Chord & FretD#m7 · Electric guitar
End of the workday, headphones on, the bus moving slowly — and, strangely, everything's fine. That state of mind has a chord symbol: D#m7. Press play down there and recognize it.
Listen first
What you just heard
The recipe: take the D#m you know — D#, F#, A# — and add C# on top. Now listen to the arpeggio, one note at a time and wait for the fourth note. It doesn't make the chord happy; it takes the weight off its shoulders. That's why bossa nova, neo-soul and the whole of R&B live here.
Now it's your hands' turn
On the electric guitar a chord needs only a few clear notes — the amp sustains them and fills the space, so you mute the strings you are not playing and let the tone carry the rest. So start with the first position below — the position marked with ⭐ is the easiest to play. Four notes sharing the same space, so there's one rule: every single one has to ring. Play it slowly, listen for each voice. A muffled chord here is a double waste.
2 more shapes of this chord on the neck
Part of over 200,000 voicings and inversions in Chord & Fret Pro — see and play every one.
Precision Tuner — Before you play these shapes, get in tune — chromatic tuner and reference tones · use it in Chord & Fret
And keep the mid-neck positions in your pocket: in modern comping they're worth more than the open one, because they leave room for a voice on top. You'll get it the first time you play behind a singer.
Left-handed? Mirror's right here
What is D#m7?
D#m7: D# minor with Seventh. The notes are D#, F#, A#, C# (fixed-do: Re#, Fa#, La#, Do#) — the degrees 1–b3–5–b7.
Where this chord lives
Now the part beginners rarely get told: D#m7's classic job is being the ii — the first piece of the ii–V–I, the most-used sentence in jazz and everything jazz ever touched. Across keys you'll find it as i7 in D# minor, v7 in G# minor, iv7 in A# minor. In other words: this chord is almost never standing still; it's setting something up.
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 D#m7 as the home chord (I) of its key, it tends to go toward the pre-dominant (Fm / Ab) or the dominant (Bb / D°) — and the dominant pulls back home. Typically, not a rule.
When you want to go further
For improvising, D# Dorian (D# E# F# G# A# B# C# · 1 2 b3 4 5 6 b7: the minor scale with a major sixth — the minor that smirks); D# Aeolian (D# E# F# G# A# B C# · 1 2 b3 4 5 b6 b7: the natural minor, the major scale's relative sibling); D# Dorian ♭2 (D# E F# G# A# B# C# · 1 b2 b3 4 5 6 b7: a dorian with a lowered second) contain the whole chord. And the jazz shapes at the bottom are these same four notes rearranged across the neck: same chord, arranger's tailoring.
D# Dorian
3 more scale positions on the neck
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The same D# 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.
Improvising in context
To improvise over D#m7 as home, the D# Aeolian scale fits entirely — it contains every note of the chord. And when the dominant (Bb) pulls back, the leading tone D is the note that wants to resolve home.
Swaps that work:
- Gbmaj7 — Relative major (♭III)
- Ab7 — It's the ii; resolves to this V
Reharmonize — Want richer substitutions? Reharmonize the progression in a tap · see it in Chord & Fret
The same chord, dressed for jazz
Jazz Lab — Drop 2, drop 3 and shell in any key — the Jazz Lab opens them all · see it in Chord & Fret
The thing this chord is preparing has a name: G#7. Chain the two and there it is — half a ii–V in your pocket, jazz's favorite sentence.
Every shape of D#m7 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.