Abmaj13 guitar chord
The third voice from the top lowered an octave. The dropped voice becomes the bass, which is why a string is skipped.
- Tap a note to hear it
- Arrows change position
- Fingers, notes or intervals
- Play the chord
About Abmaj13 — drop 3 voicings
Abmaj13 is Ab, C, Eb, G, Bb and F — Abmaj9 with the thirteenth on top, and the eleventh left out.
It sounds full and wide open. Everything the major scale offers except the eleventh, which is left out because it fights the third.
Tonic — the major sound with most of the scale showing.
Abmaj13 notes and formula
| Ab | C | Eb | G | Bb | F |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 3 | 5 | 7 | 9 | 13 |
Also written AbM13, AbΔ13 or Ab major 13. The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play Abmaj13
The same operation one voice further down: the third voice from the top falls an octave and becomes the bass.
That leaves a bigger hole under the top three notes, so a string gets skipped: the muted string in the middle is the shape, not a mistake.
Abmaj13 has 9 of them, on strings 6-4-3-2 and strings 5-3-2-1, from open position up to the 13th — every inversion the chord has: Ab in the bass, C in the bass, G in the bass and F in the bass. The one to learn first is the G shape at the nut.
5 of them sit on strings 6-4-3-2, so you can run the inversions up one set without changing strings — which is the whole reason to learn them as a family rather than as separate grips.
Six notes and four fingers, so something has to go. Keep C and G (they fix the quality) and F and Bb (what the symbol is about). Let Eb and Ab go, in that order — a perfect fifth says nothing the root has not, and in a band the bass has the root.
Play Abmaj13 as a shell — root, third and seventh — and the spare string takes the #11 (D).
All 6 common shapes as fret numbers, lowest string first. Hover or tap one to see it drawn.
- 433343, 3rd fret, Ab, root position, top note G, barred
- 445564, 4th fret, Ab, root position, top note Ab, barred
- x86688, 6th fret, F, 13th in the bass, top note C, barred
- x-11-10-10-8-8, 8th fret, Ab, root position, top note C, all fretted
- x-11-8-10-8-8, 8th fret, Ab, root position, top note C, barred
- x-11-11-12-13-13, 11th fret, Ab, root position, top note F, all fretted
How to use Abmaj13
How you get to it. The turn that lands on Abmaj13 is Bbm7 to Eb7 — the ii and the V of Ab — and Eb7 shares its third and seventh with Bbm7, so the hand barely moves between them.
In which keys. Every note of Abmaj13 belongs to C minor (the ♭VI), Eb major (the IV, the subdominant), F minor (the ♭III) and Ab major (the I, the tonic).
What to play over Abmaj13
Every note of Abmaj13 is in Ab major and Ab lydian.
Chords near Abmaj13
Change one note of Abmaj13 and you have Abmaj9 (drop the thirteenth), Abmaj11 (the thirteenth becomes the eleventh), Ab69 (drop the major seventh) or Ab13 (the major seventh becomes the flat seventh).
Abmaj13 is a major chord — root, major third, fifth. Major chords on every root.
The common shapes and the derived voicings come from different places, and both are explained in how this site is built.