Chord & FretBm · Cavaquinho
From B major to Bm, a single note moves — and it feels like the season changed. Hit play below and check.
Listen first
What you just heard
The trick is smaller than it sounds. Two of the three notes didn't move: B and F# stayed put. Only the middle one dropped — a half step, the smallest distance in music — and became D. Go back to the audio and catch the arpeggio note by note and stop at the second note. That's the one. Half a step separates a sunny day from a Monday morning.
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 the first position below is your way in — the position marked with ⭐ is the easiest to play. And do the exercise that's worth a whole lesson: B major, then Bm, then major again. Back and forth ten times, slowly. Your ear learns the difference before your brain does.
2 more shapes of this chord on the neck
That's over 200,000 voicings and inversions in Chord & Fret Pro, ready to play.
Precision Tuner — Before you play these shapes, get in tune — chromatic tuner and reference tones · see it in Chord & Fret
Once the first shape comes out without thinking, the positions below are waiting. That's where Bm lives in songs that roam the neck.
Left-handed? Mirror's right here
What is Bm?
Bm: B minor. The notes are B, D, F# (fixed-do: Si, Re, Fa#) — the degrees 1–b3–5.
Where this chord lives
In real music, Bm works almost always as v in E minor, iv in F# minor, i in B minor. In pop everywhere it tends to be the famous vi — the chord the chorus runs to when it wants to get serious without changing key. You've heard it a thousand times; now you'll start noticing it.
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 · try it in Chord & Fret
Where it tends to go
Treating Bm as the home chord (I) of its key, it tends to go toward the pre-dominant (C#m / E) or the dominant (F# / A#°) — and the dominant pulls back home. It's a tendency, not a law.
Every shape of Bm lives in Chord & Fret Pro — 4 instruments, 16 tunings, 41 chord types and 57 scales, in every key. Start free. Unlock everything with Pro. 100% offline. Free to start, no card needed.
When you want to go further
When it's time to improvise, B Dorian (B C# D E F# G# A · 1 2 b3 4 5 6 b7: the minor scale with a major sixth — the minor that smirks); B Aeolian (B C# D E F# G A · 1 2 b3 4 5 b6 b7: the natural minor, the major scale's relative sibling); B Phrygian (B C D E F# G A · 1 b2 b3 4 5 b6 b7: the minor with a lowered second — a Spanish seasoning) work in full. The swaps below are the chord's cousins: different color, same job.
B Dorian
4 more scale positions on the neck
Chord & Fret Pro maps over 35,000 mapped scale shapes — hear and play them all.
The same B Dorian in its main shapes along the neck — pick whichever position sits under your hand. The rings mark the guide notes (the 3rd and 7th) that carry this chord's color.
Scale — The whole scale on the neck — in boxes or 3 notes per string; on the major modes, on guitar in standard tuning, with the CAGED forms named · see it in Chord & Fret
Improvising in context
To improvise over Bm as home, the B Aeolian scale fits entirely — it contains every note of the chord. And when the dominant (F#) pulls back, the leading tone Bb is the note that wants to resolve home.
Swaps that work:
- Dmaj7 — Relative major (♭III)
- E7 — It's the ii; resolves to this V
Reharmonize — Want richer substitutions? Reharmonize the progression in a tap · use it in Chord & Fret
There's one step left in this story. The serious Bm you just learned has a softer, late-afternoon version that lo-fi and bossa nova love: Bm7. Go hear the difference.