E B E Cigar Box Guitar: Common Chord Shapes Part 1

Here are some common chord shapes for a 3 stringed E B E guitar including the keys of E major and A major and their relative keys including relative minors.

Technically the B shown is a B power chord rather than B major

There are many ways to play each chord and the chord shape you choose will depend on:

your ability to stretch your fingers
which chords you are playing together
how confident you are with barre chords

In part 2 of this series, we will explore various chord shapes for playing the chords above, but see further down this article for an easer way that I like to play A and D to toggle between them.

Cigar Box Guitar – Why Tune Down To E B E?

the guitar sounds punchier
lower string tension
easier to fret
similar to 6 string tuning

Some players like to tune their Cigar Box Guitar down to E B E rather than the more common G D G as this makes the guitar sound a bit punchier.

Also, since the string tension is lower the strings are a little easier to fret.

If you come from a background in 6 string guitar it also helps you to know your way around the fretboard. This is because a 6 string guitar has its top string and bottom string tuned to E and it’s 2nd string tuned to B.

The problem you can run into is that chord diagrams are mainly designed for G D G instruments and if you don’t have much knowledge of music theory it’s a bit bewildering. This article is designed to help you on your way.

Tuning My Cigar Box Guitar Down To E B E- What Happens To The Chords I Have Learned On A Guitar Tuned G D G?

If you come from playing a G D G guitar, you can use much of what you’ve learned chord wise. Just remember that each chord shape will be what we call transposed. This means that playing a chord shape (or a note on a fret position you have learned) will naturally sound in a different key.

chord on G D G

chord on E B E

NOTE THAT G# = Ab, Bb = A#, C# = Db, F# = Gb

This holds true for all chord shapes and barred power chords e.g.

G power chord on GDG tuning is open strings and this transposes to E power chord on EBE tuning
Playing a C major chord shape from a GDG tuned guitar transposes to A major on EBE tuning

Power Chords On A Cigar Box Guitar Tuned E B E

You can play power chords as follows:

for E – strum the open strings
for A – fret the fifth fret across all 3 strings and strum
for B – fret across all 3 strings on the 7th fret

This gives the I, IV and V ( 1,4 and 5) chords that everyone talks about as the very easy way to start learning cigar box guitar. These are the chords that will allow you to play the 12 bar blues and many rock and pop and country and folk…. the list is endless…. songs

(For those of you that want the theory behind this: A power chord is made by paying the 1st and 5th notes of a chord, omitting the 3rd)

Let’s compare these power chords on a cigar box guitar tuned E B E and one tuned to G D G :

Fret	Chord Number	E B E Power Chord	G D G Chord
0	I (One)	E	G
5	IV ( Four)	A	C
7	V (Five)	B	D

You will find that a guitar tuned to E B E will play in some keys easier than others, just as a G D G guitar will play easier in some keys.

This will partly depend on how far you can stretch your fingers for the more complicated shapes.

The great thing about the open tuning used for Cigar Box guitar means that you can often substitute a power chord if the chord you want to play is a bit beyond your capabilities at the moment.

If there’s a song you really want to strum along to that you can find the chords to, keep it simple at first and substitute power chords. Any chord progressions you can find online can be used on the cigar box guitar. They don’t have to be specifically written for CBG.

E B E Cigar Box Guitar: Finding Your Way Around The Fretboard

This table shows the notes on each string of a guitar tuned E B E and the power chords you can play by fretting across all the strings

fret

power chord

note on E ( top and bottom) strings

note on B (middle) string

NOTE THAT G# = Ab, Bb = A#, C# = Db, F# = Gb

Relative Chords For E Major On A 3-Stringed Guitar Tuned E B E

Now we’ve seen how to play the very easy barre chords on an E B E guitar, let’s look at some more complicated shapes.

There are so many ways to play different chords. What I wanted to know when I started playing in this tuning was some chord shapes to get me started. I knew I could add more as I got better at playing.

Here are some shapes for the key of E, including 7th chords and relative minors:

Note that the B7 chord is played with the 1st finger on the 4th fret, 2nd finger on the 5th fret and 4th finger on the 7th fret. Technically the B shown is a B power chord rather than B major, but if you want you can play B major as follows:

This is not an easy chord for a beginner.

If you want to substitute the 1 finger barre chords for E, A and B that’s fine. Remember that’s the open strings for E, the 5th fret for A and the 7th fret for B.

If you learn to play these shapes, you will be able to play many songs. Since these chords are the basis for many different songs in many different genres, try learning them all.

Adding E7, B7 and C#m ( we say this as C sharp minor) will add a lot of extra color to your playing.

Starting To Play Chords On An E B E Cigar Box Guitar

Try playing this very simple chord progression:

Remember that you can line up your 1st,2nd and 3rd fingers ( or your 2nd,3rd and 4th fingers) to play the A chord if you find the 1 finger barre difficult.

Relative Chords For A Major On A 3-Stringed Guitar Tuned E B E

These are the chords for A major. Again you can substitute the 1 finger barre chords for A,D and E if you like. A is played with a barre on the 5th fret, D on the 10th fret and E on the open strings ( or 12th fret)

There is an alternative way of toggling between A and D that I find a bit easier on the fingers. You might like it too if you are struggling with the stretch required:

Line up your fingers for the A chord with your first finger in position for the D as shown in the middle chord chart. Then all you need to do is lift off the 3rd finger to play D and put it back down for A

More Chords For E B E Cigar Box Guitars

This is the first of a series of articles about how to play chords on a cigar box guitar tuned E B E. There will be more to follow. There are many articles on this website that will help you as a beginner to cigar box guitar and a lot of these will apply to both E B E and G D G tunings ( and others like D A D)

If you are absolutely new to Cigar Box Guitar I recommend this article: Absolute Beginner’s Guide To Cigar Box Guitar

Chord Shapes for Another Alternative Tuning For Cigar Box Guitars: D A D

There are plenty of other tunings available for Cigar Box Guitars as outlined in this article: https://beginnercbg.com/9-different-tunings-for-a-cigar-box-guitar/

You might be interested in this tuning in particular: https://beginnercbg.com/d-a-d-cigar-box-guitar-common-chord-shapes-part-1/