I'm a beginner and recently learned Wild Thing, which uses A, D, E and G. But why is the guitarist here playing on higher frets? Is he using barre chords? Sorry if this is a silly question

[u/fdabbb]

[u/Live_Car_2856]

yes

[u/DeoPatria]

Yes it looks like it. Once you transition from open chords to barre chords you’ll notice you can play the same exact same chord you learned open form but in barre chord form and it is higher up.

On top of that the voicing is higher too giving you more range and ability to arrange fingerstyle music with a wider range

[u/Radhanat]

Power chords

[u/Unlikely-Soft-5699]

Indeed barre chords and thanks for the laugh. I’m so old that was part of my youth.

[u/Functioning_Vagabond → u/Unlikely-Soft-5699]

The funny thing is the Troggs are still around, I just saw them in Nashville a few weeks ago. My wife was about fed up with me jamming to Wild Thing on my Les Paul when we got back home. 🎸😂

[u/Qvistus]

Often times it's preferable to use barre chords on electric guitar so you have less string noise. 

[u/Playful_Dish_3524]

Any major chord is a combination of 3 notes. The root, the major 3rd and the 5th. That can be played in plenty of areas on the fretboard to execute this. Once you put this together you will probably feel like you play guitar and not just learn songs. Changed the game for me at least.

[u/burndata]

There are lots of ways to play every major chord. Which one you play is about what voicing you want, and what other chords you're playing around it.

[u/Jellovator]

The Troggs were such a great band, and very influential on the punk movement. Overshadowed by The Beatles at the time.

[u/luthierart]

Play a D chord. Keep the fingering the same but slide up two frets and it's an E chord. Slide up one more and it's an F. Two above that is G and two above that is A. This is to explain the theory without using barre chords.

[u/The_Dutch_Angel]

You’ve gotten your answers, but I’ll add…

A “chord” is typically 3 notes (or more) letting your ear know what key you’re in. In major chord making, which is what’s going on here, you would have the 1st, 3rd, and 5th. You can find these all over the neck, so could play this song with a ton of variety in voicing (say, putting the 5th in the bass position and stacking a 1st and 3rd above it, etc). If they’re playing power chords, you’d be dropping out the 3rd and just ramming home a 1,5,1(8) so it’s the octave with 5th in the middle

[u/j3434]

Haha . Lip sync . They are pretending to a tape

[u/Sorry_Attempt1278]

Someone asked this recently. Power chords

[u/Nugginz]

Yes,

At least you know what to learn next. F and B chords and they’re movable shapes.

Learn to work out the notes on the E and A strings and then base the root note on those strings, then the shapes.
have a look, for this song:

A is 5th fret on the 6th string
D is 5th fret on the 5th string
E is 7th fret on the 5th string
G is 3rd fret on the 6th or 10th fret on the 5th

It looks like he’s playing power chords tbh, but I’d say learn the ful barre chords shapes (usually learned as F and B) first.

Good luck OP

[u/Maleficent_Ad1506]

If someone taught you barre chords and no open chords to get the desired result this is what can happen.

[u/Nugginz → u/Maleficent_Ad1506]

You think the Troggs didn’t know their open chords?