Basic Beginner Guitar Chord – Learn to Play C Major 7

The C Major 7 Guitar Chord (also known as C Major Seventh, CMaj7) is a beautiful, dreamy sounding chord. It is often used in Jazz Guitar.  It is a basic beginner chord and very easy to play.  There are several different ways to play this chord, but this lesson will demonstrate the easiest way.

The C Major 7 Chord is found by locating the 1, 3 , 5  and 7 positions (C, E, G and B) of the C Major Scale: C D E F G A B C.  You are basically playing a C Major Chord and simply lifting your first finger off the C Note of the 2nd string first fret. That string now becomes open, so you are playing a B note.  The chord chart below demonstrates how to play the CMaj7 Chord.

Here is a key that will help you read the chart:

Everything on the above chart should be self explanatory, except for the last three in the third column. They may need a bit of explaining. The O, or open symbol, simply means that you do not press down on any notes on that string. The X means you do not strum that particular string. The Barre symbol means you need to barre that particular fret. When you barre a fret you are pressing down on multiple strings at the same time with one finger.

Chord Playing Tip: Be sure that you are pressing down on the strings hard enough. You should play each string one at a time to make sure you have a nice clean sound. If any of the strings buzz or sound muted, then something is not right.

C Major7 Guitar Chord Video

The video below will further demonstrate how to correctly play the CMaj7 Chord. Enjoy!