Chord book?

[CSIMelissa]

I'm wanting to get a mando chord book and I was wondering which one everyone liked here. I recently bought one by James Major but it's a bit impractical for me (at least right now) because the chords are arranged by key rather than by chord name. I don't know HOW anyone could memorize all those chords for each key. Anyway, that being beside the point, what would another good resource be for me to have? I'm not looking for complicated Bluegrass chords, just the 2 and 3 finger chords.

Thanks!

[Joseph Baker]

Have you looked at chords under "more resources" on the Mandolin Café home page?

Joseph Baker

[Don Julin]

"Mandolin For Dummies" has hundreds of chords with the simpler two finger or open chords all located in one chapter. Other chapters feature jazz style chords, bluegrass chop chords, and other styles of chords. At 400 pages I'll bet there is something else in there that you may find useful also. In the spirit of full disclosure, I am the author of the book. Happy New Year!

[tander]

I would recommend the Mandolin For Dummies, maybe the only book you will need.

[MaggieMae]

"Mandolin For Dummies" has hundreds of chords with the simpler two finger or open chords all located in one chapter. Other chapters feature jazz style chords, bluegrass chop chords, and other styles of chords. At 400 pages I'll bet there is something else in there that you may find useful also. In the spirit of full disclosure, I am the author of the book. Happy New Year!

Don, I bought your book on my Kindle and am using it as I begin my journey of learning to play this lovely instrument. It is so useful that I think I am going to need to get the paper copy as well, so I can have it when my Kindle is charging. I highly recommend it.

[Mike Arakelian]

Melissa...If you use either an IPad or IPhone, you can download a free Mandolin app that will show you chords, scales, has a metronome, etc. It's easy to use and would be a good backup to your books.

[John Soper]

A Mandolin Cafe Coffee mug (NFI) will give you a primer while you are waking up in the morning, and will help support this site...

[Jackflyn]

If you have an android device I would suggest smartChord. It has about everything you would need and the recent revision makes the screen easy to read. It has the added advantage of letting you hear (as midi) each chord. Inversion.

[Marvino]

There was a older post that had this chord chart.( I cant find the post, maybe someone else has link to it?) I really like it because I am trying to get away from the typical bluegrass 4 finger chop chords. Might be a good chart to start with.

[CSIMelissa]

Ha, ha no Android devices here... I'm old school. I'll need to get a copy of Mandolin for Dummies because I just don't care for the chord book I have. Now... If only I could stop "failing finger syndrome".

[RobP]

I use the Niles Hokkanen book found here:

http://www.elderly.com/books/items/46-13.htm

It has everything I need in a nice format

Cheers

Rob

[lorrainehornig]

My constant companion is "Mel Bay's Deluxe Encyclopedia of Mandolin Chords". It is available on Amazon.com. The author is the Mandolin Cafe's Scott Tichenor. I reference it constantly.

[Nevin]

Sounds like you have lots of good suggestions but can I put a plug in for learning some theory and the fretboard? If you do that you can determine how best to finger the chord in any given situation.

[lorrainehornig]

When I reference my chord book it is because I am having to move too far along the fretboard and can't accomplish chord changes quickly enough. As I am trying to achieve "economy of motion" as my instructor refers to it, I check out the chord book to see if there is a variation of the chord I need that requires little movement. The book I reference above is organized by chord, not key. I like this better than books that are arranged by key.

[CSIMelissa]

Sounds like you have lots of good suggestions but can I put a plug in for learning some theory and the fretboard? If you do that you can determine how best to finger the chord in any given situation.

I am learning the fretboard (I've only had my mando a month and am just learning how to read music) but I'm also wanting a good chord book. :-)

[OU1]

Tons of resources out there for chords....books are always a good...this website, tons of other websites...but in my opinion, mandolin for dummies is a great resource, portable and has more than just chords. My guess is you'll wind up with several before it is all said and done.....I have several....might even be called a collection at this point. Nice thing is that they are always there to refer to when you need to.

[Gplayer]

I've been using this one. It takes the prospective of what key you're playing in and lays out the chords of that key signature. A little weird at first, but once you get use to it's really helpful.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Mandolin-C.../dp/0825622964

[mandroid]

Old tech .. I used a photocopier , and I compiled my own.. 3 finger chords from Jetro Burn's books

and another old Oak Publication .. had several inversions up the neck and Chords
Maj/Min/ Aug/dim and 7ths of each..


You could use staff paper and have a format to draw on ..

[Phil Vinyard]

Glad to share the chord chart I give to my students. Get these down and you're good for 90%+ of the bluegrass tunes you'll run into.

[Rodney Riley]

"Mandolin For Dummies" has hundreds of chords with the simpler two finger or open chords all located in one chapter. Other chapters feature jazz style chords, bluegrass chop chords, and other styles of chords. At 400 pages I'll bet there is something else in there that you may find useful also. In the spirit of full disclosure, I am the author of the book. Happy New Year!

Love mine. Thanks Don. Take the book to Staples or other office supply stores that can change it to ring bound. Inexpensive and the book lies open sooo much better.

[Ryk Loske]

What Rodney said. Ring bound NOT comb bound. Great book! Don also has some very helpful videos on YouTube.

Ryk

[OmarEastwind]

Love mine. Thanks Don. Take the book to Staples or other office supply stores that can change it to ring bound. Inexpensive and the book lies open sooo much better.

I'm not a big fan of the whole "Dummies" thing, but this book by Don Julin is really excellent. I hadn't thought of getting it ring bound until I saw your post this morning, so I took my copy in to the copy shop and it only cost $3 to have it bound...very nice!!