Why: The main reason to re-transpose an existing song is to fit it to the singers voice. Usually this can be done by leaving the song alone and just using a capo when playing it, but sometimes it's necessary to totally re-key the song. This chart will make it a quick and painless process.
What: As I'm sure you've noticed, about half the chords on the chart are not anything standard. This is because I got tired of trying to remember dozens of chords with #m, #m7, etc, etc. If you know the 11 basic chords (A, Am, B, Bm, C, D, Dm, E, Em, F, G) then you can play pretty much any song on the planet (in any key) with little to no effort. I've spent hours on the net and in stores searching for transpose charts that are worth using. I've found charts, wheels, automated webpages, and others, but they all had a major flaw. They would give you all the major chords but none of the minors. The ones that were detailed had so many #'s, #m7's, etc, that it wasn't worth bothering with, because let's face it, who in their right mind bothers learning all the dozens and dozens of chords that are out there.
How: The way to play these chords is easy. The number that's beside a given chord is the fret that your index finger is on. For instance, a standard F has your index finger on the 1st fret. An F2 is the same finger positioning as a standard F but slid up so your index finger is on the 2nd fret. In reality an F2 is the same thing as a F#, but why confuse yourself with that when it's just an F slid up to the 2nd fret. Another example: Bm3 is really a Cm, but again, why bother with trying to remember that when it's just the finger pattern of a Bm that's slid up to the 3rd fret. The point of all this is to make it easier to play an existing song that you can't sing in the original key. Once you recognize that music is just specific repeating patterns, it all starts to make a little more sense and becomes surprisingly a lot easier to play.
Transposing: To re-key a song you must first have the song already tabbed in whatever key the writer found playable. Step 1: Play the song and make sure that the tabs that you're pulling from are all correct. The worst thing to do is re-key a song and then realize that your source was wrong. Step 2: Decide if you want to go up or down with the song's key (do you want it to sound higher or lower). Usually you can make a song higher by just using a capo, but if you need to re-key it then you still can. Step 3: To re-key a song down we need to use the top row of the chart as our source line. Let's say you want to lower the song just a little bit, we'll say 2 steps. If your source song has a D, look on the top line of the chart and find the D, look down 2 lines and the D becomes a C. If your source song has an Em, look on the top line of the chart and find the Em, look down 2 lines and the Em becomes a Dm. Simple. Do this for all the chords in your source song and suddenly you have the same song in a different key. To re-key a song up you'd use the bottom row of the chart as your source line and go up instead of down.
Tip: Songs are not always easy to play after re-keying. Songs with a lot of different chords can lose their warmth when you change them from their original chords into a different chord pattern. If at all possible you should try to stick with the original song's chords and use a capo instead of re-transposing it.
Chords: Not all standard chord patterns equate to other standard chord patterns when re-keying. That's why I use the numbering method that I have. But, here's a few that I know about so you can have an easier time figuring things out. I've also added some of the standards that equate to my numbering system so you can see that playing guitar chords is just a series of repeating patterns.
