A · Cavaquinho

Think of the sound of getting home and closing the door behind you. That's A major, in three notes. Give the audio below a listen and see if your body doesn't agree.

Listen first

What you just heard

Now listen to the arpeggio, one note at a time. There are only three: A, C# and E. The middle one is the one that matters. That's the major third, and it's what gives this chord its wide-open-day face — file that name away, because in a minute we'll move exactly that note and you'll hear the weather change.

Now it's your hands' turn

On the cavaquinho, four steel strings tuned D–G–B–D pack the chord into a small, bright space — every finger counts. So start with the first position below — the position marked with ⭐ is the easiest to play. Advice from someone who's seen this scene a thousand times: play the notes one by one before strumming. If one sounds muffled, a finger is touching the next string. Adjust, try again. Everyone goes through it; it doesn't last.

Precision Tuner — Before you play these shapes, get in tune — chromatic tuner and reference tones · try it in Chord & Fret

Above, the same A, higher up the neck. No rush — but the day a song wants this chord brighter and tighter, you'll already have the address.

What is A?

A: A Major. The notes are A, C#, E (fixed-do: La, Do#, Mi) — the degrees 1–3–5.

Where this chord lives

In real music, where does it earn its keep? Almost always as VI in C# minor, III in F# minor, VII in B minor. Don't memorize that — just notice that the same shape plays different roles in different songs, the way a word changes meaning with the sentence.

Transpose & Capo — Need it in another key? Move the whole chart and find the easiest capo · open in Chord & Fret

Identify Chord — Found a shape on your own fretboard? The app names it back · use it in Chord & Fret

Real songs pass through here: Rock · mixolídio clássico · Rock · blues frame · Reggae · vamp maior · Forró · vamp nordestino · Forró · I-IV-V simples · Blues · twelve-bar

Where it tends to go

Treating A as the home chord (I) of its key, it usually moves toward the pre-dominant (Bm / D) or the dominant (E / G#°) — and the dominant pulls back home. Typically, not a rule.

Every shape of A lives in Chord & Fret Pro — 4 instruments, 16 tunings, 41 chord types and 57 scales, in every key. Start free. Unlock everything with Pro. Plays offline. Free to start, no card needed.

When you want to go further

When it's time to improvise over it, A Ionian (A B C# D E F# G# · 1 2 3 4 5 6 7: the plain major scale, where everything starts); A Lydian (A B C# D# E F# G# · 1 2 3 #4 5 6 7: the major scale with a raised fourth — one extra step of daydream) fit entirely. The swaps below are for when your ear gets bored of the obvious.

Scale — The whole scale on the neck — in boxes or three notes per string, with an exercise and a tempo ramp · open in Chord & Fret

Improvising in context

To improvise over A as home, the A Ionian scale covers it whole — it contains every note of the chord. And when the dominant (E) pulls back, the leading tone Ab is the note that wants to resolve home.

Swaps that work:

• Gbm7Gbm7Gbm7Gbm7 — Relative minor (vi) — same tonic function
• Dbm7Dbm7Dbm7Dbm7 — Mediant (iii) — tonic function

Reharmonize — Want richer substitutions? Reharmonize the progression in a tap · see it in Chord & Fret

One last test: play A and let it ring. Comfortable, right? Exactly. Now come see what happens when we add one note and take that comfort away: A7.

Updated August 5, 2026