D Chord Guitar Variations – 24 Ways to Play D Chord on Guitar

The D Guitar Chord

In Today’s lesson we are going to cover the D guitar chord. The D chord is usually one of the very first chords guitarists learn when first starting out.Usually this is due to guitarists learning chords in what is considered the “Open position.”

The D Major guitar chord has the following notes in it:
Root Note: D
The 3rd: F#
The 5th: A

What notes make up the D Guitar Scale?

The D Chord is a derivative of the D Major scale. The D major scale has the following notes in it.
D major scale: D, E, F♯, G, A, B, and C♯

What Chords are in the key of D guitar?

The chord types that come from this scale are:
D major. Note: D E F# G A B C# D. …
E minor. Note: E F# G# A B C# D# E. …
F# minor. Note: F# G# A# B C# D# E# F# …
G major. Note: G A B C D E F# G. …
A major. Note: A B C# D E F# G# A. …
B minor. Note: B C# D# E F# G# A# B. …
C# diminished. Note: C# D# E# F# G# A# B# C#

Learn more about music theory and guitar here.

If you’re new to guitar I recommend working on this open position chord before moving on to more advanced chord voicing’s.

The Open D Chord Looks Like This:

Here are a few tips for the open position D Chord

Tip 1: Remember to roll your fingertips. If you don’t roll your fingertips it’s highly likely that you will end up muting strings and having the D chord sound incorrectly.

Tip 2: Keep your thumb on the back of the neck. Place your whole thumb there (not the tip).

Tip 3: Play the chord note by note to make sure you aren’t accidentally muting any of the strings that need to ring out.

For the open position D chord this would be the 4th string open, which is the D note. The third string second fret with your index finger, which would be the A note.

The second string of the third fret with your ring finger,which would be another D note.
Lastly, the sixth string on the second fret with your middle finger, which would be the F# note.

This open voicing should ring out D – A – D – F#

Next up let’s take a look at the 5 most commonly used D chords across the entire neck of the guitar.

D Chord Guitar Variations

D Chord Guitar Songs

Did you know that the relative minor key for D Major is B Minor?

This means that many famous songs in the key of B Minor theoretically are also in the key of D Major. Here are some famous songs inside this key

1. “Hotel California” – The Eagles
2. “Should I Stay or Should I Go” – The Clash
3. ” Bad Moon Rising” – CCR
4. “Blowin in the wind” – Bob Dylan
5. ” The Thrill is gone” – BB King

Learning More Basic Guitar Chords

If you’re interested in learning more basic guitar chords check out my other post here. 14 basic guitar chords every guitarist must know