Pat McClintock's Jazz Chords
Pat McClintock is a good friend, a terrific mandolin player and aficionado of fine single-malt whisky. He's been a musical inspiration to me and I can say I've learned a lot from his playing. I'm proud to present Pat's chord collection here and hope you gain some insight from his work.
Here's a PDF copy of the chord chart used for our presentation at the 1998 CMSA mandolin convention in Alexandria, Virginia.
What is a Quatropenta?
These pages contain chord shapes for "quatropentas," my made-up name for stringed instruments that have four strings or courses tuned in ascending fifths -- members of the mandolin family, tenor guitar, tenor banjo, and other instruments.
The shapes are for chords that are often thought of as "jazz" chords, including extended and altered chords, and, for the most part, each chord contains four separate notes; that is, no chord element is repeated.
These shapes are the ten or so most commonly used, and you may notice that there are a number of enharmonic shapes; some shapes can have three chord names. Finally, these certainly aren't the only chord shapes; there are other shapes and other chord names not included here.
For directions on how to read these pages, see below. Have fun!
- dominant 7th
- minor 7th
- major 7th
- dominant 6th
- minor 6th
- dominant 9th
- major 9th
- dominant 6/9
- dominant 7b5
- minor 7b5
- dominant 7b9
- dominant 7#5
- minor 9
- diminished
How to Use These Chord Shapes
The shapes are as "closed" as possible, with no open strings. Fingerings are not shown; maybe that's a future project, but in most cases, the fingerings are obvious, and you should be able to figure them out.
The shapes are shown without reference to a specific key; to use these shapes, you have to know the elements that make up a specific chord name (for example, 1-3-5-b7 is a dominant seventh chord), and you have to know where the notes are on the fingerboard. You should be able to use these shapes in any and every key.
For each chord name, the sequence of shapes shown is based on a progression that begins with the chord root on the lowest string (such as the G string on the mandolin), then the third note of the chord on the lowest string, and so on.
