 We're going to teach you how to play all of the chords (major, minor, 7th, diminshed, ...) in all of the keys (A, Bb, B, C, ...) in all of the positions (up and down the fretboard). The magic in "Chord Magic" is that you can do this without a lot of memorization. Let me show you what I mean. Think about the 7th chords for example. You can play an A7 chord at four different positions on the fretboard of a soprano ukulele (trust me on this for now – I'll show you how in a minute). On a tenor uke with a longer fretboard, you can play an A7 chord in six different positions. So to learn all of the 7th chords in all twelve keys, you need to memorize 6 x 12 = 72 different patterns (if you learn it the hard way). But you don't have to learn it the hard way. Chord Magic shows you how to learn all 72 chords, but you only need to learn four patterns plus how to shift those patterns up and down the fretboard. Same for every other chord: to play all 72 major chords, you only need to learn four more patterns. To play all 72 minor chords, you only need to learn four more patterns. Don't be intimidated by the length of this writeup. It really doesn't take very long to learn everything in here. There are a lot of diagrams, so it reads pretty quickly. The principles are really very simple and straightforward – the text is as long as it is only because we've taken the time to explain everything very completely. And there's some supplemental information (A Little Bit Of Chord Theory) that you don't really need to read – it's just there for the more inquisitive among you. The ideas here are simple, and you'll pick them up pretty quickly. By the time you're finished with "Chord Magic", you'll never get stuck not knowing a chord, you'll be able to transpose a song into any key, and you'll be able to add color and interest to your music by playing chords in alternate positions up and down the neck. If you're already an advanced player, or if you've already got an understanding of some of these concepts, you can skim through this document: read the "Important Points" and the "Tips", and study the summary Fig. 21: How To Play All Of The Chords In All Of The Keys. You can read back over some of the more detailed explanations if the summary page isn't clear. Before we get started, though, you might want to check out this
page to make sure that we're all using the same terminology.
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