Eb69 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 Eb69 — drop 2 voicings
Eb69 is Eb, G, Bb, C and F — Eb6 with the ninth added as well.
It sounds wide and entirely at rest. The modern way to voice a tonic when a triad is too bare and a maj7 too pointed.
Eb69 notes and formula
| Eb | G | Bb | C | F |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 3 | 5 | 6 | 9 |
Tonic — it commits to nothing.
Also written Eb6/9, Eb6add9 or Eb six nine. The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play Eb69
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.
Eb69 has 14 of them, on the top four strings, the bottom four strings and the middle four strings, from open position up to the 12th — every inversion the chord has: Eb in the bass, G in the bass, C in the bass and F in the bass. The one to learn first is the Eb shape at the nut, 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 x63543 — no barre and low, at the 3rd fret. 1 of the 8 shapes here sits in open position. 7 of the 8 need a barre. Together they cover the neck from the 1st fret to the 13th.
| Frets | Where | Bass | Top | Hand |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| xx1011 | open position | Eb, root position | F | barred |
| x33343 | 3rd fret | C, 6th in the bass | G | barred |
| x63543 | 3rd fret | Eb, root position | G | all fretted |
| x65566 | 5th fret | Eb, root position | Bb | barred |
| x88888 | 8th fret | F, 9th in the bass | C | barred |
| 11-10-10-10-11-11 | 10th fret | Eb, root position | Eb | barred |
| x-x-13-12-13-13 | 12th fret | Eb, root position | F | barred |
| x-13-13-12-13-13 | 12th fret | Bb, 2nd inversion | F | barred |
The same notes rebuilt from scratch give 5 shell, 9 drop 3 and 15 rootless voicings, each on its own page.
Tensions. A shell of Eb69, root, third and seventh, leaves a string free, and the tones that belong over it are the #11 (A).
How to use Eb69
How you get to it. The turn that lands on Eb69 is Fm7 to Bb7 — the ii and the V of Eb — and Bb7 shares its third and seventh with Fm7, so the hand barely moves between them.
In which keys. Every note of Eb69 belongs to C minor (the ♭III), Eb major (the I), F minor (the ♭VII), G minor (the ♭VI), Ab major (the V) and Bb major (the IV).
What to play over Eb69
Eb69 is every note of the Eb major pentatonic, and nothing else. It also sits inside Eb major, Eb lydian, Eb mixolydian and Eb lydian dominant.
Chords near Eb69
Change one note of Eb69 and you have Ebmaj9 (the sixth becomes a major seventh), Ebmaj13 (add the major seventh), Ebm69 (the major third becomes a minor third), Ebadd9 (drop the sixth), Eb6 (drop the ninth) or Eb9 (the sixth becomes a flat seventh).
Eb69 is a major chord — root, major third, fifth. Major chords on every root.
On Eb69’s sound and use this page follows Mark Levine, The Jazz Piano Book (Sher Music, 1989). The shapes and the derived voicings come from different places, and both are explained in where the chords and the theory come from.