Dmaj9 guitar chord
The root left to the bass player. Frees a finger for a tension.
- Tap a note to hear it
- Arrows change position
- Fingers, notes or intervals
- Play the chord
About Dmaj9 — rootless voicings
Dmaj9 is D, F#, A, C# and E — Dmaj7 with the ninth stacked above it.
It sounds a maj7 with more air in it. The ninth argues with nothing here, so it works anywhere a maj7 does.
Dmaj9 notes and formula
| D | F# | A | C# | E |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 3 | 5 | 7 | 9 |
Tonic — an extended resting chord.
Also written DM9, DΔ9, Dma9 or D major 9. The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play Dmaj9
Leave the root to the bass player. In a band nobody misses it, and the ear supplies it from the guide tones anyway.
The finger it frees goes to a tension, which is why these sound richer than the shape they came from rather than thinner.
Dmaj9 has 13 of them, on the top four strings, the middle four strings and strings 5-3-2-1, from the 2nd fret up to the 14th — every inversion the chord has: F# in the bass, A in the bass, C# in the bass and E in the bass. The one to learn first is the E shape at the 2nd fret, which is the easiest grip here.
5 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 x5465x — no barre and low, at the 4th fret. None of the shapes for Dmaj9 uses an open string, so every one of them is movable; the lowest sits at the 2nd fret. 7 of the 12 need a barre. Together they cover the neck from the 2nd fret to the 14th.
| Frets | Where | Bass | Top | Hand |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| x52222 | 2nd fret | D, root position | F# | barred |
| x5465x | 4th fret | D, root position | E | all fretted |
| 55465x | 4th fret | A, 2nd inversion | E | barred |
| x90979 | 7th fret | F#, 1st inversion | C# | barred |
| x77779 | 7th fret | E, 9th in the bass | C# | barred |
| xx7979 | 7th fret | A, 2nd inversion | C# | all fretted |
| 10-7-7-7-7-9 | 7th fret | D, root position | C# | barred |
| 10-9-11-9-10-9 | 9th fret | D, root position | C# | barred |
| 10-12-11-11-10-12 | 10th fret | D, root position | E | all fretted |
| x-x-11-11-10-12 | 10th fret | C#, 3rd inversion | E | all fretted |
| x-x-12-11-14-12 | 11th fret | D, root position | E | all fretted |
| 14-12-12-14-14-12 | 12th fret | F#, 1st inversion | E | barred |
The same notes rebuilt from scratch give 3 shell, 10 drop 2, 7 drop 3 and 6 open string voicings, each on its own page.
Tensions. A shell of Dmaj9, root, third and seventh, leaves a string free, and the tones that belong over it are the #11 (G#) and the 13 (B).
How to use Dmaj9
How you get to it. The turn that lands on Dmaj9 is Em7 to A7 — the ii and the V of D — and A7 shares its third and seventh with Em7, so the hand barely moves between them.
In which keys. Every note of Dmaj9 belongs to D major (the I, the tonic), F# minor (the ♭VI), A major (the IV, the subdominant) and B minor (the ♭III).
What to play over Dmaj9
Every note of Dmaj9 is in D major and D lydian.
Chords near Dmaj9
Change one note of Dmaj9 and you have Dmaj7 (drop the ninth), Dmaj11 (add the fourth), Dmaj13 (add the sixth), DmMaj9 (the major third becomes a minor third), Dadd9 (drop the major seventh) or D69 (the major seventh becomes a sixth).
Dmaj9 is a major chord — root, major third, fifth. Major chords on every root.
On Dmaj9’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.