Features, explainers and long-form stories from across Australia.
Few things feel as good as your first clean chord change, when the buzzing stops and the guitar starts sounding like music, and that moment usually begins with the trio behind many popular songs: G, C, and D — the same starting set recommended by Fender, guitar maker. Strings on a standard guitar: 6 · … Read more
A chord symbol like Cmaj7 or G7 isn’t a photo to memorize — it’s an interval formula: a seventh chord is a triad with one more note added, as the guitar-theory site Applied Guitar Theory puts it. Read the formula and any chord chart opens up, including why the tritone earned its “forbidden” nickname and … Read more
Anyone who picks up a guitar and feels six strings hum knows the first question isn’t theory — it’s which chord to press. This guide connects the usual starter pack of G, C, and D — the shapes Martin Guitar’s tutorial recommends first — to tab reading, song-friendly progressions, and the folklore behind nicknames like … Read more
Every guitar player remembers the moment a chord diagram finally made sense: a few dots on a grid, and suddenly your fingers know where to go. If you’re just starting out, those diagrams are the fastest map you’ll get — the five open chords C, A, G, E, D (GuitarPlayer (guitar publication)) are the shapes … Read more
Somewhere between “I own a guitar” and “I can play a song” sits a short stack of chords. The CAGED system—C, A, G, E, and D—names the five open shapes that define the first stage of beginner learning, and once you see how they connect, the fretboard starts to look like a map instead of … Read more
Anyone who has just bought a first guitar quickly realizes the same thing: the instrument sounds far better when you stop picking single notes and start playing whole chords. The good news is that a small set of open chords carries a surprising number of songs — even a classic like Stand by Me needs … Read more
Anyone who has picked up a guitar knows the gap between strumming your first chord and playing a song, but you don’t need dozens of shapes to get there — an eight-chord starter set (A, D, E, C, G, Am, Dm, Em) carries thousands of songs. This guide maps those essential chords, shows you how … Read more
Your first chord ever buzzed, and your fingers had no idea where to land — that’s the shared starting point for anyone who has picked up a guitar. From there, the road is shorter than it looks: eight open chords — C, A, G, E, D, Am, Em, and Dm — form the recommended starting … Read more
Every guitarist remembers the first chord that rang out clean — the moment the strings vibrate instead of thudding. That moment gets closer when a chord chart looks like a map, not a puzzle: six vertical lines for the strings, horizontal lines for the frets, and numbered dots that mark where each finger presses, a … Read more
There’s a moment every beginner guitar player hits: you learn a few chords, and suddenly so many of the songs you love sound reachable — the eight open chords A, Am, C, D, Dm, E, Em, and G build on the standard beginner set. Here’s how to learn them in the right order, read any … Read more