Minor ninth shapesm9

It sounds warm, and considerably richer than an m7. The standard voicing for a ii chord once the plain one has been played enough.

4 moveable shapes. None has an open string in it, so each one plays every root there is; the dots are degrees, and R is the root.

One shape, twelve chords

Pick a root and every diagram below moves to it. Nothing about any of the grips changes — only the fret they start on, and each one starts somewhere different because they are rooted on different strings.

Showing Cm9. Every voicing of it, open strings included, is on its own chord page.

Root on the low E string

The lowest root available, so these are the fullest-sounding shapes and the ones that carry a band. F at the first fret, G at the third, A at the fifth: the shape is the same and the fret is the whole of the difference.

8-10-8-8-8-10

6 notes · 3 frets

Root on the A string

The other half of the pair. Almost every progression is played by alternating these with the low E shapes, because a root a fourth up the neck is a root two frets along the string below — the hand barely moves.

x3133x

4 notes · 3 frets

Inversions

The same chord with something other than the root underneath. You reach for one of these because of what the bass is doing, not because of what the chord is — a bass line that walks while the harmony stays put is made of these.

1st inversion

♭3 in the bass.

♭3 on the A string, root on the high E string

x68788

5 notes · 3 frets

9 in the bass

9 in the bass.

9 on the A string, root on the G string

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5 notes · 3 frets

The other minor shapes

Minor triad Minor sixth Minor six-nine Minor seventh Minor eleventh Minor major seventh Minor major ninth Minor major eleventh Minor add nine

Every voicing of one particular m9 chord — including the open-string ones that do not move — is on that chord's own page, linked under each shape above. All the moveable shapes for every quality are on the shapes index, and the minor chords as a family are on their own page.