How to substitute an open chord for a barre chord?

[Riverwolf]

For those of you cringing at the title of this thread...

I am 64, been playing for about nine years and very fluent in open chords.
Also some moveable shapes and some flatpicking and Carter style.
However, hand arthritis prevents playing any full barre chords.
My pinkie on both hands are basically useless for guitar playing.
Sucks!

Anyway I am learning "Two of Us" by the Beatles.
There is a Bb and a Gm barre used in this song.

Any help or ideas?
Thanks!

[Robin, Wales]

Shorten the chords.

I have had the last phalanx of my left hand index finger amputated, so barre chords are out. So I'll play a chord like F just on the bottom 4 strings, perhaps with an alternating bass on the 4th and 5th strings.

It is surprising just how accurate you can become at strumming just 4 strings for song accompaniment. And how full the sound can still be. Plus I can guarantee that your audience will never notice that you are not using a barre chord.

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by Riverwolf

For those of you cringing at the title of this thread...

I am 64, been playing for about nine years and very fluent in open chords.
Also some moveable shapes and some flatpicking and Carter style.
However, hand arthritis prevents playing any full barre chords.
My pinkie on both hands are basically useless for guitar playing.
Sucks!

Anyway I am learning "Two of Us" by the Beatles.
There is a Bb and a Gm barre used in this song.

Any help or ideas?
Thanks!

You'll need to be able to mute a string or two, but these non-barre shapes might work:

Bb: x-1-3-3-3-x (one finger per string). Or x-1-0-3-3-x, or x-1-3-x-3-x

Gm (Gm7) = 3-x-0-3-3-x, 3-1-3-0-3-x

Or if you can use your thumb to fret the 6th (and mute the top 2 strings at the same time), there's these:

Bb: 6-8-8-7-x-x

Gm: 3-5-5-3-x-x

These are rather nice-sounding shapes for Bb, but might be tricky changing to the other chords:

6-8-0-7-6-x (index pinky ring middle)

6-5-0-7-6-x (middle index pinky ring)

Another alternative (maybe easier all round!) is to use a capo on fret 3, so the shapes are then as follows:

G = E
C = A
C/B = replace this with Cmaj7 x-0-2-1-2-0
Am7 = x-0-4-2-2-0, or 2-0-2-2-2-0 (4 fingers, or thumb on 6th)
D = B7

Bb = G
Dm = Bm x-x-4-4-3-2, or go for Bm7: x-2-0-2-0-2
Gm7 = Em7

[Mr. Jelly]

I haven't looked at the song but there are times where one or two notes will work instead of whole chords. Especially if you don't have to hang on them very long.

[MC5C]

If you want to go really simple, a Gm7 chord is the top four strings barred at the third fret, mute the fifth and sith strings. One finger chord! Or add the root G with the fourth string fifth fret. An ultra simple Bb chord is the exact same as the Gm7 but mute the top string, or play the Bb on the stop string 6th fret, or play the Bb on the fifth string first fret. Two finger chords. As you can see, Bb and Gm are amost the exact same chord.

[FrankHudson]

Yes, try different chord forms and chord voicings. Sometimes you'll simplify the chords, maybe not playing all the notes, other times you can add interesting "extra" notes that morph chord into something with a different flavor that can be interesting. Let your ears and taste be your guide.

I often play Bm as with just the D, G, and B strings (B string on 3rd fret, G and D strings on 4th fret -- the Am form moved up two frets). That gets you the full Bm triad. Add the open A below this? Bm7. Add the open E above it as well? Bm11.

Lack of reliable flexibility in my fretting fingers has also led me to investigate altered tunings more often, another way to add harmonic colors your left hand otherwise wouldn't be able to make happen.

[tbeltrans]

For me, the best approach to this sort of problem (how can I voice a chord in different ways) is a two step process:

1. Learn to identify all the notes on the fretboard
2. Learn how to spell chords

Once you know these two items, you can voice any chord anywhere on the fretboard, and that solves your problem forever (i.e. teach a man to fish...). All the suggestions for specific voicings that are posted to this thread are all well and good, but knowing these two items will allow you to find all of those suggestions yourself and many more. The best part is that it really doesn't take all that much time and effort as long as you are consistent by doing a little every day and letting the knowledge accumulate over time. Also, all this information is freely available on the internet so it doesn't cost you anything.

In the middle of this page is a nice chart: https://guitaration.com/guitar-fretboard-notes/
...and you can download it for free: https://guitaration.com/free-resourc...retboard%20pdf

Chord spellings are here: https://www.brendanpauljacobs.com/spelling.htm

It only took me a few seconds to find these links. There are many, many more elsewhere on the net, all for free.

A Bb major chord is spelled 1 3 5 (for Bb: Bb D F).
A G minor chord is spelled 1 b3 5 (for G mi: G Bb D)

If you can identify all the notes on the fretboard, then you know where all the Bb, D, and F notes are and can therefore find all the ways to play these anywhere on the fretboard and pick whatever suits what you are trying to do. Same story with the G, Bb, and D notes. All you need are the three notes for these triads, not 5 or 6. When voicing your own chords, you only need to play as many or as few notes as you want. Big 5 and 6 note chords that only contain triads, contain repeated notes of the triad. You don't need those repeated notes.

The more you do this, the better you get at it and you are not just doing silly exercises for the sake of doing exercises. This stuff always relates to what you need on the fretboard to play music.

Edit: Here are a couple more really helpful goodies:

1. When voicing chords using so-called "color tones" (extensions), we still have only six strings. Generally, we don't often want to use all six strings even if that is enough to voice a chord. So, here are a couple of helpful guidelines to keep the voice count down and still have a nice sounding chord:

- 6th can replace 7 (not dominant 7 though)
- 13 replaces 5
- #11 replaces 5
- 11 (in a minor 7 chord) can replace 5

Also, some solutions to get out of musically odd situations such as making a chord easier to play, to nicely harmonize a certain melody, or just ot add interest - a couple of very basic diatonic substitutions:

- I, iii, vi can substitute for each other
- ii, IV can substitute for each other
- V7 and viib5 can substitute for each other (very common in pop music)

There are many more such as the tritone or b5 sub, sub-dominant, back cycling, etc., but these go way beyond typical fingerstyle and folk type accompaniment.

Anyway, much to chew on...

Tony

[Mandobart]

Here's something no one says enough here - you don't have to play all the strings on every chord.

In fact, in most cases you probably shouldn't. I can, but almost never do, play full E-to-E barre chords.

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by MC5C

If you want to go really simple, a Gm7 chord is the top four strings barred at the third fret,

Yes, but barres are precisely the chord shape he has difficulty with.

Mind you, in my post I forgot that he has problems with his pinky too, which rules out some of my suggestions...

[merlin666]

Another solution is transposing to a key that has all easy open chords. With Beatles songs I find that I have to transpose almost everything anyway for ease of singing, even though I am a tenor but some of their stuff is just too high.

[Riverwolf]

Thanks for all the replies!

[Gdjjr]

This link has a transpose + and - at the bottom right hand of the page-
It doesn't always work out for me ( I don't do barre chords) but transposing it
up or down usually gets me a lot closer to what I can and want to do.

I chose this song at random- I just type in "lyrics and chords" to a particular song and it is one of many that comes up

https://tabs.ultimate-guitar.com/tab...-chords-763859

[ljguitar]

Originally Posted by Riverwolf

For those of you cringing at the title of this thread...

I am 64, been playing for about nine years and very fluent in open chords.
Also some moveable shapes and some flatpicking and Carter style.
However, hand arthritis prevents playing any full barre chords.
My pinkie on both hands are basically useless for guitar playing.
Sucks!

Anyway I am learning "Two of Us" by the Beatles.
There is a Bb and a Gm barre used in this song.

Any help or ideas?
Thanks!

Hi R-wolf

Two suggestions:

I'm in the transpose camp as well for a quick solution.

Chord shape solution…
Also, you can play a minor chord by fingering an A minor with fingers 2-3-4 (on strings2-3-4), and then drop the first finger to the A string one fret behind the A minor fingering for the root. Confine your strumming or picking to eliminate the outside strings. Takes it's name from the note on the 5th string.

And for major chords, finger an E maj chord with fingers 2-3-4 (on strings (3-4-5) and drop the first finger one fret behind the chord grouping for the root. Eliminate strings 1-2 when you play this style chord. I call them easier-than-a-barre chords. Takes it's name from the note on the 6th string.

I can still play full barres, and I often resort to these because of the sound of them.

[phydaux]

Take all the barre chords and throw them on the floor until they break up into their basic triads.

You can play a gm 2nd inversion on the 3-4-5 strings at the 3rd fret using the E form barre shape on those strings.

You can play bm 2nd inversion on the 2-3-4 strings at the 4th fret using an A form barre on those strings.