FmMaj7b5 guitar chord
Root, third and seventh: the guide tones fix the quality, so the fifth is dropped. That is what leaves a string free, so pick a tension to put on top.
- Tap a note to hear it
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- Fingers, notes or intervals
- Play the chord
About FmMaj7b5 — shell voicings
FmMaj7b5 is F, Ab, Cb and E — Fm7b5 with the seventh raised a semitone.
It sounds brittle and impossible to mistake. Scarce enough that most players meet it as a passing sonority rather than as a chord they chose.
FmMaj7b5 notes and formula
| F | Ab | Cb | E |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ♭3 | ♭5 | 7 |
Rare tonic — a half-diminished chord with its seventh raised instead.
Also written FmM7b5 or Fm(maj7)b5. The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play FmMaj7b5
Root, third and seventh. The third and seventh, the guide tones, are what make the chord major, minor or dominant, so the fifth can go: it says nothing the symbol needs.
Three notes means a spare string, which is the real point. Put a tension on it.
FmMaj7b5 has 3 of them, on strings 6-4-3-2 and strings 5-3-2-1, from open position up to the 12th — all in one inversion, so the bass note never moves. The one to learn first is the F shape at the nut.
Start with 122100 — no barre and 2 open strings. 1 of the 7 shapes here sits in open position. 3 of the 7 need a barre. Together they cover the neck from the 1st fret to the 14th.
| Frets | Where | Bass | Top | Hand |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 122100 | open position | F, root position | E | 2 open strings |
| 1221x1 | 1st fret | F, root position | F | barred |
| xx3454 | 3rd fret | F, root position | Ab | all fretted |
| x8x997 | 7th fret | F, root position | Cb | all fretted |
| x8999x | 8th fret | F, root position | Ab | barred |
| 13-14-x-13-12-12 | 12th fret | F, root position | E | all fretted |
| 13-14-14-13-x-13 | 13th fret | F, root position | F | barred |
The same notes rebuilt from scratch give 14 drop 2, 9 drop 3 and 3 open string voicings, each on its own page.
Tensions. A shell of FmMaj7b5, root, third and seventh, leaves a string free, and the tones that belong over it are the 11 (Bb) and the b13 (Db).
What to play over FmMaj7b5
Every note of FmMaj7b5 is in F diminished.
Chords near FmMaj7b5
Change one note of FmMaj7b5 and you have Fdim (drop the major seventh), Fdim7 (the major seventh becomes a sixth), Fmaj7b5 (the minor third becomes a major third), Fm7b5 (the major seventh becomes a flat seventh) or FmMaj7 (the flat fifth becomes a fifth).
FmMaj7b5 is a diminished chord — root, minor third, flat fifth. Diminished and half-diminished chords on every root.
On FmMaj7b5’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.