Unit 18: Add 9?

We studied the sus chord in "Sweet Home Alabama". To review, A sus is a direction to "suspend" or replace the 3rd in a triad (1,3,5) with the 4th or other scale degree indicated- sometimes the 2nd. To illustrate: a C chord is spelled C,E,G. A Csus4 is spelled C,F,G and a Csus2 is spelled C,D,G. If you ever see something like "Csus" With no number after it, the 4th is understood to be the scale degree replacing the 3rd, So Csus is spelled C,F,G, just like C sus 4

The operative word here is replace. A sus chord removes the 3rd, and replaces it with the 2nd or 4th.

We will now look at a chord extension, "add 9". which means to simply add the 9th scale degree to the existing chord. For example, Cadd9 is spelled: C,E,G,D as D is the ninth. Sometimes this chord is written as Cadd2 because a D is a D no matter what octave it's in. The thing you need to remember is that a chord with add9 attached to it means that there is a third in the chord. A sus means that the third has been replaced.

Let's learn a song that uses this chord. Green Day's ever popular "Time of your Life". The progression for the verse is:G /Cadd9 D/
The Cadd9 is spelled C,E,G,D with the C on the A string (2nd finger, 3rd fret) E on the D string (1st finger, 2nd fret) open G, then D on the B string (3rd finger, 3rd fret). If you look closely, you can see the shape of the C chord you learned long ago with the B string note moved up a whole step.

I'll pass out a chart for this tune in class, and we'll play it together. Your assessment will be making a recording of yourself playing this tune, and a written component where you will need to spell sus chords and add9 chords.