BbmMaj7 guitar chord
A close-position chord with the second voice from the top lowered an octave. Sits on four adjacent strings.
- Tap a note to hear it
- Arrows change position
- Fingers, notes or intervals
- Play the chord
About BbmMaj7 — drop 2 voicings
BbmMaj7 is Bb, Db, F and A — Bbm 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.
Minor tonic — the tonic of the melodic minor.
BbmMaj7 notes and formula
| Bb | Db | F | A |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ♭3 | 5 | 7 |
Also written BbmM7, Bbm(maj7), Bb-Δ7 or BbminMaj7. The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play BbmMaj7
Take the four notes stacked as close together as they go, then drop the second voice from the top an octave. The gap it opens is what makes the chord sound like a chord rather than a cluster.
It lands on four adjacent strings, which is why it is the workhorse voicing on guitar.
BbmMaj7 has 13 of them, on the middle four strings, the bottom four strings and the top four strings, from open position up to the 13th — every inversion the chord has: Bb in the bass, Db in the bass, F in the bass and A in the bass. The one to learn first is the Bb shape at the nut, which is the easiest grip here.
5 of them sit on the middle four strings, 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.
Play BbmMaj7 as a shell — root, third and seventh — and the spare string takes the 9 (C), the 11 (Eb) or the 13 (G).
All 7 common shapes as fret numbers, lowest string first. Hover or tap one to see it drawn.
- x13221, 1st fret, Bb, root position, top note F, all fretted
- x43365, 3rd fret, Db, 1st inversion, top note A, all fretted
- xx8665, 5th fret, Bb, root position, top note A, all fretted
- 687666, 6th fret, Bb, root position, top note Bb, barred
- x-x-8-10-10-9, 8th fret, Bb, root position, top note Db, all fretted
- x-13-11-10-10-x, 10th fret, Bb, root position, top note A, all fretted
- x-13-15-14-14-13, 13th fret, Bb, root position, top note F, all fretted
How to use BbmMaj7
How you get to it. The turn that lands on BbmMaj7 is Cm7♭5 to F7♭9: the ii and the V of Bb minor, which is where a minor tonic is usually arrived at rather than simply begun on.
What to play over BbmMaj7
Every note of BbmMaj7 is in Bb harmonic minor and Bb melodic minor.
Chords near BbmMaj7
Change one note of BbmMaj7 and you have Bbm (drop the major seventh), Bbmaj7 (the minor third becomes the major third), Bbm6 (the major seventh becomes the sixth), Bbm7 (the major seventh becomes the flat seventh), BbmMaj7b5 (the fifth becomes the flat fifth) or BbmMaj9 (add the ninth).
BbmMaj7 is a minor chord — root, minor third, fifth. Minor 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.