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40 Ways to Play a 'C' Chord
BY JESSE GRESS
February 11, 2014
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“WHAT WOULD JIMI DO?” IT’S AQUESTION I'VE ASKED MYSELF
countless times over the last four
decades, particularly when faced with
creating groovy rhythm guitar parts from
basic chord charts. Hendrix didn’t really
use a lot of different types of chords, but
the vocabulary he created with the ones
he knew was astounding, especially on
ballads like “Hey Joe,” “The Wind Cr ies
Mary,” “Little Wing,” “Castles Made of
Sand,” “Axis: Bold As Love,” and “(Have
You Ever Been to) Electric Ladyland.”
Drawing from the soulful guitar moves of
Curtis Mayfield and the country piano
style of Floyd Cramer, Hendrix
developed a unique collection of
embellishments and filigrees that
allowed him to improvise using dyads, or
two-note chordal fragments, decoratedwith hammer-ons, pull-offs, and slides to
play within and around a basic “parental”
chord shape. For the next few months,
we’ll demystify some of these magical
sounds so you can incorporate them into
your own musical vocabulary.
Take the humble third-position C barre
chord. Some might think of it as a finite
entity, but in Hendrix’ hands, it became
an entire universe. Fig. A puts this
transposed “ A”-shaped major triad (root
on the fifth and third strings) on the grid
and shows how it connects to the next
highest “G”-shaped C chord (root on the
sixth and third strings). Fig. B adds parenthetical diatonic passing tones—the 2, the 4, and the 6—to the same grid. These are the notes Hendrix used to pair with and weave
in and out of the chord tones, and this is your world for the next month.
We begin at the upper end of the chord, with the 5 (G) voiced on top of each dyad. Ex. 1 illustrates ten different ways to hammer- on, pull-off, or slide the 2 and 4 (D and F ) in
and out of chord tones on the top three strings during a single beat. Many feature the same notes and rhythms with subtle variations in phrasing. Th is is a key concept inHendrix’s style, and the idea is to mix and match these moves into one-bar phrases. For instance, try playing bars 7, 1, 10, and 2 back-to-back. See what I mean? The more
moves you learn, the more options you’ll have.
Now that we’ve established a kind of
formula, dig into the ten s imilar 3-on-top
moves shown in Ex. 2. Here, we’re
mostly hammering and pulling the root
and 2 by shifting into the “G”-shaped C
chord and concentrating on the second,
third, and fourth strings. Get comfy with
the moves, and then mix and match
them with the ones from Ex. 1. Follow
suit in Examples 3 and 4, which feature
the root and an octavelower 5 on top of
each dyad, and you’ll have played
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circles around that humble C chord 40
different ways! Finally, pick a nice slow
tempo and combine any of the previous
40 ideas while you cruise the four-bar
chord progressions in Examples 5a and
5b. Play any C moves as written,
transpose them to first position for Bb,
sixth position for Eb, eighth position for
F, tenth position for G, and eleventh
position for Ab, and presto! You’ve been
Jimi-fied!
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