Fadd9 guitar chord
The third voice from the top lowered an octave. The dropped voice becomes the bass, which is why a string is skipped.
- Tap a note to hear it
- Arrows change position
- Fingers, notes or intervals
- Play the chord
About Fadd9 — drop 3 voicings
Fadd9 is F, A, C and G — F with the ninth added, and no seventh.
It sounds bright and ringing. No seventh at all: that is what “add” means, and it is why this sounds open where a maj9 sounds lush.
Fadd9 notes and formula
| F | A | C | G |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 3 | 5 | 9 |
Tonic — a triad with one colour on it.
Also written F(add9), Fadd2 or F add nine. The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play Fadd9
The same operation one voice further down: the third voice from the top falls an octave and becomes the bass.
That leaves a bigger hole under the top three notes, so a string gets skipped: the muted string in the middle is the shape, not a mistake.
Fadd9 has 10 of them, on strings 6-4-3-2 and strings 5-3-2-1, from open position up to the 13th — every inversion the chord has: F in the bass, A in the bass, C in the bass and G in the bass. The one to learn first is the G shape at the nut.
5 of them sit on strings 6-4-3-2, 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 xx32x3 — no barre and only 3 fretted notes. 1 of the 6 shapes here sits in open position. 2 of the 6 need a barre. Together they cover the neck from the 2nd fret to the 15th.
| Frets | Where | Bass | Top | Hand |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| xx32x3 | 2nd fret | F, root position | G | all fretted |
| xx3065 | open position | F, root position | A | 1 open string |
| x87585 | 5th fret | F, root position | A | all fretted |
| x87088 | 7th fret | F, root position | C | barred |
| 13-12-x-12-13-13 | 12th fret | F, root position | F | barred |
| x-x-15-14-13-15 | 13th fret | F, root position | G | all fretted |
The same notes rebuilt from scratch give 15 drop 2 and 1 open string voicings, each on its own page.
How to use Fadd9
How you get to it. The turn that lands on Fadd9 is Gm7 to C7 — the ii and the V of F — and C7 shares its third and seventh with Gm7, so the hand barely moves between them.
In which keys. Every note of Fadd9 belongs to C major (the IV), D minor (the ♭III), F major (the I), G minor (the ♭VII), A minor (the ♭VI) and Bb major (the V).
What to play over Fadd9
Every note of Fadd9 is in F major pentatonic, F major, F lydian, F mixolydian and F lydian dominant.
Chords near Fadd9
Change one note of Fadd9 and you have F (drop the ninth), Fsus2 (drop the major third), Fsus2sus4 (the major third becomes a fourth), Fmaj7 (the ninth becomes a major seventh), Fmaj9 (add the major seventh) or Fmadd9 (the major third becomes a minor third).
Fadd9 is a major chord — root, major third, fifth. Major chords on every root.
On Fadd9’s sound and use this page follows Robert Rawlins & Nor Eddine Bahha, Jazzology (Hal Leonard, 2005). The shapes and the derived voicings come from different places, and both are explained in where the chords and the theory come from.