General Question on Chords

[Bongo Boy]

Great big topic, eh? I have a weird question (of course). I just bought two books containing chords--one is your basic "Lots of Chords" book, the other is your basic "Lots of Jazz Chords" book. Both books have perhaps 2400 chords in them, and in 30 minutes of review of Cmaj chords alone, I found only one chord that appeared in both books.

So here's the question: why does anyone bother to write them down (in such vast numbers)? While the Jazz Chords book includes example progressions, the other book simply shows a given chord in six versions (six different locations on the neck).

Is this mainly a tool for composers/players so one can find, say, a Cmaj that both sounds good and is nicely located, to save time? I'm not sure I understand why someone would want to document many or most of the bajillion possibilities.

Can you provide some insight here?

[Bongo Boy]

...ooops. I think EricV provided what I was really looking for already in the 'practising chords' thread. Opinions on the topic are still strongly solicited--please.

Just FYI, his point was that a player should know the basics of how to build their own chords--why they might want a particular one, etc., and not have to rely soley on a Book o' Chords.

[EricV]

Hi BongoBoy.

Right, that´s what I posted in the other thread. I mean, those chord books are nice to look into if you need a chord and really don´t know how to construct it quick, or to maybe find some chords you had never tried before, just for inspiration or to learn more about the construction of chords.
But I think it´s more important to know how to make those chords up yourself, so you don´t need to check it out in the book.
I do have one of those books, and it has a bunch of chords for every key ( so it has all the chords with the root C, all the chords with the root C#/Db, D etc. )
And that is really only for quick reference, because if you know how to get a Cmaj add9 chord, you should be able to play a Dmaj add 9 or F maj add9 too...

Warm regards
Eric