Guitar Lesson: strumming guitar
Strumming guitar is one of the first skills most guitar players start with. No matter what stage we’re at with our playing though, we can all learn to strum more accurately… and more interestingly! Below are some resources you might find helpful. Take a look at the video and print out the two pdf files for your own use. Practice the strumming patterns slowly and once you see how this works, you can easily understand how to strum songs you hear. Or even better, you can make up your own strumming patterns!
Start with the simple concept of “down strums” and “up strums”. In 4/4 time there are four beats per measure, so to start, we only need to count to four over and over again. Practice counting without pausing between any of the numbers and especially between “4” and “1”. So we’ll count “one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four” etc. The thing to avoid is counting “one, two, three, four……. one, two, three, four”. So no pause between any numbers and especially not between four and one.
Next, hold any chord that’s comfortable for you and count while you strum down across the strings. Often we might start with a G chord in the first position, and don’t worry about the 1 string too much- this exercise is more about working the right-hand […]
We know that the “two strings up and two frets back” rule can give us the same note but an octave up. We can do that from the 6 string and the 5 string. Let’s concentrate on the 5 string first. So C on the 5 string is at the 3rd fret and consequently, on the 5th fret of the G string. That gives us our one note in two places!
