Guitar: Bb maj11 in the Changes

Where Bb maj11 sits once the key is named, and what this seat is responsible for while it sounds.

A# maj11 chord diagram, starting at fret 1. Strings low to high: E 1st fret, A 1st fret, D open, G 5th fret, B 4th fret, E 5th fret.

Bb maj11 is Bb – C – D – Eb – F – A. Naming the notes is where a chord chart stops. A tune asks the next question instead, and that is the one this page answers.

Nine times in ten a chart puts Bb maj11 in the tonic's place, and the subdominant after that — so before working out a voicing, work out which key makes it that, because the key decides which notes the rest of the group has already taken.

The guitar seat carries the comp — the changes stated in three and four notes behind whoever is playing the melody, which in practice means dropping the root and playing the notes nobody else is covering — the third and the seventh first, everything else only if it fits under the hand.

Every shape is drawn for EADGBE across 6 strings, the open ones first and the movable ones up the neck after them, and each one plays back so you can hear the voicing before you commit it to a chorus.