Learning chords and strumming

Gaz

Well im in Koh Phangan in southern Thailand at the mo and will be traveling for the next year and as a result have a lot of spare time on my hands.

Now id like to learn the guitar , so i have a few questions for you.

What im doing at the moment is trying to learn all the major and minor chords and jump between them as quickly and as smoothly as i can ... is this a good way to start learning ?

Now when i can do this i will presumably now all the chords to a few songs and should in theory be able to play them , right ? But my 2nd question is how do i go about learning to strum correctly ?

Also when i look up songs on the net and it gives the lyrics with the chords above it .. how do you know what the strum pattern is ? up up down down etc etc ???

Please help ! Im getting frustrated

Oh and also , anyone know a good site with the chords and finger positions listed that i can print off ??

Gordon

You won't get any information on songs' strumming patterns I'd say. I've always found strumming to be a personal preference really. As long as you hit all of the notes in the chord and manage to strum in time it usually doesn't matter. If you really want to get pernickety about the sound of the strumming then the only way really is to listen to the song itself. You will be able to pick out the down as usually being the slightly louder strum as opposed to the quieter up stroke.

Some people strum with picks utilising every note of the chord and some just the last four strings, some use their fingernails, a mate of mine uses his pointy finger, I use the edge of my thumb and my fingernails.

General rule of thumb is to get it to sound like the song basically and you are laughing, or singing even.

Just my opinion though.

Good luck with it, if I can suggest after you are comfortable with strumming get on to picking. House of the rising sun is a good song to start 'alternate picking' with if you like. ie: chord Aminor - pick 5string A down, 4 string (note E) up, 3 string (note A) down, 2 string (note c) up, 1 string E down. etc etc

Giblet

Simple. keep your arm loose. Any other way and you look like a robot.

RicardoSmith

Listen to music and just try and copy it. Music is about listening with your ears not learning a mechanical action. If you are doing it wrong it will sound wrong. Its a simple as that. You need to develop your ear not just learn songs off by heart.

ogy

hey this is the general rules of strumming i use when im explaining it teaching when people have hassle with it

1. always strum from your elbow (kinda have it hanging over the edge of the guitar) cos its really hard to strum from the wrist (though it is possible). This is cos if you use your wrist it rotates out and in from the guitar kinda digging into the strings, but if you use your elbow and keep your wrist straight (but relaxed) you go up and down rather than rotating in and out. (this might sound like a load of bollox but if you watch your hand when your doing it youll see what i mean).

2. If you count along with a song count 1 + 2+ 3 + 4 + (1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and) or 1 + 2 + 3 + depending on the song. Whenever your saying a number (1 2 3 or 4) your hand should be moving downwards and whenever your saying 'and' your hand should be moving upwards. However, obviously, you dont always hit the strings, but whether you do or not your arm should always be moving like this (like a sideways pendulum). So basically whether your arm touches the strings or not it should be rhythmically going down up down up down up down up. At first its a good idea to just go up and down like this hitting the strings all the time just holding one chord to get the swing kinda then get used to leaving some of the ups and downs out (but still moving your arm in that direction over the strings)

3. Most important keep all your joints relaxed to avoid a mechanical kinda sound (down down up mein herr!!!)

A few useful strum patterns thatll work (last time i tried to type strum patterns it fuked up and they came out wrong so ill try and get these to work right

For songs with 4 beats in a bar:
1. D d u d u d u
1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +

2.(alot more useful)
D d u u d u
1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +

3. (also fairly common, the strumming isnt faster but you have to count faster)
D D d u u D D d u
1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + | 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +

And for songs with three beats
D d u d u
1 + 2 + 3 +

or
D u d u d u
1 + 2 + 3 +

(d - down, u - up, D - accented down, not being patronising but just in case)

If you know A, D, E, G, C, Am, Dm, Em, and maybe A7, D7, E7, G7, C7, B7
theres loadsa songs you can play (thats all the open position chords i think)

Hope this helps (sorry if its too long)

ogy

see next post

ogy

maybe a mod could delete my second post i have it sussed now:

D   d u d u d u
1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 

D   d u   u d u 
1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +

D       D   d u     u D   D   d u 
1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + | 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 

D   d u d u 
1 + 2 + 3 + 

D u d u d u 
1 + 2 + 3 + 

as i said before d - down, u - up, D - accented down

fingers crossed this comes out right