Learn the music theory behind minor 6 chords on guitar. How they're made, which notes they consist of, and most importantly, the context in which to use them. Become a minor 6 master!
You can also replace the IV chord in any major key with a minor chord, and turn that into a minor 6 chord! The resolution back to the tonic sounds awesome. A lil' tip for anyone looking to expand more on these. Great video!
Yes, more specifically, what that does is adds a b9 alteration to the V chord, which is popular in older jazz. Another thing you will notice from that, is that if you play a minor 6th arpeggio, descending from that same b9 note (on high-E string) of that V chord, that also sounds good as well. And more fun: you'll notice that same arpeggio is effectively the minor 6th starting on the 7th of that same V chord (ascending) , a.k.a. the root note of the 4 chord that that key. Also, m6 descend from the 3rd (of the V) and from the 7 (of the V) sound as good as it does from the b9 (of the V)
I'm a true beginner. I've only been playing about a year and a half. I've watched a number of different channels and yours is the best I've found. I hope you keep at it. I've learned a lot. Thanks.
No one explains things as clearly as you Sean. My band was playing a show tonight and I met a guy who said he'd been taking lessons but was getting frustrated because his guitar teacher would spend most of the lesson time playing and not letting him play and be critiqued and analyzed. I recommended your RU-vid channel to him. I have a feeling he'll be suggesting your RU-vid channel to his instructor. You're a great teacher and I hope you continue to prosper in your music and teaching endeavors.
Amazing man. Not only you make it easy to understand, but you can talk and use some smart jokes. Best of bests. Dont stop pls, for the theory's sake! Greatings from Portugal.
Im glad you brought up that it's a major triad with a minor 6th. A minor chord with a 6 added is an inversion of its relative major 7th. I'm gonna call minor 6th chords quarter diminished from now on. Just for myself.
+Alfred Potter Guitar Wow thanks a lot man. You're not so bad yourself. Love your video stuff on the modes! I'm thinking about doing a series on that someday. Thanks for watching and keep up the great work on your channel.
I always use the minor 6th of the 4th (Fm6 in C) in my compositions to end a phrases when coming to root from 5th. Ab is not in the scale of C major but it adds a decent amount of suspense, at least to me it does :)
You certainly have given me more knowledge towards different chords. Thank you! I have a request. Can you do a tutorial for diminished and augmented chords?
I always stick these in near the end of my progressions. They sound good, at least to me, one example is Cmaj9-Am9-Fmaj9-G13 and a brief Abm6 passing chord before going back to Cmaj9. Another example is E-Emaj7-D-C#m7-Emaj7-Ab7-Amaj7-Am6. Thoughts?
Check out Cannonball Adderley's arrangement of "Autumn Leaves". Its in the key of Gm, and the opening section revolves around a cool Gm6 arpeggio. And the A part resolves to a Gm6 as well.
The D min6 has the same notes of the Bm7(b5)...so it s ok to play a Bm7(b5) arpeggio over a Dm6 chord or over a D power chord (if you're a metal guy), assuming that the song is in C major/A minor???
You're providing some great stuff here man, thanks for that. I just wondered: Even though you said you can only really use a minor 6th for the second chord of the scale (so e.g. in the key of C only a Dm6 would work properly), you could still add a 6th to, say, the third chord, couldn't you? So, again in the key of C, I could take E minor (consisting of the notes E/G/B) and add the sixth note of the scale (C) to it which would leave me with the same notes as a Cmaj7. Is this just a matter of musical naming convention? Technically, I would still have added a 6th to an Em, right?
That's true BUT the way chords are named (or built) comes down to the major scale of whatever root you start on. So you're absolutely right when you can add the 6th note away from E in the C major scale to get that Cmaj7 inversion. But for it to be an Em6 chord, you have to take the 1 b3 5 6 from the E major scale, which gives you an E - G - B - C#. Kind of confusing at first, but if you think about Dm6, let's look at the 1 b3 5 6 in the D major scale, it yields a D F A B. All those notes happen to be in the C scale and line up as the 2 chord in that key. Hope that makes sense.
Hey Sean, big fan of your lessons & what you do for all us amateur guitarists, you got me out of a learning plateau. Just curious though (theory wise) as to why minor 6th chords are formed with the major scale yet the minor 7ths with the minor.
I always thought that was weird too. Check out this article though: music.stackexchange.com/questions/37957/why-does-a-minor-sixth-chord-contain-a-major-6th-interval
Sean Daniel Thanks that cleared it up somewhat. Min6 is one of those many names chords designed to mess you up just when you think you're getting the hang of it :P
hahahaha man you are awesome, i really like theory and you explain things really well with a lot of nice jokes, keep up the good work ;) but where did you learned all that stuff???
+andre oviedo Thanks for watching! As far as learning stuff, it just kind of came slowly but surely over the years talking to other musicians, reading online. I've never really found a great book/channel to explain it in a way I understood easily, so I thought I'd try and share what I've learned. I'm glad it's helping!
+Sean Daniel yeah man you're the only channel of music theory that i understand with ease, you should make videos teaching how to practice the modes or something with solos, by the way thank you for your videos and greetings from mexico :p ;)
+andre oviedo That's awesome to hear. I'm definitely going to eventually get to a series of videos on the modes, there's a lot of info there, so I want to plan it out where there's not too much at once.
Hey Sean, this video makes total sense but then I compared the chord chard from this video and your minor 7 b5 video and it seemed like the chord shapes were the same in a way. (Maybe I’m looking at it wrong) but it looked like when rooting a minor 6 on the D string, the shape was the same as rooting a minor 7 b5 on the low E string, especially when you replace the low E string note with a high e string note. Hopefully you understand my question. Thanks for the help and all the video lessons, been learning a lot!
Cool thanks! Wasn’t sure if I was going crazy or something 😂 I thought I was playing minor 7 b5s right his whole time until the minor 6 came along and thought life was a big lie for a minute... 🤯 does this have anything to do with the fact that they are the relative minor/major keys of each other? Thanks for the reply!!
Well technically all chord are built according to making adjustments to the major scale, like as far as their chord spelling goes. Even a minor 7 chord is 'spelled' as '1 b3 5 b7' But I'm totally with you, it kind of makes more sense for an Am6 to be A-C-E-F (but then that would be an F major 7 inversion) Short answer is: because that's how they decided to do it.
lol, no problem, probably because you are so familiar with the fret positions and also easier for players than audiences. Again appreciate sharing your knowledge.
Hi man how are you .. i want to ask you which scale I can use to minor 6 because I use e minor scale for am6 also for minor 9 and 11 which scale I can to use .. i really wants to know that .. I will be thankful to you
Great question. I think we all begin learning from images, but the thing to remember is that the fingers you use will ultimately be defined by context. Like if I know I'm switching back and forth between C and G, I'll probably play the G major as a C chord moved a string lower with my pinky on the high e string and no index finger. It's not something you'll eventually be thinking about a lot because the more familiar you get with the notes of the chords, the more your hand will find ways to be efficient.
I've been recently getting into FL Studio and i wanna connect a cheap guitar i have to my computer. People say that using an adapter ruins the soundcard so you gotta buy some expensive port-thingy that i can't find anywhere. Please consider this as an idea for a new video.
+Danijel Smolčić So you'll need something like an IK Multimedia StealthPlug. It's less expensive than a full blown interface would be (one where you could plug in a guitar and/or microphone). There are other brands of that kind of thing out there, but the IK is the only PC one I've used.
+Sean Daniel Just one last question. Is the amplitube software a must for recording or can i record without it? I just want a normal clean sound, as cheap as possible. Also i just found this and want your opinion on it. www.ebay.com/itm/Electric-Guitar-to-USB-Interface-Audio-Link-Cable-Music-Recording-Adapter-G/131714956548?_trksid=p2045573.c100034.m2102&_trkparms=aid%3D222007%26algo%3DSIC.MBE%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D20131003150253%26meid%3D5ac7f1bfffdf4d6eb71d288097c50175%26pid%3D100034%26rk%3D2%26rkt%3D7%26sd%3D351623283258
+Danijel Smolčić Yeah you can record without it. Amplitube gives you some cool effects and different amps and stuff, but I think are also free guitar pedal plug-ins and stuff you can use instead. I really don't know FL Studio at all, but I'm guessing they might even have some as part of their software. I can't really give you a great opinion on that link you sent me because I've never tried it. What that product would be doing though is converting your guitar signal into something your soundcard would have a better time recognizing. The other interfaces out there would essentially be acting as a second soundcard. Couldn't hurt to give it a shot for less than ten bucks though. Let me know how it goes.
The theory of this chord is giving me a headache for some reason..why is it assumed that the 6th is major in this chord? What indicates that the 6th is major? What would it be called if I wanted a minor 6th (b6)
Right?!! You would think a minor 6th chord would have the 6th note of the minor scale in it. Very confusing but chord building is made in relation to major scale. Like if you ever see a 'chord spelling' it's always using and altering major scale notes. So even a minor chord would be made from the major scale by taking a 1 b3 and 5.
Sean Daniel thanks for the reply..yes I suppose that makes sense..I figured just putting minor in the chord would change everything after it to minor like it does with. a minor 7th chord..so if I wanted this chord with all the natural notes of A min how would it be written?
I'd rather call this a Min/Maj 6 Chord or something like that. And have a chord with both flat 3rd and 6th be a Min 6 Chord. But hey, I didn't make the rules.
Well technically that would be an F major 7 inversion. An Am is A-C-E, if you take the 6th note from the A minor scale, it's an F. So A-C-E-F would be the first inversion of F-A-C-E, F major 7
That's as much an excuse as saying any minor sixth is just an inverted half-diminished chord. Mathematically, sure, but they aren't always functioning that way. You can absolutely have a chord rooted in A with E and F notes in it. I use them all the time. The only accepted terminology I've seen is the ugly Am(m6) notation. It needs a better name and a more respected identity.
The crazy rules of music theory as seen just before 4:22 explain why I only get so far with it. I use chords for their flavor; I don't bother with rules I can't explain or remember. Not a criticism of this channel.
Thanks for watching! Yeah it's definitely not necessary, knowing the rules can help some people but if you're rocking it out and sounds good, it is good!
Yeah but is not the conventional way. So, if you put a "6" you allways now: that 6th is major Am6 = minor chord with major 6th Amb6 = minor chord with minor 6th
Man you talked too fast and the way you explained it so complicated. The easy way is for any chord, for example A6, A includes A C E ( la do mi) so, just take the last one which is E and replace it with a higher note which is F# ( any note which allows you to go to #) If you want A7, go further for a note which is G Now if you want G6, ( G includes G B D) then replace D with E ( not E# as it will become F)....Simple?
Well that's not actually correct. When you replace the D in a G major chord with an E, you end up with a G - B - E, that's actually an E minor chord. So it's important you keep the 5th in there.
Sorry thats not what i meant buddy. I mean, if you want to change a main chord for ex Am to Am6 then this is the principle: Am includes 3 main notes : A, C, E ( la do mi) with E (mi) being the 5th note. After mi is Fa (F) meaning after 5 is 6. Result: you play a normal Am but one of your fingers needs to press on an extra F (in this case an F#) ( this case use your little finger to press on the F# on the 2nd fret of the 1st string....
