The CAGED
system is a method used to help you relate scales to chord patterns.
It’s a simple concept, some guitarists think it’s useful
and some think it’s pointles
s or not necessary. The truth is it
has it’s uses but as you become more experienced you will find
yourself never really thinking about or needing it and it certainly
isn’t a requirement to becoming good on the guitar. So
what’s the point of it you might be wondering?
Well, it’s
easier to remember chord shapes than it is scale shapes. It’s
also easier to find where a chord should be played on the neck of the
guitar for any given key. By using a method to relate five common
major scale shapes to five common chord shapes we should, in theory,
have an easier time locating those scale positions.
CAGED guitar
system, as the name implies, refers to the common major chords C A G
E D in open position.
The five
chords do not have to be in open position, they can be played in fact
anywhere on the neck. Realising this is the key to understanding the
CAGED system. For example here is the G chord played in fifth
position to make an A major.
The square
shaped note in the diagram is the root note and any of the chords can
be moved along the neck in the same fashion, whatever note the root
lands on will decide what the chord is. By thinking of these chord
shapes and the major scales together, it becomes a much easier job
trying to find major scales anywhere on the neck because it’s
easier to remember and quickly visualise a chord shape than a scale shape.
The following
diagrams show the common five patterns for the Major scale and how
the chords fit nicely into those scale patterns. The order of chords
never change and this is what makes it handy. A is always next to G,
E always next to D and so on. If you start from the E chord for
instance then the order will be EDCAG. Learn to associate the shapes,
get used to the order of chords along the fretboard and you will
start finding many uses for the CAGED guitar system.
