How to Play 7 Chord Arpeggios on the Guitar

Learning the 7 chord arpeggios allows more versatility in playing your guitar. While a chord sounds nice and forms many of the notes when playing guitar, understanding the arpeggio, which makes up the chord, lets you play more music and create your own songs as you learn.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

1. Know what an arpeggio is. A major scale consists of eight notes in half and whole step increments. The pattern is the same on all scales, and an arpeggio consists of the first, third, fifth and last notes of a scale.
2. Practice scales and chords first. Playing arpeggios will be difficult if you're not an expert with scales and chords. Select one chord you know really well to begin to learn to play the arpeggio.
3. Identify the notes in the chord. For guitar players, they are called root, third, fifth and seventh. The pattern is the same for all scales, though the exact notes will change.
4. Play the notes one at a time. Play them slowly until you get it right and then move forward. As you advance, play the notes in more than one octave. In this scenario, the "seventh" for the first octave becomes the "root" for the second octave.

Tips & Warnings

• If you have trouble identifying the notes in an arpeggio in your head, try writing out the notes to the scale on paper and circling the appropriate notes. Use this "cheat sheet" until you can play the arpeggio from memory.