Root notes and jazz chord grips

 

I've realized that I think in terms of the root note as the anchor note for my chord shape choices, and I strongly bias to E or A strings.  If it's an Am7 chord, I'm looking at the fifth fret of E, so I'd make a 5x5555 shape.  I have a limited vocabulary of grips that I go for and they mostly anchor on the E or A string, but sometimes use D to be fancy.  Here's what I have at my fingertips:

Example A chords anchored on the 5th fret of E string: A7, Am7, Amaj7, A13, A6/9

Example D chords anchored on the 5th fret of A string: D7, D6, D9, Dm7, Dm7b5, Dmaj7, D7#9, Ddim, D6/9

Example G chords anchored on the 5th fret of D string: D7, D6, Dm7, Dm7b5, Dmaj7

A clear downside of this is that I'm grabbing the root at the bottom and playing it.  


I then thought - well, with that anchor note, I could make a shape on either the nut side or the bridge side, and those are CAGED-type shapes.  So:

- E string, bridge:  E shape

- E string, nut: G shape

- A string, bridge:  A shape

- A string, nut: C shape

- D string, bridge:  D shape

- D string, nut: E shape

- G string, bridge:  G shape

- G string, nut: A shape

- B string:  C shape or D shape

Not sure this is an amazing insight exactly but when I see an exotic chord, I look for where the root is (or would be if voiced) and think "oh, that has a C-shaped chord as the base."

I didn't think I was a CAGED person exactly but I think that's how I look at the fretboard for chord identification.

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