How To Make An 'A' Chord On Guitar

The 'A' chord is one of the most heavily used chords in guitar playing. They are used in bands such as Metallica, AC/DC, Megadeth, and much more. There are many ways to play the 'A' chord besides your standard position that you are all familiar with.

Did you know that you can play the 'A' guitar chord up and down the neck? Here I will show you how to make an 'A' chord on a guitar in a variety of different positions. This will benefit you in a few ways. You will make your guitar playing sound better. When it comes to playing songs that have an 'A' guitar chord, you can use your own method.

Ok, so to start this off we will look at the standard 'A' guitar chord (The 'A' Major guitar chord not the Minor chord)

guitar A chord

As you can see, this is your standard 'A' guitar chord, and it shows the notes that you will be hitting. The 'X' means to mute the string, and the 'O' means they are an open string and you should hit them when you strum the guitar strings.

Now, this is how to make an 'A' chord on guitar using another position:

guitar A chord

As you can see on this guitar chord diagram, this is the 'A' guitar chord on the 5th fret of the 'E' string. 

In order to make an 'A' guitar chord in any position you just need to remember three letters. These notes are 'A' 'E' 'C#'. Why? You might be asking.

These are the three notes that make up an 'A' guitar chord. If you can find these notes on the fretboard, you can make an 'A' chord shape anywhere!

Look at the following picture below, and you see the different types of guitar chord shapes that you can make. Keep in mind also that some of these will be somewhat long stretches.

a guitar chord chart

 Pay attention to the notes of the string; they are all the same just in a different order. If you play those three notes that you can see on the chord diagram (regardless of the order of the notes) then you will always have an 'A' Major guitar chord.

One thing worth knowing is that you can apply this same formula for other chords too. If for example, you want to make an 'E' Major guitar chord or a 'G' Major guitar chord you only need to know the three notes that make up that guitar chord.

To make it visual, here is an E Major chord. The guitar chord of E Major has three notes, and they are 'E' 'B' 'G#'

Take a look at this guitar chord chart:

Image result for e major chord

This is your standard E Major guitar chord. Now, to find another position just remember the three notes as written above and find them on the fretboard.

E major guitar chord

 As you can see for this E Major guitar chord, the notes are B, E, and C#. Find those three notes, and you can make the chord anywhere on the fretboard!

It's that simple. That was our guide on how to play an 'A' chord on the guitar, as well as playing the chord in any position.