How do I play Barre Chords (Bar Chord) on the Guitar?

What are barre chords?

With barre chords, we can play any major and minor chord, whether it’s C major, Bb major, or G# minor. 🙂 But first, we need to understand what barre chords are.

You can think of barre chords as essentially just basic chords (open string chords) that are moved up the fretboard.

Let me explain a bit more:

These are our basic chords: Basic Chords (open string chords)

A major with open strings (Open String Chord) The green-marked area in guitar anatomy is called the ‘nut’ (or in English: nut).

This nut ensures that the string sounds the way it does. So, when you play an open string (playing a string without pressing anything), a tone is produced. In our case, if we play the string marked with an X, a low E rings out.

Now, let’s move the entire chord forward ->. However, to do that, we also need to move the ‘nut’ forward.

If we move everything forward and add our index finger to the open strings of the previous A major chord, the result looks something like this:

B major with Barre The three fingers (which are usually played with the index, middle, and ring fingers) slide up to the 3rd fret. The fingers also need to be adjusted now since we need the index finger for the barre.

We also have to move the ‘nut’ forward by one fret, so we need the index finger to cover a total of 5 strings for this.

Yes, it’s true that only the A and E strings need to be pressed, since the others wouldn’t sound anyway due to the index to middle finger placement. But it’s much more complicated to ‘only’ fret 2 strings with the barre, rather than simply pressing them all together.

Also, make sure not to press down the low E string. Instead, move the index finger up enough to touch the E string, preventing it from sounding.

The same principle applies to the other basic chords.

Here are all the basic chords with barre listed again: Basic chords with barre shapes.

Shifting Barre Chords up and down

In the barre chords with grips, we see red notes. These are the ‘root notes.’

The root note determines the name (and, of course, ultimately the sound!) of the chord. The red note in a ‘C major’ chord, for example, would be C. In an E minor chord, it would be E, and so on.

We can leverage this principle and shift the chord freely. To apply this principle, we first need to know all the available notes on the guitar.

Bass Notes = Root Notes

Examples to Find Barre Chords

Now let’s revisit this overview: Basic chords with barre shapes.

As you can see, the first two barre chords (B major and B minor) have the bass on the A string, and the two lower ones (F major and F minor) have the bass on the E string.

Don’t be confused by B and H and Bb and B.
In the USA/UK, they still refer to Bb (B flat) and B, while in Europe, it’s B and H. Bb (USA) = B (Europe)
B (USA) = H (Europe)

Now, let’s try playing a C major barre chord.

If you closely examine the list of bass notes, you’ll see there are 2 different “C”s. One is in the 3rd fret on the A string, and the other is in the 8th fret on the E string. It doesn’t matter which one you choose to play now, but it makes sense to play as close as possible to the last or next chord. It’s not ideal if you have a chord in the 1st fret and then play the C chord in the 8th fret. It’s better to play the C chord in the 3rd fret, so you’re closer to the last chord, and it sounds better.

Now, press down with your index finger in the 3rd fret on the A string and lay the finger completely so that all strings (except the low E string) are pressed.

Now, the question is: Are we looking for a major or a minor chord? In our example, this would be a major chord, so we take the first pattern from the basic chords.

Now, let’s do the same with a G minor chord.

Again, look for a G on the bass note overview; for this example, we’ll take the G on the E string in the 3rd fret. After that, we need the minor pattern. Therefore, we take the last pattern in the basic chords.

How To Start?

If you want to try this method yourself, follow these steps:

1. Identify where the bass note is located (A string or E string?).
2. Determine whether you need a major or minor chord.
3. Find the right pattern for the correct bass note (if the bass note is on the A string, use the upper 2 patterns; if it’s on the E string on the Basic Chords, use the lower 2 patterns).
4. Fret the chord at exactly that position (Point 1) using the right pattern (Point 3).