B Minor guitar chord
The standard grips this chord is usually shown with.
- Tap a note to hear it
- Arrows change position
- Fingers, notes or intervals
- Play the chord
About Bm — 1st inversion
Bm is B, D and F# — B with the third lowered a semitone.
It sounds darker than a major triad, and just as settled. The i of a minor key, and the vi, ii or iii of a major one.
Bm notes and formula
| B | D | F# |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | ♭3 | 5 |
Tonic — minor chords rest as readily as major ones.
Also written Bmin, B- or B minor. The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play Bm
Bm in 1st inversion puts D in the bass instead of B, the 3rd of the chord. The notes are the same; what changes is what the bass line does, which is most of why you would reach for it — it lets the lowest voice move by step where the root would have jumped.
2 of Bm’s 8 common shapes do this: x5443x, x-x-12-11-12-10.
Start with x5443x — no barre and low, at the 3rd fret. None of the shapes for Bm uses an open string, so every one of them is movable; the lowest sits at the 2nd fret. 2 of the 8 need a barre. Together they cover the neck from the 2nd fret to the 14th.
| Frets | Where | Bass | Top | Hand |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| x24432 | 2nd fret | B, root position | F# | all fretted |
| x5443x | 3rd fret | D, 1st inversion | D | all fretted |
| 7544x7 | 4th fret | B, root position | B | all fretted |
| 799777 | 7th fret | B, root position | B | barred |
| xx9777 | 7th fret | B, root position | B | barred |
| x-x-9-11-12-10 | 9th fret | B, root position | D | all fretted |
| x-x-12-11-12-10 | 10th fret | D, 1st inversion | D | all fretted |
| x-14-12-11-12-x | 11th fret | B, root position | B | all fretted |
The same notes rebuilt from scratch give 46 triad and 4 open string voicings, each on its own page.
How to use Bm
How you get to it. The turn that lands on Bm is C#m7♭5 to F#7♭9: the ii and the V of B minor, which is where a minor tonic is usually arrived at rather than simply begun on.
In which keys. Every note of Bm belongs to D major (the vi), E minor (the v), F# minor (the iv), G major (the iii), A major (the ii) and B minor (the i).
What to play over Bm
Every note of Bm is in B minor pentatonic, B blues, B dorian, B natural minor and B phrygian.
Chords near Bm
Change one note of Bm and you have B (the minor third becomes a major third), Bdim (the fifth becomes a flat fifth), Bsus2 (the minor third becomes a ninth), Bsus4 (the minor third becomes a fourth), Bm6 (add the sixth) or Bm7 (add the flat seventh).
Bm is a minor chord — root, minor third, fifth. Minor chords on every root.
On Bm’s sound and use this page follows Edward Aldwell & Carl Schachter, Harmony and Voice Leading (Schirmer / Cengage, 4th ed., 2011). The shapes and the derived voicings come from different places, and both are explained in where the chords and the theory come from.