Last Updated on May 15, 2019 by Klaus Crow

10 Ways to Play the Most Beautiful Open Chord Shapes Part I



A great way to make your chord progressions and songs sound awesome is to use open chord shapes.

I always love to use these chords to add some flavor to my chord progressions. One of my favorite chords is Fsus2.That chord has got the whole package for me. It’s sounds beautiful, gentle, tight, cool and rough at the same time.

When you move an open chord up the neck the name of the chord changes and the chord gets extended with 1 or 2 notes. This way you can get beautiful sounds.

While you can play barre chords at any fret on the fingerboard, open chords can only be played at certain frets. If you play them at the right frets they sound amazing, if you don’t… well they just sound terrible. So be careful.

Because of all the extended chord names I didn’t bother to name every single one of them. That’s not the point here.

It’s all about incorporating these chords into your songs and chord progressions, putting your creativity to the test, experimenting with all the possibilities, replacing some basic chords for these extraordinary ones, learning to hear what sounds right and what feels good.

Check out the youtubes Part I, II & III and the corresponding Chord fingerings below.

Have a great time!

10 Ways to Play the Most Beautiful Open Chord Shapes Part II



Here is an example of how to read the chords below:

E = eadgbe (the strings from left to right)

E = 022100 (the numbers indicate where to put your fingers on the fret)

E string = 0 – you play an open string. (no fingers on the fret)

A string = 2 – put your finger on the 2nd fret.

D string = 2 – put your next finger on the 2nd fret.

G string = 1 – put your next finger on the 1st fret.

B string = 0 – you play an open string. (no fingers on the fret)

E string = 0 – you play an open string. (no fingers on the fret)

1 – Open chords in the key of E

022100

2×2200

4×4400

577600

799800

9×9900

11×11 11 00

0 14 14 13 0 0

2 – Open chords in the key of E (different approach)

022100

x44200

x66400

x77600

x99800

x11 11 9 00

x12 13 11 00

0 14 14 13 00

3 – E chord shapes

022100

133200

355400

577600

799800

8 10 10 900

10 12 12 11 00

4 – C shapes

x32010

x54030

x10 9080

5 – D shapes

xx0232

xx0454

xx0565

xx0787

xx09 10 9

xx0 10 11 10

xx0 12 13 12

xx0 14 15 14

6 – Open chords in the key of A

x02020

x04030

x05050

x07070

x09080

x0 11 0 10 0

x0 12 0 12 0

x0 14 0 14 0

7 – Fsus2 shapes

x33011

x55033

x10 10 088

8 – F#m7(11) shapes

2×2200

4×4400

5×5500

7×7700

9×9900

10×10 10 00

12×12 12 00

9 – Bb triad shapes

xx0331

xx0553

xx0775

xx0997

xx0 10 10 8

xx0 12 12 10

xx0 14 14 12

10 – Dmaj7sus2 shapes

xx0220

xx0550

xx0770

xx0990

xx0 10 10 0

xx0 12 12 0

xx0 14 14 0