Guitar For Dummies

From Guitar For Dummies, 2nd Edition by Mark Phillips, Jon Chappell

To play guitar according to a songbook, you need to translate the fingerboard diagrams in the book to actual notes or chords on a guitar. Most guitar songs are composed of chords in various combinations, so the time spent on adding chords to your playing repertoire is time well spent.

How to Translate Fingerboard Diagrams to a Real Guitar

You can translate the lines and circles in a fingerboard diagram for guitar players quite easily once you get the hang of it. The following figure, which shows the relation between a diagram and an actual guitar helps you turn a diagram into a chord.

Basic Guitar Chords

Guitar playing is mostly, or at least often, a matter of playing chords. The standard guitar chords are represented in the following charts, which show the basic chords for a variety of well-known songs.