The Key of E — Dobro

E major harmonises to E – F#m – G#m – A – B – C#m – D#°; E minor to Em – F#° – G – Am – Bm – C – D. Most of the country repertoire in this key lives on three of those chords — the tonic, the subdominant and the dominant — plus the relative minor when a song wants one darker turn.

The dobro chair carries slide fills and turnaround answers, the same job the pedal steel does on records that carry one instead. Face-up in open tuning, a chord here is a bar laid straight across the neck, or tilted a fret or two, rather than a hand shape — every diagram below is such a bar position, and a quality open G cannot spell that way is marked instead of drawn.

Learn the tonic-subdominant-dominant grammar in E until your hand goes there without asking, then add the relative minor, and most of the repertoire in this key is already playable.