Using the well-known song “Tom Dooley,” the next several lessons will introduce you to strumming in time with a song. The tablature in these examples consists of two separate arrangements: the strumming pattern and the melody. Notice that the top line in each pair is the strumming pattern and the bottom line is the melody of the song. We are concerned mostly with strumming the chords at this point and the melody with words is just added in so you know where you are in the song. Feel free to play the melody too if you like. The melody notes in Tom Dooley are a little difficult only because the eighth notes are not evenly matched, but we will deal with that subject later on.

Listen to the midi file by clicking on the midi icon. You will strum the correct chord one time in each measure, on the count of 1. The subsequent lessons will make this a little clearer, so if you have difficulty understanding what is going on, go to the next one or two lessons and them come back.