PRESENCE - Volume 67
Inspiration For Guitarists
CAGED vs. Triads — This Debate Shouldn't Exist
Every time I use CAGED to break down a song — like I did in my recent Sultans of Swing video — a few well-meaning commenters pop up to "correct" me: "Actually, that's triads."
They're not wrong. But they're not seeing the full picture either.
Here's what I want you to understand: triads don't live somewhere separate from CAGED. They live inside CAGED.Every CAGED shape is essentially a container that holds multiple triads within it.
Think of it this way — CAGED is the map, triads are locations on that map. You can absolutely navigate by landmarks alone, but zooming out and seeing the whole map makes everything easier.
Within a single CAGED shape, you actually have up to four triads sitting right there — one on each of the main string groups:
E, A & D strings
A, D & G strings
D, G & B strings
G, B & E strings
Why overcomplicate it? The CAGED shapes contain all of the triads.
So when someone says "that's really triads," what they're actually doing is zooming in on one piece of something larger. That's fine — but if you've been studying triads without anchoring them inside your CAGED shapes, you're working harder than you need to.
And here's where it gets really practical. In my Practical CAGED system, I group the A & G shapes together and the D & C shapes together — because within each pair, the notes are so similar that they function almost identically. That takes what could be 12 separate triads to memorize and collapses it down to just 3 CAGED shapes to learn.
Three shapes. Not twelve.
That's the whole point. CAGED doesn't complicate things — it simplifies them. Get the shapes under your fingers first, and the triads will reveal themselves naturally as you zoom in.
My advice: zoom out first. Get your CAGED shapes solid, then let the triads reveal themselves inside them. The guitar neck is complicated enough. CAGED is how we tame it.
-Dustin
P.S. If this kind of thinking — seeing how concepts fit together rather than learning them in isolation — resonates with you, that's exactly what the Essential Skills for Guitar Course is built around. You can check it out by clicking the button below.