Diminished, demystified (hopefully)

[Alan L]

After studying diminished chords on guitar for a while, I have some tips and tricks I wanted to share. The stuff I wish someone told me! If this helps one person, it’s worth it 🙂

This only applies to fully diminished chords (dim, dim7, or sometimes written as a circle.) this DOES NOT work for half diminished! (m7b5, or sometimes written as a circle with a slash through it.)

(Fully) Diminished chords are built by stacking minor thirds. Scale degrees 1-b3-b5-6 (aka bb7.) E.g., in C: C-Eb-Gb-A-(C).

Because of the symmetry, there are some cool tricks that appear:

1.) you can slide the diminished shape 3 frets up or down the fretboard, and get a different inversion of the same chord:

2.) any of the chord tone choices could potentially function as the root. So if you find a note on the fretboard where you want to build a diminished chord, you can just drop in the diminished shape to line up with that fret:

We often see diminished applied in blues as a passing chord, usually 1-> #1 (aka b2) ->4; or 4-> #4 (aka b5) ->1. I wrote this little exercise to help me drill in the diminished chords within this context, while cycling through various positions on the board:

here is a great lesson applying some of these concepts (which actually inspired the exercise!)
ML072

Hope this helps, and let me know if I can clarify!
Alan

dim7

[Nick M]

Woah that’s really cool, thanks for sharing. the symmetry you find in music and guitar always fascinates me

Nick

[Alan L]

Thanks! I do know that if you drop that shape down one string (playing strings 2-5) you get a half diminished! 😀

[charjo]

Thanks, Alan. As I’ve said in threads about nurturing the forum, members teaching and sharing their insights is a great addition. Reminding us of and adding the video was a great touch. ML 072 is one of th best lessons I’ve seen for using diminished chords in a major blues.
John

[Alan L]

Thanks John. I’m a teacher by trade so it’s in my nature. I find when I explain things I reinforce and clarify for myself. Part of my personal initiative to “keep the forum fresh and alive.” 🙂

[charjo]

What subject(s) and grade level, Alan. Teaching probably would have been my alternate career path. I don’t envy the challenges teachers face these days.
John

[Alan L]

Currently my wife and I own and operate a Montessori preschool. Difficult in its own way, but I feel we’re also shielded from many of the challenges the public school teachers are facing.

[Jean-Michel G]

Hi,
If you want to dive deeper, I wrote a complete analysis of dim7 chords in the Theory forum about a year ago; it’s right there.

I also posted something about how gypsy jazz (and Western swing) musicians often use it; it’s here.

Cheers,
JM

[Alan L]

Thanks JM! Great links. I always appreciate your in depth theory write ups. I know there’s a lot of theory I glossed over, just trying to do an “as applied to guitar fretboard” kind of thing. 🙂

[JoeD1]

Most excellent Alan. This will surely help me practice diminished chords. Thank you for posting the drawings and video.

Joe

The sight of a touch, or the scent of a sound,
Or the strength of an Oak with roots deep in the ground.
--Graeme Edge

[Alan L]

Thanks Joe! Check out updated charts below! 👇🏾

[Alan L]

I was playing around with Soundslice to get some cleaner charts 😀

Inversions up the neck:

Possible functions, with examples for 12 keys. This can cycle just repeats up the neck:

Exercise:

[Michael W]

Awesome! That is so cool…I needed just that kind of hack.

[Bill]

Good stuff Alan! Using those diminished chords really spices up a chord progression. They are all over older music (30s/40s jazz and blues) and a particular favorite of mine.

[Author]

Posts