E11 Chord: Notes, Voicings, and How to Play It

Five notes carry a symbol that says eleven: E, B, D, F♯ and A. Nothing has gone astray. The major 3rd, G♯, is left out on purpose, because A stands a semitone above it and the two will not share a chord without souring it. What is left is an E7sus4 with a 9th on top, which is why most arrangers write E7sus where a chart says E11 and expect the same sound back.

Those five notes have another life. Laid out as D, E, F♯, A, B they are the D major pentatonic scale, note for note, and read from B they are B minor pentatonic. Anyone who has soloed in either has been spelling this chord out a note at a time.

Try It: E11 in the Chord Finder

Set the root to E and switch the Eleventh toggle on. Compare degree 1 in E mixolydian with degree 5 in A major: identical notes, two different jobs.

The Notes of E11

Written out: E, B, D, F♯, A. One accidental, F♯, and it falls on a black key, so the spelling holds no traps. The 14 and the 17 are placement instructions rather than interval names: F♯ is a whole tone above the root but belongs an octave higher, and A belongs above the F♯.

How E11 Is Built

Begin with E9, which is E, G♯, B, D and F♯. Add the perfect 11th, A, and you have an argument rather than a chord: A and G♯ are a semitone apart, and the 11th is the note the symbol has just promised. So the 3rd gives way, and what is left leans on fourths and fifths instead of thirds. That is where the open, unfinished quality comes from.

Read the same notes from the 5th and something familiar surfaces. B, D, F♯ and A are B minor 7th in root position, sitting whole on top of an E, and charts often say precisely that: Bm7/E. Read them from the 7th and D, F♯ and A form a plain D major triad, which is why D/E is the other notation you will meet on a lead sheet.

Losing the 3rd costs the chord its mode. Nothing in E, B, D, F♯ and A declares major or minor, so one grip serves a blues, a modal vamp and a dominant approach. Suspended Chords: Sus2, Sus4, and the Art of Tension covers how an absent 3rd behaves.

E11 on the Piano

Only one of the five notes is black. E, B, D and A are all white, F♯ is the lone accidental, and the hand stays near the front edge of the keyboard throughout. As extended chords go this is one of the flattest shapes to learn.

It will not fit in one hand. E up to A is seventeen semitones with three notes standing in between. Give the E to the left hand by itself and the right holds B, D, F♯ and A, a minor 7th across, under thumb, index, middle and little finger with the F♯ falling to the middle.

That right hand is B minor 7th in root position, which most players already own from D major or B minor, so learning E11 at the keyboard means putting something known over an unfamiliar bass.

There is an easier route still. Take E and B together in the left hand, a bare fifth, and give the right hand D, F♯ and A. That is an ordinary D major triad in root position: three fingers, one black key, no stretch. Players reach the sound of an eleventh chord long before they can spell one.

E11 on the Guitar

Say the open strings out loud: E, A, D, G, B, E. Four of those five names belong to this chord. Only the G is foreign, and it has to travel two frets to reach A, the 11th. Put F♯ on the first string at the 2nd fret and the chord is finished.

0 0 0 2 0 2 sounds E, A, D, A, B and F♯. All five notes, two fingers, four strings still open, and it rings for as long as the arm holds out. Almost nothing this large is this cheap on any instrument.

The bottom is thin, because the fifth string is supplying an 11th where a bass player expects a 5th. Fret that string at the 2nd fret and B appears instead: 0 2 0 2 0 2 sounds E, B, D, A, B and F♯. Three fingers, all at the 2nd fret, on the fifth, third and first strings. Same five notes, firmer footing.

The slash spelling has its own grip. Hold an ordinary open D chord and let the low E ring: 0 x 0 2 3 2 sounds E, D, A, D and F♯. No B, so no 5th, but the sound is unmistakable and any beginner can produce it by accident.

Higher up it gets easier rather than harder. Lay one finger flat across the 7th fret and strum: 7 7 7 7 7 7 sounds B, E, A, D, F♯ and B, which is this chord with B in the bass. Drop the sixth string, x 7 7 7 7 7, and the root returns to the bottom. The trick works because standard tuning is very nearly a stack of fourths: the six open strings already spell A11.

Inversions

A chord this open changes identity readily, so read the table as description rather than instruction. The first inversion is the one a guitarist stumbles into with a 7th fret barre, and from that B the notes are a root, minor 3rd, 5th, minor 7th and 11th, so it doubles as B minor 7th with an added 11th. The second inversion is a different chord in practice: from D the five notes are a root, major 3rd, 5th, 6th and 9th, a D six-nine, so walking a bass down to D under a held E11 rewrites the harmony without a hand moving. See Chord Inversions and Voice Leading.

Voicings

One rule covers all of these: do not let a G♯ back in. On a guitar that means keeping the third string off the 1st fret, which is where every E shaped chord in the open position wants to put your index finger.

Which Keys Contain E11

• II of D major
• V of A major
• VI of G major
• I of E natural minor
• I of E dorian
• I of E mixolydian
• IV of B dorian
• inside D major pentatonic and B minor pentatonic entirely

Three of those are E rooted modes, and the chord sits on the first degree of all three. That is not luck. E natural minor, E dorian and E mixolydian differ only at the 3rd degree and the 6th, G against G♯ and C against C♯, and those are exactly the two degrees this chord leaves out. A listener hearing E11 cannot tell which of the three you are in, which is what makes it useful at the start of a vamp.

The last line matters to improvisers: the chord and D major pentatonic are the same five notes, so that scale played over E11 lands on nothing wrong at any point.

Where E11 Shows Up

Look at the first row again. B minor 7th is B, D, F♯ and A, and every one of those notes is in E11, so going from ii to V in A major means the bass drops to E and the rest of the band sits still. On a guitar it is literally that. Open Bm7 is x 2 0 2 0 2. E11 is 0 2 0 2 0 2. The fretting hand does not move at all: the change is made by letting the low E string ring.

The second row is the reason the chord exists in pop and rock. Hold E11, move the A down a semitone to G♯ and you have E7, with the tension resolved inside the chord instead of after it. The arrival on A then feels twice as settled for having been made to wait. Country and gospel players run the figure so often that the slide is a stylistic marker in itself.

The vamp in row three is a rhythm part more than a harmony: one shape, open strings ringing under a picking pattern that never stops for a chord change. Organs and horn sections get the same effect by voicing it as Bm7 over E.

The fourth row is the odd one. In D major the second degree normally carries E minor, but E11 has no G in it, only F♯, so it refuses to be minor while still belonging to the key. Songwriters use it to walk from D to A without committing to a mood on the way.

Related Chords

• E Dominant 9th Chord, the same shape with G♯ where the A is
• E Sus4 Chord, the suspension with nothing stacked above it
• E Dominant 7th Chord, the 3rd restored and the 11th gone
• B Minor 7th Chord, the four notes sitting above the bass
• E Minor 7th Chord, what six open strings very nearly give you
• Extended Chords: Which Tensions Work, and How to Voice Them

Learn More

• Seventh Chords: A Complete Guide
• Suspended Chords: Sus2, Sus4, and the Art of Tension
• Pentatonic Scales for Improvisation
• Chord Inversions and Voice Leading
• The E Mixolydian Scale