Easy Chords For Cigar Box Guitar – Absolute Beginner Part 1

When you first pick up a cigar box guitar, you will probably want to learn a few chords. Here is my absolute beginner guide.

Playing a chord of the open strings plays a G chord. We can show it in a chart form or by the numbers 0 0 0. The second chord we will learn is the C chord, played by fretting across the 5th fret, just behind the fret wire, 5 5 5. The D chord, 7 7 7, is played by fretting at the 7th fret.

Chord shape diagrams are shown like this:

See further down for an alternative D chord shape

The 1 in the circles on the black bar mean that you use your first finger to fret across all the strings. This is called a barre chord.

Why Are Barre Chords So Useful?

It is an incredibly useful way to play a Cigar Box Guitar. Because the guitar is tuned in open tuning, strumming the notes produces a chord so any time you move that chord up the neck it will make a chord too. You are using your finger to effectively act as the nut.

These chords are also called power chords- they contain the 1st and 5th notes of the scale. You don’t need to worry about that theory, but it’s useful to know that power chords can be played in place of both a major and a minor chord.

Barre chords on a 3 or 4 string guitar are easier to play than on a 6 string guitar. However if you find them difficult, there nothing to say that you can’t use 3 separate fingers like this:

There is more detail on barre chords and getting to know your way around the fretboard in How To Play A Cigar Box Guitar With One Finger

The First Three Chords In Open G Tuning

First of all if you don’t know how to tune your guitar, read my absolute beginners guide here to tune to open G.

The three chords G,C and D are linked together in a special relationship to each other, so they are ideal chords to learn as an absolute beginner.

These are chords that are referred to as I (1), IV (4) and V (5) and will help you with improvising, playing 12 bar blues and many other songs. As an added bonus, they are really easy to play with just one finger or a guitar slide on that on finger.

There are so many songs you can play with just these 3 chords, so it’s really worth learning to play them well, so read on for tips on how to get a good sound.

Open Strings And Fretted Strings- What Does This Actually Mean?

When we talk about open strings, we mean playing a string without having any frets pressed down by the fretting hand.

When we talk about fretting strings, we mean that the string is played at the same time as the fretting hand is pressing down on the string.

We can use a finger to fret the strings or a slide. The positions on the frets of the finger with and without a slide are slightly different:

If you are not using a guitar slide, follow the directions below to put the fretting finger just behind the fret wire.
If you are using a guitar slide, the slide must be positioned directly over the fret line- see this article for more tips

The G Chord On A Cigar Box Guitar

If your guitar is tuned G D G, then just strumming the open notes without using a fretting hand at all will give you a G chord.

You will want to check that the strings aren’t buzzing awkwardly. See here if you have any problems.

This is the absolutely easiest chord you can play, but it’s not the only way you can play a G chord.

Fretting across the 12th fret will give you a G chord but played at a higher octave.

There are also ways to add musical colour to the chord to make it a G major, or G minor or G7th chord, but for this lesson, we are just concentrating on easy to play power chords.

Practise playing this chord by strumming straight down with your thumb or back of the nail on your forefinger ( pointer finger) or a plectrum or pick if you prefer.

Once you can get a good sound with down strums, try playing an up strum. This means playing the highest string first. Then you can try alternating up and down strums. In later lessons, we will look at strumming in more detail. This is just to get you started so you can start playing different chords.

How To Play The C Chord On A Cigar Box Guitar

Fretting across the fifth fret will give you a C power chord. What that last sentence means is that you put your fretting finger, usually your left hand ( but see this article if you are left-handed) on to the fretboard just behind the 5th fret wire.

You can see where your fretting finger needs to be in this picture:

To get a good sounding chord, you need to bear a few things in mind:

Your fretting finger needs to sit just behind the fret wire. If you have your finger too far back, say in the middle of the fret, halfway between the fret wires, the notes will be out of tune. The chord will sound flat.
Push down firmly enough to get a good sound but not too firmly so that your wrist and finger ache straight away. Learning the guitar will be difficult on your fingers and wrist to start with, but let’s try to make it so that you don’t hurt yourself. Your thumb and forefinger will be pressing in different directions on the neck. The thumb will press up and the forefinger will press down.
Look at the creases in your finger where the joints are. Try to avoid having crease directly over a string as the gap produced will mean you are trying to press down even harder.
If you find fretting very difficult, try using your 1st, 2nd and 3rd fingers in a line on the strings instead. Put your 1st finger on the lowest sounding string at the 5th fret. Then put your 2nd finger on the middle string at the 5th fret. Then put your 3rd finger on the highest sounding string at the 5th fret.

Two Easy Ways To Play The D Chord On a Cigar Box Guitar

So the third chord we are looking at today is the D power chord. This completes the special group of G, C and D which are also called the I, IV and V chords( Roman Numerals which are spoken as the 1, 4 and 5 chords)

Just like you played the C chord on the 5th fret, now you can play the D chord on the 7th fret. 7 7 7

Remember the tips from above about how to get a good fretting position or alternatively, line the 3 fingers up on the 7th fret.

It seems to me that most cigar box guitarists seem to favour the barred chord using just one finger, but there’s no reason why you can’t use 3 fingers if you want. On a s string guitar, barre chords are something that a beginner is not expected to be able to play, so do feel free to try the 3 finger method if you are struggling.

There is an easy alternative to playing the D chord on the 7th fret and this is to play on the 2nd fret, not fretting all 3 strings, just the outer 2.We can write this as 2 0 2 or show it as:

Play Two Versions Of The D Chord

Try playing both versions now and compare the sound. They sound very similar- right? That’s because you are playing the same notes, just in a different order. As you progress, you will find that there are lots of ways of playing the same chord on a Cigar Box Guitar.

If you know anything about music theory, you will know that these are called inversions, but it’s not important to remember that word. Just remember that if you are struggling to play a chord in a particular chord shape, there’s always an alternative.

There’s a good reason that I wanted to tell you about the alternative version of the D chord. Moving from the open G chord to fretting the 5th fret is not too hard. Moving from the 5th fret to the 7th is not too hard. But sometimes, especially if the chords need to be played really quickly, moving from the open chord all the way up to the 7th fret is a bit tricky.

Try it now-

open G chord to 7th fret D 7 7 7 compared to
open G chord to 2nd fret D ( just don’t forget to leave that middle string open!) 2 0 2

It’s your choice and it’s your choice every time you play that D chord. Whichever way is easiest when you are moving from one chord to another is the best chord for you for that strumming pattern or song.

Whichever chord shape is easiest for you when you are moving from one chord to another is the best chord shape for you for that particular strumming pattern or song.

What To Do Now

Hopefully, you now feel that you know how to make the correct chord shapes for G, C and D.

It’s probably not sounding quite how you want it, but keep trying.

Many people forget that playing a cigar box guitar is just as much about getting a good rhythm as playing the right chords. Practice moving from one chord shape to another as smoothly as you can. See if you can improve your strumming. Look at this article or watch this YouTube video for tips. (coming soon)