About C#m — triad voicings
C#m is C#, E and G# — C# 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.
C#m notes and formula
| C# | E | G# |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | ♭3 | 5 |
Tonic — minor chords rest as readily as major ones.
Also written C#min, C#- or C# minor. The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play C#m
Three notes on one string set. No seventh, so nothing is claimed about the chord beyond its quality.
Thin on their own, excellent over a bass line or against someone else’s harmony.
C#m has 47 of them, on the high-middle three, the top three strings, the top four strings, the bottom three strings, the middle four strings, the bottom four strings, the low-middle three, strings 5-3-2-1 and strings 6-4-3-2, from open position up to the 13th — every inversion the chord has: C# in the bass, E in the bass and G# in the bass. The one to learn first is the E shape at the nut, which is the easiest grip here.
6 of them sit on the top 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.
Start with x4212x — no barre and down at the nut. None of the shapes for C#m uses an open string, so every one of them is movable; the lowest sits at the 1st fret. 2 of the 8 need a barre. Together they cover the neck from the 1st fret to the 14th.
| Frets | Where | Bass | Top | Hand |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| x4212x | 1st fret | C#, root position | C# | all fretted |
| x46654 | 4th fret | C#, root position | G# | all fretted |
| x7665x | 5th fret | E, 1st inversion | E | all fretted |
| 9766x9 | 6th fret | C#, root position | C# | all fretted |
| 9-11-11-9-9-9 | 9th fret | C#, root position | C# | barred |
| x-x-11-9-9-9 | 9th fret | C#, root position | C# | barred |
| x-x-11-13-14-12 | 11th fret | C#, root position | E | all fretted |
| x-x-14-13-14-12 | 12th fret | E, 1st inversion | E | all fretted |
How to use C#m
How you get to it. The turn that lands on C#m is D#m7♭5 to G#7♭9: the ii and the V of C# minor, which is where a minor tonic is usually arrived at rather than simply begun on.
In which keys. Every note of C#m belongs to C# minor (the i), E major (the vi), F# minor (the v), Ab minor (the iv), A major (the iii) and B major (the ii).
What to play over C#m
Every note of C#m is in C# minor pentatonic, C# blues, C# dorian, C# natural minor and C# phrygian.
Chords near C#m
Change one note of C#m and you have C# (the minor third becomes a major third), C#dim (the fifth becomes a flat fifth), C#sus2 (the minor third becomes a ninth), C#sus4 (the minor third becomes a fourth), C#m6 (add the sixth) or C#m7 (add the flat seventh).
C#m is a minor chord — root, minor third, fifth. Minor chords on every root.
On C#m’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.