Strumming 101 and rhythm guitar for beginners
Here is an excerpt from an email I sent to a new adult student regarding strumming and it's relationship to the beat. This student has experienced some road blocks to his progress before so we are going over some musical fundamentals to see if we can get around those road blocks. This is good for new students and for more experienced (but still beginner) students to review from time to time. This student took me up on my offer to review recordings of his practice sessions and that has helped.
Please ask me if you have any questions about any of this, I'm pleased to hear from you during the week.
Step one is finding the beat, you are accomplishing that (I am listening as I type) good job. Step 2 then is to consistently stay with it, that takes longer to master. We spend a lot of time developing our ability to hear it, notice it and then "lock in". Locking in involves our technique on the guitar too, particularly our accuracy and consistency. That's really where we live and continue to improve as long as we play. If you can lock in with your timing though you can improve your learning curve and make some of those baby steps (good way to think about it).
Now that you have noticed the 1 2 3 4 of it we can start with strumming patterns. Keep in mind that your ability to play the patterns will improve as you improve your ability to lock in. Especially as you develop the ability to listen and adjust your timing as you strum. That last bit takes some time as it is difficult to adjust before the locking in and the strumming are more familiar.
You are doing the right things now and this will be one of the things we work on in lesson and at home. This is a common point of frustration, many people simply never give themselves a chance, sometimes because they are not aware of the steps they should take or the ingredients they need to put together. Also (even more frustratingly) other people seem to get there mysteriously fast or cannot say how they did it!
Next step is to align the D's and U's with the right beats. This can wait until you are solid with the steady beat keeping and counting, but you don't have to be perfect at those to hear it begin to come together.
Try these patterns if you get time today (if not we'll get going with them tomorrow):
Count (out loud if you can, or quietly to yourself) and strum down on each beat.
1 2 3 4
D D D D
Here you are strumming down on every down beat, or quarter note. The quarter note gets the beat in most of the songs we will be doing at first
This next step is very important:
The U's or Up strums fall in in between these beats. It is very important that the Downstrums stay on the 1 2 3 and 4's and do not waver in tempo (don't speed up or slow down that steady beat). It is also important that when you add the upstrums that the downs stay right where they are time-wise and that they do not speed up or slow down when you add upstrums.
You count upstrums by saying "and" after every beat. "1, 2, 3, 4," become "1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and" and again the 1 2 3 and 4's have not sped up or slowed down. You would hear twice as many strums in the same amount of time, your hand is swinging steadily and striking the strings on the way down and up. You are strumming down as you say "1 2 3 4" and up as you say the "ands" after every beat.
Next pattern
1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &
D U D U D U D U
Alternate with the first rhythm until you can keep each pattern the same tempo. A metronome or drum machine can be very helpful here, if not essential. Otherwise we can never be quite sure if we are staying on beat or not.
The ingredients we need then are 1) the ability to find the beat and stay steady, 2) the ability to strike the strings we want to strike when we want, 3) the ability to remember the pattern and 4) the knowledge of when to change chords. This last thing we call the "road map" of the song and we will often use a chart for that that we can read until we get it memorized. Each of these things can be practiced separately or with other techniques two or three at a time. Once you get familiar with these and each ingredient is more natural (you don't have to think about it as much) then you can realistically expect to play along and sing.
We'll review this next lesson, no worries if you don't have time for it all tonight. If all you had time for was more counting with Margaritaville that would still be productive.
Catch you tomorrow!
Please ask me if you have any questions about any of this, I'm pleased to hear from you during the week.
Step one is finding the beat, you are accomplishing that (I am listening as I type) good job. Step 2 then is to consistently stay with it, that takes longer to master. We spend a lot of time developing our ability to hear it, notice it and then "lock in". Locking in involves our technique on the guitar too, particularly our accuracy and consistency. That's really where we live and continue to improve as long as we play. If you can lock in with your timing though you can improve your learning curve and make some of those baby steps (good way to think about it).
Now that you have noticed the 1 2 3 4 of it we can start with strumming patterns. Keep in mind that your ability to play the patterns will improve as you improve your ability to lock in. Especially as you develop the ability to listen and adjust your timing as you strum. That last bit takes some time as it is difficult to adjust before the locking in and the strumming are more familiar.
You are doing the right things now and this will be one of the things we work on in lesson and at home. This is a common point of frustration, many people simply never give themselves a chance, sometimes because they are not aware of the steps they should take or the ingredients they need to put together. Also (even more frustratingly) other people seem to get there mysteriously fast or cannot say how they did it!
Next step is to align the D's and U's with the right beats. This can wait until you are solid with the steady beat keeping and counting, but you don't have to be perfect at those to hear it begin to come together.
Try these patterns if you get time today (if not we'll get going with them tomorrow):
Count (out loud if you can, or quietly to yourself) and strum down on each beat.
1 2 3 4
D D D D
Here you are strumming down on every down beat, or quarter note. The quarter note gets the beat in most of the songs we will be doing at first
This next step is very important:
The U's or Up strums fall in in between these beats. It is very important that the Downstrums stay on the 1 2 3 and 4's and do not waver in tempo (don't speed up or slow down that steady beat). It is also important that when you add the upstrums that the downs stay right where they are time-wise and that they do not speed up or slow down when you add upstrums.
You count upstrums by saying "and" after every beat. "1, 2, 3, 4," become "1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and" and again the 1 2 3 and 4's have not sped up or slowed down. You would hear twice as many strums in the same amount of time, your hand is swinging steadily and striking the strings on the way down and up. You are strumming down as you say "1 2 3 4" and up as you say the "ands" after every beat.
Next pattern
1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &
D U D U D U D U
Alternate with the first rhythm until you can keep each pattern the same tempo. A metronome or drum machine can be very helpful here, if not essential. Otherwise we can never be quite sure if we are staying on beat or not.
The ingredients we need then are 1) the ability to find the beat and stay steady, 2) the ability to strike the strings we want to strike when we want, 3) the ability to remember the pattern and 4) the knowledge of when to change chords. This last thing we call the "road map" of the song and we will often use a chart for that that we can read until we get it memorized. Each of these things can be practiced separately or with other techniques two or three at a time. Once you get familiar with these and each ingredient is more natural (you don't have to think about it as much) then you can realistically expect to play along and sing.
We'll review this next lesson, no worries if you don't have time for it all tonight. If all you had time for was more counting with Margaritaville that would still be productive.
Catch you tomorrow!
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