About F#5 — triad voicings
F#5 is F# and C# — F# with the third taken out altogether.
It sounds blunt, and neither major nor minor. Distortion turns a real third to mud, which is why rock guitar plays this instead of a triad.
F#5 notes and formula
| F# | C# |
|---|---|
| 1 | 5 |
Neutral — with no third it commits to no mode.
Also written F#(no 3rd) or F# power chord. The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play F#5
Three notes on one string set. No seventh, so nothing is claimed about the chord beyond its quality.
Thin on their own, excellent over a bass line or against someone else’s harmony.
F#5 has 21 of them, on the bottom three strings, the low-middle three, the bottom four strings, the high-middle three, the middle four strings, the top three strings, strings 5-3-2-1, strings 6-4-3-2 and the top four strings, from the 2nd fret up to the 11th — every inversion the chord has: F# in the bass and C# in the bass. The one to learn first is the F# shape at the 2nd fret, which is the easiest grip here.
4 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 244xxx — only 3 fretted notes and down at the nut. None of the shapes for F#5 uses an open string, so every one of them is movable; the lowest sits at the 2nd fret. None of them needs a barre. Together they cover the neck from the 2nd fret to the 11th.
| Frets | Where | Bass | Top | Hand |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 244xxx | 2nd fret | F#, root position | F# | all fretted |
| x-9-11-x-x-x | 9th fret | F#, root position | C# | all fretted |
How to use F#5
In which keys. Every note of F#5 belongs to C# major (the IV), C# minor (the iv), D major (the iii), Eb minor (the ♭III), E major (the ii), F# major (the I), F# minor (the i), Ab minor (the ♭VII), A major (the vi), Bb minor (the ♭VI), B major (the V) and B minor (the v).
What to play over F#5
Every note of F#5 is in F# major pentatonic, F# minor pentatonic, F# blues, F# major and F# lydian.
Chords near F#5
Change one note of F#5 and you have F# (add the major third), F#m (add the minor third), F#sus2 (add the ninth) or F#sus4 (add the fourth).
F#5 is a suspended chord — root and fifth, with a second or fourth where the third would be — or nothing at all. Suspended and power chords on every root.
On F#5’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.