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Jazz Guitar Chords for Blues & Rock

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Jazz up your blues with these cool chords

So you play blues and rock, but you want to jazz up your sound a little bit. I'll show you a few chords that will give your sound some serious verve!

These chords are easy to play with a bit of practice, and completely movable. So, once you learn how to finger these shapes you can move them around the fretboard and play them with a different root. If you'd like to see a video of me demonstrating the chords in this lesson here's a link to youtube. Jazz Chords

There are lots of very cool sounding chords that jazz guitar players use, but the ones I'm going to show are the ones most often used by blues and rock players.

So grab your axe, and lets get started!

9th Chord

Commonly use in blues instead of a Dom7

This is a great sounding chord that gets used in blues progressions all the time.

In a I-IV-V blues progression many times you hear guitarists use a dominant 7 chord for the I chord and a 9th chord for the IV and V chords.

An example would be: A Dom7-D9-E9

It's good to change it up, instead of playing dominant 7 or major chords all the time when you play 12-bar blues.

7 Sharp 9 Chord

Sometimes referred to as the Jimi Hendrix chord

A lot of guitar players reject the idea of learning music theory, and the proper names of chords...so this one has been dubbed "The Jimi Hendrix Chord". When you play it, you'll recognize the sound right away. Stevie Ray Vaughan used this chord quite a bit as well.

One of my favorite uses of this chord is in a blues progression as the turn around chord.

An example would be: A Dom7-D9-E7#9

This chord really sounds like it wants everything to move back to the I chord. (ADom7 in the example)

13th Chord

A Great Chord for Ending Songs

The 13 chord can be used in most places where you would normally play a Dominant 7 chord.

I most often like to use it to end a song. To continue using the chord progression from the previous examples. If we are playing a 12 blues in A and our chord changes are: ADom7-D9-E9...when it's time to end the song, instead of ending on the ADom7 try an A13 instead. It kind of ends the song with a bit of a lift.

For a nice touch fret the chord one fret above or below the root and slide it into place.

If you are looking for more ways to jazz up your sound...
Dominant 7 Arpeggios are another good way to jazz up your blues solos.

Jazz Chords at Amazon

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ajp71555

I'm 37 years old, and I get what I want out of life. You can do it too, it's that simple. Just make the decision to live the life you want, and enjoy!... more »

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