Bar Chord Shapes

There are two main types of chords, open chords and bar chords. Open chords are named this because they have at least one string in the chord which is played open (no fingers pressed on any fret). Have a look at the "Basic Chords" section and you will see all chords written there have a least one string which is not pressed down (played open).

When you play a bar chord you are pressing all the string down in the chord you're playing, not one is left open. Because of this you can move the chord shape up and down the neck of the guitar, this is also called a movable shape.

There are five main bar chord shapes you can play, E Shape, A Shape, C Shape, D Shape and G Shape. All these shapes are your five main open major chords. For now we'll only focus on the first three.

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