Am/G Chord on Guitar

1,008 guitar chords with several shapes each, finger numbers, difficulty and real sound, in any tuning.

Am/G means “Am with G in the bass”: play a A minor chord and make G the lowest note. G is not one of the chord’s own notes, so the bass adds colour as well as moving the bass line.

The notes, low to high, are G, A, C, E. The library above opens on Am/G with 14 shapes that keep G at the bottom; tap one to hear it.

Notes in Am/G

Note	Degree	Interval from A	Semitones
G	bass	minor seventh (below)	10
A	1	root	0
C	♭3	minor third	3
E	5	perfect fifth	7

Formula: 1 – ♭3 – 5. On guitar the 5th is often left out of the bigger shapes without changing the chord.

How to play Am/G

Open positionBeginner302010

E-shape barre at fret 3Easy335555

Fret 2Easy3322xx

Fret 5Easyxx5555

A-shape barre at fret 10Easyx(10)(10)(12)(10)(12)

Open positionMedium33x210

Open position (bass on the 6th string), step by step

1st finger (index): 2nd string, 1st fret (C, the minor third).
2nd finger (middle): 4th string, 2nd fret (E, the fifth).
3rd finger (ring): 6th string, 3rd fret (G, the bass).
Let the 5th string, 3rd string, 1st string ring open (A, G, E).
Strum from the 6th string across all six strings.

How Am/G is used

G is the flat seventh of Am, so the full set of notes is Am7/G (minor seventh with G in the bass). Writing it as Am/G tells you to keep the Am shape and just change the bass.

In D major, A – Am/G – F♯m walks the bass down step by step (A, G, F♯) while the chords on top change. Played the other way, F♯m – Am/G – A, the bass climbs.

When a chord sheet writes Am/G, play the chord on top and let G be the lowest string you strum; if you play with a bass player, the bass plays G.