Gm9 guitar chord
Playable, correctly spelled, and not how the chord is normally voiced. Right now this is the shapes that put a ninth, eleventh or thirteenth below the root.
- Tap a note to hear it
- Arrows change position
- Fingers, notes or intervals
- Play the chord
About Gm9 — uncommon voicings
Gm9 is G, Bb, D, F and A — Gm7 with the ninth stacked above it.
It sounds warm, and considerably richer than an m7. The standard voicing for a ii chord once the plain one has been played enough.
Pre-dominant or minor tonic — an m7’s job with more colour.
Gm9 notes and formula
| G | Bb | D | F | A |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ♭3 | 5 | ♭7 | 9 |
Also written Gmin9, G-9 or G minor 9. The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play Gm9
Five notes and four fingers, so something has to go. Keep Bb and F (they fix the quality) and A (what the symbol is about). Let D and G go, in that order — a perfect fifth says nothing the root has not, and in a band the bass has the root.
Play Gm9 as a shell — root, third and seventh — and the spare string takes the 11 (C) or the 13 (E).
All 9 common shapes as fret numbers, lowest string first. Hover or tap one to see it drawn.
- 300331, open position, G, root position, top note F, barred
- 31x231, 1st fret, G, root position, top note F, all fretted
- x13233, 1st fret, Bb, 1st inversion, top note G, barred
- 353335, 3rd fret, G, root position, top note A, barred
- xx7066, 6th fret, A, 9th in the bass, top note Bb, 1 open string
- 687786, 6th fret, Bb, 1st inversion, top note Bb, all fretted
- x-10-8-10-10-x, 8th fret, G, root position, top note A, barred
- x-12-12-12-11-13, 11th fret, A, 9th in the bass, top note F, barred
- x-x-12-14-11-13, 11th fret, D, 2nd inversion, top note F, all fretted
How to use Gm9
How you get to it. The turn that lands on Gm9 is Am7♭5 to D7♭9: the ii and the V of G minor, which is where a minor tonic is usually arrived at rather than simply begun on.
In which keys. Every note of Gm9 belongs to D minor (the iv, the subdominant), F major (the ii, the supertonic), G minor (the i, the tonic) and Bb major (the vi, the submediant).
What to play over Gm9
Every note of Gm9 is in G natural minor and G dorian.
Each of those is a page: the scale across the neck, and the chords it harmonises into — which is where Gm9 sits in it. Every scale.
Chords near Gm9
Change one note of Gm9 and you have Gm69 (the flat seventh becomes the sixth), Gm7 (drop the ninth), Gm11 (add the eleventh), GmMaj9 (the flat seventh becomes the major seventh), Gmadd9 (drop the flat seventh) or G9 (the minor third becomes the major third).
Gm9 is a minor chord — root, minor third, fifth. Minor 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.