Minor 7 Arpeggios for Jazz Guitar

Every way to play A minor 7 arpeggios on the guitar.

Making the changes is an important part of learning to play better solos in jazz guitar. And your minor 7 arpeggios are an essential piece of “making the changes.”

I remember spending a lot of time learning these arpeggio patterns early on in college.

Especially as I was working on figuring out how to play through ii V I progressions. You can’t really have the ii chord without a minor 7 arpeggio.

Check out our ultimate guide to jazz guitar chords to find more minor 7 shapes to play with.

Luckily for us, they’re also a fun pattern to play. These patterns usually fit pretty nicely under your fingers, and they’ve got a nice sound to them.

Best of all, they’re easy to learn.

I tell many of my students that the hardest part about working on minor 7 arpeggios is making sure you don’t accidentally play a minor pentatonic scale instead.

2 images showing the similarities between the minor pentatonic scale, and the minor 7 arpeggio.

If you know your minor pentatonic scale patterns, these arpeggios are going to be easy – you just have to leave out one note, and you’re good to go.

Although in reality, it’s not a huge deal if you mess this up – it just won’t be an arpeggio anymore, strictly speaking.

Keep reading to find out what makes minor 7 arpeggios tick, how to play them on your guitar, and how to use them in jazz.

Building Minor 7 Arpeggios

A minor 7 arpeggio is built using the root (1), minor or flat third (b3), perfect fifth (5), and a minor or flat 7th (b7).

An image showing the intervals of the minor 7 arpeggio.

Remember that I prefer to use the “flat” name for the interval, rather than the “minor” name for the interval.

This helps keep things straight when we’re talking about chord or arpeggio qualities.

It also helps describe what you need to do to a note in order to get the sound you need

You could also think of this arpeggio pattern as the first, third, fifth, and seventh notes of the natural minor scale.

2 images showing how to convert the natural minor scale into an arpeggio.

As far as your playing goes, the theory behind how an arpeggio is built isn’t as important as being able to play it on your guitar.

It doesn’t matter what you think it is if you can’t play it!

Minor 7 Arpeggio Patterns

Just like with our other arpeggio shapes, we’ll be using movable patterns. This means we won’t be using any open strings as we play.

It also means that you can learn one arpeggio shape, and then play it in all 12 keys, just by moving it to different frets on your guitar.

There are 5 movable patterns for your minor 7 arpeggios, starting on the 6th, 5th, 4th, 3rd, and 2nd strings.

6th String Form

Music notation and TAB example of how to play a G minor 7 arpeggio on the 6th string.

5th String Form

Diagrams for arpeggios starting on the 5th string.

Music notation and TAB example of how to play the C minor 7 arpeggio from the 5th string.

4th String Form

Diagrams for the minor 7 arpeggio starting with the 4th string.

Practice example for an Fmin7 arpeggio starting on the 4th string.

3rd String Form

Diagrams for a minor 7 arpeggio starting on the 3rd string.

Practice example for the Bbmin7 arpeggio starting on the 3rd string.

2nd String Form

Fretboard diagrams for a minor 7 arpeggio starting on the 2nd string.

Music notation and TAB example for a D minor 7 arpeggio starting on the 2nd string.

Practicing These Shapes

When you’re starting out with these, go slow. Practice one pattern at a time, and really learn it before moving on.

I like to move a shape up the neck one fret at a time until I’ve played it 12 times (or in all 12 keys, if you’re keeping track).

This really helps build up your muscle memory so you can access the arpeggio quickly as you play.

Work with a metronome or a drum track. Once you have the basic finger pattern down, it’s important to practice these patterns in time.

Metronomes or drum tracks are great for keeping you honest about your timing as you play.

Improvise with it. Even if you’re not playing a song just yet, you can still improvise with your minor 7 arpeggios.

Try changing direction randomly as you play up and down to really explore the different sequences you can create.

You can also try skipping notes to create larger intervals as you improvise. There’s only so much you can do with just 4 notes… but it’s important to explore all of the possibilities.

When you’re ready, try using these arpeggios in ii V I progressions.

Example of a ii V I progression, along with which arpeggio to use with each chord.

See if you can connect the minor 7 arpeggio to the dominant 7 arpeggio in the progression. Then find a way to connect the dominant 7 to the major 7 arpeggio.

Now you’re really working on playing the changes!

Conclusion

Minor 7 arpeggios are an important skill you’ll want to develop as a part of your jazz guitar toolbox.

They help you outline minor 7 chords in your solos – and are super helpful as you start building ii V I lines using arpeggios.

Spend the time to practice these, and they’ll serve you well for years to come.

And don’t forget – the hardest part about learning minor 7 arpeggios is not playing a minor pentatonic scale by mistake.

How are you using minor 7 arpeggios in your playing? Let me know in the comments below.

Need a lesson on something I haven’t covered yet or have a question? Ask me anything about jazz guitar and I’ll get back to you ASAP!

More Arpeggio Patterns

To learn more jazz guitar arpeggio shapes, check out my lessons on major 7, dominant 7, and minor7b5 arpeggios.