How to play Bm (B Minor) on Guitar

Bm is the B minor chord. It is built from 3 notes — B, D and F# — which sit at the root, minor third and perfect fifth above the root B. Written as a formula that is 1P – 3m – 5P. Those intervals, not the note names, are what give the chord its character: move all of them to a different root and you still hear a minor chord.

Bm on guitar is a movable shape with no open strings, fretted between fret 2 and fret 4, the shape spans 3 frets, 1 string is muted and should not sound — damp it with the underside of a fretting finger. Since the shape uses no open strings it is fully movable: slide it one fret higher and you have the same chord a semitone up, which is the cheapest way to learn eleven more chords from one hand position.

The interval that defines this chord is the minor third between B and D. Lowering the third by one semitone is the entire difference between B major and B minor, and it is the reason the chord reads as darker or sadder to most listeners. With only the triad and no added seventh, the chord is stable and finished-sounding, which makes it a natural place for a phrase to land.

Bm belongs to 3 major keys, including G major, where it is the iii chord, D major, where it is the vi chord and A major, where it is the ii chord. That is the practical reason to learn it: a chord that is diatonic to several keys turns up constantly, and knowing which degree it occupies tells you what tends to come next. A iii chord in G major most often moves toward the tonic, so practising Bm in the context of G will teach you more than practising it in isolation.