest one to play out all these. You can play any two [music] fingers you want to use. Especially if you want to go from this A minor seventh A minor seventh >> [music] >> A minor 13 to C C 13 to E seventh back to [music] A.

[00:14:01]So, again, once you start incorporating these extensions, you can really have some fun just playing really basic chord progressions that really open up your playing. So, let's talk about this. So, this is the first time we [music] have used the fourth fret on the D string.

[00:14:16]What note is this? D D sharp E F F sharp. This is the first time we've got a sharp in the problem here in the problem. Is it a problem? I don't know.

[00:14:26]I guess we'll talk about it. Some people say this is a problem because we've been using notes from the A minor scale A B C D E F G and A and now we're using an F sharp to make a chord. Well, this is where the naming of these chords becomes a little bit interesting and we're going to talk about this in conjunction with the minor six chord.

[00:14:46]Okay?

[00:14:47]So, let's take two chord progressions and let's talk about why that F sharp is kind of butting into whatever it is we're doing here.

[00:14:54]Open A 4 D 5 G 5 B >> [music] >> or if you want to make it movable grab that A with your middle finger.

[00:15:05]A minor six.

[00:15:07]B flat minor six. B minor six. [music] So on and so forth. A really mysterious chord progression chord. I love ending chord progressions with this in the key of A minor. A C E Leaves people hanging with a sense of mystery. I would do that in live shows all the time and it would make people so uncomfortable. But that's what they get for not clapping [music] loud enough.

[00:15:37]So, why is the F sharp there? The F sharp is there because we actually build chords technically from the major scale.

[00:15:44]And if we went through the A major scale, we'd get an A, a B, a C sharp, D, E, F sharp, G sharp, A. 1 2 3 [music] 4 5 6.

[00:15:58]So, it's actually a major six on top of a minor chord. I think it is easier to talk about minor chords building them from the minor scale and then we get to a six chord, just take the six from the major scale instead of saying an A minor is an A with a flat three, a five, a flat seven, so on and so forth, right?

[00:16:19]Again, it's two ways of kind of thinking about the same thing, but some people will fight me on this.

[00:16:24]And guess what? I'm ready to throw hands whenever. I'm just here waiting. I got my Journey Instruments acoustic preamp.

[00:16:30]Also, this is pretty heavy duty. You could bludgeon someone with it if they do come after you for building chords from the minor scale instead of the major scale. That is a great secondary use that is not advertised on their website, but checks out. All right, so, A minor six is an A minor triad with a major six, an F sharp. [music] Okay? Now, to make that 13, we essentially do kind of want that F sharp in there.

[00:16:56]>> [music] >> So, we're getting so good. Open 4 5 0 0.

[00:17:02]This is the sound that accompanies the police investigation of [music] who bludgeoned that random YouTube commenter with the Journey Instruments acoustic preamp.

[00:17:12]They're at a loss, guys.

[00:17:15]Some crimes [music] were never meant to be solved.

[00:17:17]13. Okay? So, let's recap and let's do some arpeggios quick.

[00:17:21]A minor triad. A minor seventh. A [music] minor ninth. A minor 11th. A minor 13th. A minor sixth. Let's do it in order of numbers.

[00:17:37]A minor triad. [music] A minor sixth seventh. I don't know how to count. A minor triad. A minor sixth. A minor seventh. A minor ninth. [music] A minor 11th.

[00:17:52]A minor 13th back home. [music] Especially adding that 13th chord in your just a regular progression. A >> [music] >> C E seventh.

[00:18:07]>> [music] >> How cool is that?

[00:18:12]>> [music] >> You can even switch them up.

[00:18:17]>> [music] >> So, a lot of fun that you can have just by going around. Now, let's talk about turning all of these into different arpeggios quickly and then you can go about your life and I'll leave you alone for a little bit.

[00:18:31]So, arpeggiating any chord is great in understanding how they're built and being able to make the same chord on a different root note. Okay? So, we're actually going to get away from open A minor land and we're going to go to the middle of the fretboard. So, the A minor scale starting here.

[00:18:48]A B C D E F G A. Okay, we'll start here and then we'll actually go higher to finish it as we get into the extended chords. All right? So, 5 7 [music] 8 5 7 8 5 7 9 5 7. We'll stop right there. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 [music] 11.

[00:19:13]Now, let's spell out the chord. A minor triad. 1 3 5.

[00:19:19]1 3 5 1 [music] 3 5 7 1 3 5 7 1 3 5 7 1 3 5. That's an A minor seventh arpeggio.

[00:19:30]Really great practice.

[00:19:33]1 3 5 7 9 1 3 5 7 9.

[00:19:40]I like doing this >> [music] >> where I kind of go past the octave and then end on the octave A.

[00:19:50]A C E G B A A C G >> [music] >> So that's a nine. The 11 we could just keep going. So I got 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11. So 1 2 3 5 7 9 10 11.

[00:20:16]>> [music] >> It's going to be the seventh fret on the G string.

[00:20:22]1 3 5 7 9 11 >> [music] >> 1 3 5 7 9 11 9 7 1 3 [music] 5 7 9 9 9 9. You can start kind of >> [music] >> make up little riffs with this kind of thing. But again, this >> [music] >> is an A minor nine along with the So you can kind of hear that.

[00:20:55]A minor nine A minor [music] >> [music] >> That's like a chord way to play that melody adding it into the harmony of the chord.

[00:21:07]Let's add Oh, we did add the 11 already, right? And the nine.

[00:21:11]>> [music] >> 11. Let's add the 13. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Wait a minute. Wait a minute, guys. This is an F.

[00:21:23]>> [music] >> Again, we're going to add the F sharp, the major scale 13. So again, everything is works fine with the minor scale. It's fine. We just have to remember right there. I'm going to grab the seventh fret on the B string. 1 3 5 7 9 >> [music] >> Right? Sounds pretty cool.

[00:21:49]You could actually add the natural F.

[00:21:52]>> [music] >> 1 2 3 4 5 major six flat six F F sharp 1 3 5 7 9 11 13 >> [music] >> F natural, right? What sounds better?

[00:22:09]>> [music] >> Sounds kind of cool.

[00:22:13]But again, that's just up to you once you start arpeggiating it and just playing it like are you playing an arpeggio? Are you trying to play something in the key of A minor sticking with the key? Again, it's up to you. But the cool thing is that knowing the information and being armed with the arpeggios behind stuff is like super super important for your playing and your creativity because once you know what is possible and what's possible when you maybe just alter one note or extend the chord one note, you'll have so many more ideas for soloing, for singing different notes on top of it as a melody, so on and so forth. So anyways, thanks for sticking with it if you made it all the way to the end. Uh let me know if you want maybe like a major version of this kind of lesson.

[00:22:55]And thank you again to Journey Instruments. Like I said, affiliate link will be in the description. Everybody needs one of these. Uh really just great tool to have around. Specifically just for recording. Another really cool use for this that I probably found myself doing more than anything is if I'm playing a show, I'll just like have one input to go to two outputs. Doesn't even have to be guitar. You know what I mean?

[00:23:14]Uh could be like a keyboard or a a microphone even really if you want to adapt it down. But uh guitar into the Journey out quarter inch to my amp or PA and then also have a clean uh direct out XLR that I can maybe mix with a vocal uh after the fact. So really cool. Uh pretty inexpensive. So, you know, worth having something like that. Thanks for watching. Talk to you guys later.