BmMaj7 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.
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- Fingers, notes or intervals
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About BmMaj7 — shell voicings
BmMaj7 is B, D, F# and A# — Bm 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.
BmMaj7 notes and formula
| B | D | F# | A# |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ♭3 | 5 | 7 |
Minor tonic — the tonic of the melodic minor.
Also written BmM7, Bm(maj7), B-Δ7 or BminMaj7. The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play BmMaj7
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.
BmMaj7 has 7 of them, on the low-middle three, strings 5-3-2, strings 6-4-3 and the bottom three strings, from the 2nd fret up to the 14th — all in one inversion, so the bass note never moves. The one to learn first is the B shape at the 2nd fret, which is the easiest grip here.
Start with x20302 — 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 2nd fret to the 14th.
| Frets | Where | Bass | Top | Hand |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| x20302 | open position | B, root position | F# | 2 open strings |
| x24332 | 2nd fret | B, root position | F# | all fretted |
| x54476 | 4th fret | D, 1st inversion | A# | all fretted |
| xx9776 | 6th fret | B, root position | A# | all fretted |
| 798777 | 7th fret | B, root position | B | barred |
| x-x-9-11-11-10 | 9th fret | B, root position | D | all fretted |
| x-14-12-11-11-x | 11th fret | B, root position | A# | all fretted |
The same notes rebuilt from scratch give 14 drop 2, 10 drop 3 and 6 open string voicings, each on its own page.
Tensions. A shell of BmMaj7, root, third and seventh, leaves a string free, and the tones that belong over it are the 9 (C#), the 11 (E) and the 13 (G#).
How to use BmMaj7
How you get to it. The turn that lands on BmMaj7 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.
What to play over BmMaj7
Every note of BmMaj7 is in B harmonic minor and B melodic minor.
Chords near BmMaj7
Change one note of BmMaj7 and you have Bm (drop the major seventh), Bmaj7 (the minor third becomes a major third), Bm6 (the major seventh becomes a sixth), Bm7 (the major seventh becomes a flat seventh), BmMaj7b5 (the fifth becomes a flat fifth) or BmMaj9 (add the ninth).
BmMaj7 is a minor chord — root, minor third, fifth. Minor chords on every root.
On BmMaj7’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.