AmMaj7 guitar chord
Root, third and seventh: the guide tones fix the quality, so the fifth is dropped. That is what leaves a string free, so pick a tension to put on top.
- Tap a note to hear it
- Arrows change position
- Fingers, notes or intervals
- Play the chord
About AmMaj7 — shell voicings
AmMaj7 is A, C, E and G# — Am with the major seventh added on top.
It sounds tense and wrong-footed. A minor triad carrying a major seventh: the semitone under the root over a minor chord is the first bar of a line cliché.
AmMaj7 notes and formula
| A | C | E | G# |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ♭3 | 5 | 7 |
Minor tonic — the tonic of the melodic minor.
Also written AmM7, Am(maj7), A-Δ7 or AminMaj7. The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play AmMaj7
Root, third and seventh. The third and seventh, the guide tones, are what make the chord major, minor or dominant, so the fifth can go: it says nothing the symbol needs.
Three notes means a spare string, which is the real point. Put a tension on it.
AmMaj7 has 6 of them, on the low-middle three, strings 5-3-2, the bottom three strings and strings 6-4-3, from open position up to the 12th — all in one inversion, so the bass note never moves. The one to learn first is the A shape at the 5th fret, which is the easiest grip here.
Start with x02110 — no barre and 2 open strings. 1 of the 7 shapes here sits in open position. 1 of the 7 needs a barre. Together they cover the neck from the 1st fret to the 14th.
| Frets | Where | Bass | Top | Hand |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| x02110 | open position | A, root position | E | 2 open strings |
| x32254 | 2nd fret | C, 1st inversion | G# | all fretted |
| xx7554 | 4th fret | A, root position | G# | all fretted |
| 576555 | 5th fret | A, root position | A | barred |
| xx7998 | 7th fret | A, root position | C | all fretted |
| x-12-10-9-9-x | 9th fret | A, root position | G# | all fretted |
| x-12-14-13-13-12 | 12th fret | A, root position | E | all fretted |
The same notes rebuilt from scratch give 13 drop 2, 9 drop 3 and 6 open string voicings, each on its own page.
Tensions. A shell of AmMaj7, root, third and seventh, leaves a string free, and the tones that belong over it are the 9 (B), the 11 (D) and the 13 (F#).
How to use AmMaj7
How you get to it. The turn that lands on AmMaj7 is Bm7♭5 to E7♭9: the ii and the V of A minor, which is where a minor tonic is usually arrived at rather than simply begun on.
What to play over AmMaj7
Every note of AmMaj7 is in A harmonic minor and A melodic minor.
Chords near AmMaj7
Change one note of AmMaj7 and you have Am (drop the major seventh), Amaj7 (the minor third becomes a major third), Am6 (the major seventh becomes a sixth), Am7 (the major seventh becomes a flat seventh), AmMaj7b5 (the fifth becomes a flat fifth) or AmMaj9 (add the ninth).
AmMaj7 is a minor chord — root, minor third, fifth. Minor chords on every root.
On AmMaj7’s sound and use this page follows Mark Levine, The Jazz Theory Book (Sher Music, 1995). The shapes and the derived voicings come from different places, and both are explained in where the chords and the theory come from.