Ebaug9 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 Ebaug9 — rootless voicings
Ebaug9 is Eb, G, B, Db and F — Eb7 with the fifth raised and the natural ninth added on top.
It sounds bright, tense and slightly unreal. Raising the fifth leaves no semitone in the lower half of the chord, which is where the whole-tone flavour comes from.
Altered dominant — dominant pull with a whole-tone colour.
Ebaug9 notes and formula
| Eb | G | B | Db | F |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 3 | ♯5 | ♭7 | 9 |
Also written Eb9#5, Eb+9 or Eb9(#5). The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play Ebaug9
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.
Ebaug9 has 14 of them, on the top four strings, the middle four strings and strings 5-3-2-1, from open position up to the 12th — every inversion the chord has: G in the bass, B in the bass, Db in the bass and F in the bass. The one to learn first is the F shape at the 2nd fret, 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.
Five notes and four fingers, so something has to go. Keep G and Db (they fix the quality) and B and F (what the symbol is about). Let Eb go — a perfect fifth says nothing the root has not, and in a band the bass has the root.
Play Ebaug9 as a shell — root, third and seventh — and the spare string takes the #11 (A).
All 7 common shapes as fret numbers, lowest string first. Hover or tap one to see it drawn.
- 343443, 3rd fret, G, 1st inversion, top note G, barred
- x65667, 5th fret, Eb, root position, top note B, barred
- 989889, 8th fret, Db, 3rd inversion, top note Db, barred
- 11-10-x-10-0-9, 9th fret, Eb, root position, top note Db, 1 open string
- 11-10-11-10-12-x, 10th fret, Eb, root position, top note B, all fretted
- 11-x-11-12-12-13, 11th fret, Eb, root position, top note F, all fretted
- x-x-11-12-12-13, 11th fret, Db, 3rd inversion, top note F, all fretted
How to use Ebaug9
Ebaug9 is a dominant with its tension raised, so it still points at Ab — harder than a plain seventh does, because the altered tones sit a semitone from where they are going.
In a phrase:Bbm7→Ebaug9→Abmaj7— the ii–V–I of Ab.
Voice by voice, Ebaug9 → Ab. 3 voices move by a semitone, and one note is common to both chords.
| In Ebaug9 | Moves | In Ab |
|---|---|---|
| Eb, the root | stays where it is | Eb, the fifth |
| G, the major third | rises a semitone | Ab, the root |
| B, the sharp fifth | rises a semitone | C, the major third |
| Db, the flat seventh | falls a semitone | C, the major third |
| F, the ninth | falls a whole tone | Eb, the fifth |
What to play over Ebaug9
Every note of Ebaug9 is in Eb whole tone.
Chords near Ebaug9
Change one note of Ebaug9 and you have Ebalt (the ninth becomes the flat ninth), Ebaug7 (drop the ninth), Eb9 (the sharp fifth becomes the fifth) or Eb9b5 (the sharp fifth becomes the flat fifth).
Ebaug9 is an altered chord — a dominant seventh with its fifth or ninth moved. Altered dominant 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.