Eli5 CAGED system on guitar

Question

Eli5 CAGED system on guitar

In: 177

Answer 1

Pay attention to the *shapes* of those open chords, more than their names. Start with the open C chord, and notice its root note is the C at the 3rd fret of the 5th string.

Now play the same shape as an open A chord, but as a barre chord with its root at that 3rd fret, 5th string C note. This is still a C chord, but it’s shaped like an open A.

Now look at an open G chord. It has three open notes on the 2nd, 3rd, 4th strings, which we can line up with the three notes on our previous A shape, but at the 5th fret instead of being open. This creates another C chord barred at the 5th fret, with a low C at the 6th string’s 8th fret (where the 6th string’s 3rd fret G would be in a normal open G chord shape).

Now look at an open E. It has its root at the open 6th string, so if we slide that up to the C at the 8th fret, we get another barred C chord, this one shaped like an open E. Notice it has another C note at the 3rd string’s 10th fret (where the 3rd string’s 2nd fret E would be).

Now look at an open D, with its root at on the open 4th string. Move that shape up to have its root at the previous shape’s C on the 10th fret, and we have yet another C chord that looks like an open D.

This pattern holds for any chord, and even repeats with another C shape following after the D shape. That’s all the CAGED system is. It’s just a mnemonic to help you remember the order those chord shapes appear across the fret board, to make it easier to find other shapes of a given chord based on an initial shape and position.