A Guitars in Classroom Presentation

Augmented - Diminished

Augmented implies that the basic chord is altered and made larger. In the F augmented chord diagram notice that the "C" note of the common F Major chord is "Raised) one fret. A Diminished chord implies that it is "Smaller" than the original chord. In practice, Diminished chords are played as Diminished 7th chords. This indicates that each note in a common Dominant 7th chord is lowered one half (one fret) step. That does not apply to the Tonic (or Name note) of the chord.

These are not Primary chords but they may come in handy. A unique feature of the Diminished chord is that it has four names. Each note within the chord can be the Tonic. Therefore G dim is also Db dim, E dim and Bb dim. At least now you know the terms and have a reference for the chords.


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