This is the free online Creative Commons licensed edition of "The How and the Tao of Folk Guitar Volume One: Getting Started".
"The How and the Tao of Folk Guitar" is a genuine, printed on paper and sold in stores around the world "book". You can buy a copy at the Pik-Ware Publishing web site or from Amazon. It is also available from your local bookstore or music store. You can even get a copy of this book as a CD ROM "Deluxe Edition" packaged with a video workshop.
The only difference between this document and the book sold in stores is that this one is free. You can read it, send it to a friend, display a copy on your web site and, most of all, use it to learn how to play the guitar without spending a dime. You can even print it out if you wish. However, you will most likely spend more on paper and ink printing it yourself than you would by just buying a copy of the book.
The next volumes in the "The How and the Tao of Folk Guitar" series, "Volume Two: Getting Good" and "Volume Three: Be Cool" will be available sometime in 2005.
Bucks County Folk Music Shop supplies us with top quality entry-level guitars for our workshops. We confidently send our friends there for any guitar or banjo related needs.
There is more I'd like to say. When it comes to the guitar I could literally talk all day, but it's probably best to let the book do the talking right now.
Let's tune this puppy up and get picking.
Patrick Costello
October 2004
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For "Dear Old Dad"
my father, my captain, my friend
ISBN: 097441901x
Pick-Ware Publishing
PO Box 110
Crisfield, MD 21817
http://www.pick-ware.com
© 2004 Joseph Patrick Costello III
The highest truth cannot be put into words. Therefore the greatest teacher
has nothing to say. He simply gives himself in service, and never worries.
-The Hua Hu Ching
Instead of diving into the technical guitar stuff right away let's imagine for a moment that we are sitting together on my front porch in Crisfield. Let's say that it is just about dusk and the catbirds are in the big rose bush next to the steps and the carpenter bees are buzzing against the screen door. Every now and then you'll see an old couple out walking together or a young couple pushing a stroller and they'll wave to us with a smile because nothing hits you quite as right as seeing two guitar players picking on an evening like this, not to mention the simple fact that people around here are pretty friendly.
I'm leaning back on the old porch swing giving you this funny kind of grin because the way you are holding your guitar right now (like you're not too sure what end you're supposed to blow into) is something I've seen more than once over the years- not to mention that it reminds me about how I felt when I was just starting out. You're sitting there trying to decide what question to ask first when I break the ice and say, "So you want to play the guitar."
It's not a question because I already know the answer. You wouldn't be here otherwise. Before you can reply I just signal you to hand me your guitar so I can check the setup and make sure you are in tune. As I'm doing that I start to talk about how I started out. "See, when I was a kid in grade school I had all kinds of hearing problems. I also had a smart mouth and a bad attitude back then so the teachers would put me in the last row of the class. I was unable to hear very much but I couldn't cause too much disruption either. As a result school was kind of a drag and I felt like I didn't really fit in."
"Well, one day the school invited this girl to come in and talk to the kids about how she lived with her handicap. She was blind and something else . . . I didn't hear everything she said because I was all the way in the back of the assembly hall and, to be perfectly honest, I wasn't all that interested."
"When the principal came out on stage and handed her this great big Guild guitar I just about went crazy. I knew it was a Guild because it was right on the headstock. I can close my eyes to this day and still see her standing there with that guitar and her guide dog. Well, she started strumming on that guitar and got the whole school singing along with an old song called My Grandfathers' Clock."
As a matter of fact, we will be playing that song in a little while.
"So she was singing this sad old song and I sat there and just about cried my eyes out. It wasn't just the song. The song is kind of sad in its own way and the music really did move me, but the whole presentation hit me like a hammer. I mean, here was this girl who had just about everything going against her and she had a whole school full of kids singing along with her."
"That was power. And let me tell you, to a kid power is a fascinating thing because they don't really have any. Adults tell them what to do at home and in the classroom and bullies thump on them in the playground. In my case, being the square peg in a school full of round holes, the show of power that blind girl was putting on just took my breath away. I sat there with tears running down my face, my heart beating like a hammer and my head spinning with the possibilities until one of the other kids saw me and gave me such a hard time about being a crybaby that I decked him."
"As I sat in the principal's office next to the kid with a fat lip the idea of becoming a musician kind of took hold of me. I knew what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, I just didn't know how."
"There was a good bit of time between that girl visiting the school and me getting my first guitar. I began taking banjo lessons because my dad was starting to play the banjo. We had a spare banjo in the house so I figured what the heck, I'll give the five-string a shot. I liked the banjo, but I still dreamed about getting a guitar. I even started trying to play the blues on my banjo, but it sounded more like the reds or the greens."
"I had been playing the banjo for a while, and was actually getting pretty good at it, when one day on the way home from school I found a guitar sticking out of a trashcan. It was all busted up but I patched it together with duct tape and started trying to figure out how to play it."
Right about now I'll hand your guitar back to you and make a comment about it not being too bad of a guitar- even if it's a junky old guitar. It's not a matter of being dishonest; it's just that I know from experience that a first guitar is a wonderful thing. No matter how awful it is you'll always have a special place in your heart for your first flattop box.
"Now, the reason I'm telling you all of this is because in order to get from there to here (from being a kid in Philadelphia with a scavenged guitar to sitting with you sharing some pointers) I had to embark on what was to become a lifelong journey."
"See, learning to play the guitar isn't just something you schedule. You don't pick up a guitar and say to yourself that in six months you will be playing at such-and-such a skill level. It's a bit more complicated- no, that's not quite right- it's a bit simpler that that. You just have to start walking or, in this case start playing, and go wherever the road takes you. The things you see, the people you meet and the stuff you wind up doing all go into what becomes over time your own unique sound and way of playing."
"My own journey hasn't always been easy. There were times when I played so long and so hard trying to figure things out that my fingertips cracked open and I just sat there banging my head because nothing I was trying would work. Every book I picked up and almost every teacher I ran into just confused me even more than I already was. Things didn't become clearer until I started hooking up with old blues and country guitar players who kept yelling at me to go back and work on the basics. They also took the time to show me what those basics were."
"Eventually I managed to put the puzzle together. I went from not being able to do anything right to having adventures and doing all sorts of cool and crazy stuff. I've played on stage with my father who (because of our shared love of music) is now my dearest friend, in front of audiences so huge it was hard to take in. I've jammed with blues musicians and punk rock bands. I've played in the rain on the streets of Galway, Ireland with a bunch of guys who barely spoke English but treated me like a brother because we shared the language of music."
"As a teacher my job isn't to teach you how to play the guitar. My job is to help you teach yourself, to make things a little easier and clearer for you than they were for me. You and I are going to spend some time on this front porch together. I'll share the basic skills and concepts that you need to develop along with a story or two that will probably make you laugh. Through it all you have to set the pace. Pick up a lick or something to work on and then it's just like the old timers would tell me, "Go on and work on that, and don't come back until you can do like I showed you.'"
"Don't worry about how fast or how slow you might be learning and don't worry about playing or sounding just like somebody else. No matter how good you become you are always going to sound like you, so you might as well start enjoying yourself from the get-go."
Right about now I'll shake my head and say something about how I tend to talk too much and tell you, as well as myself, that it's time to get started. We'll start by going over the tuning again as the folks in Crisfield stroll on by and the carpenter bees buzz against the screen door.
-Patrick Costello
April 2004
Great knowledge sees all in one. Small knowledge breaks down into the many.
-Chuang Tzu
If you ask five different guitar players what the term "folk guitar" means you are likely to get twenty different answers. When affordable acoustic guitars started becoming available in North America an amazing variety of music began developing almost overnight and to this day the process is still underway.
The musicians I knew when I was growing up were interested in playing everything. These guys shared their knowledge in fields of music that ran from Delta blues and early jazz to honky-tonk country or rock and roll. At first it seemed like all of these musical styles were different, and that playing something like the blues required a separate set of skills from playing classic country songs. The cool old dudes kept telling me that if I mastered the basic skills I would start to see how everything is connected. "It's all music, kid." Was something I heard an awful lot back in those days. The only thing I head more than that was, "The only thing that matters is the rhythm!"
Over time I figured out why they were right. The more music I played and the more things I learned the clearer it became that I could use a handful of simple techniques to make the jump from one style or flavor to another. As a result when I help somebody get started on the guitar things seem to work better in the beginning if I simply share a handful of basic techniques. The student can then use these basic techniques or, in this case, you can use these techniques to make the music that you want to play.
The whole focus of Volume One is to get you playing and singing simple songs. By the end of this book you will be able to play and sing folk songs using basic fingerstyle and flatpick guitar techniques. You will start making music for and with your friends and family. If that's all you ever decide to do I'm cool with that. I mean, if all you ever learn is three chords and a simple picking pattern you can play thousands (yes, thousands) of songs! Just wait until you see how many songs you can play with one-finger chords!
Folk music isn't supposed to be complex. There is a degree of challenge in learning any instrument but it's not like training for a heavyweight-boxing match. You don't have to get up at four in the morning, drink a glass of raw eggs and punch a side of beef every day to become a good guitar player. All you really have to do is love playing the guitar. Take your time and enjoy the trip. Let your natural curiosity and creativity take over and steer you along your journey.
Like may grandfather used to say, "Work smarter, not harder."
I don't expect you to be familiar with all the songs in this book. When I was just starting on the banjo, and later on the guitar, a big part of the fun was the fact that everything was brand new. In a lot of ways not having somebody around to tell me exactly how a song should be played gave me the freedom to come up with my own ideas. Most of these songs are very old but to a beginner they are brand spanking new. The other cool thing about these songs is that you will find yourself exploring the history of the music as you start to pick up additional lyrics. In some ways every good folksinger has to be an amateur historian.
If you do get stuck on the melody line of a song I suggest that you do what I did and go exploring. Find an old guitar player in your town. Bug the local radio station to play some folk music. Browse the Internet or just make something up. There is no right or wrong way. Just follow your heart.
All right, let's get our gear together and start playing the guitar. We've got a lot of picking and singing to do.
-Patrick Costello
April 2004
If you are reading this book I think it's safe to assume that you have some kind of a guitar, but just to be safe let's take a quick look at some of the types of guitars available. The standard steel-string "flattop box" style guitar is shown in the illustration below. This is the most common type of acoustic guitar.
With the pin bridge mounted on the top of the guitar there is an amazing amount of stress placed on a guitar's top when it is tuned up. Think about it. You have six pieces of steel wire mounted on the top of the guitar without much to anchor anything. In order to keep the wooden top from collapsing or buckling under the strain a series of braces is mounted under the top of the guitar.
Most steel-string acoustic guitars also feature an arched fretboard. This is a big plus with any guitar because it puts the strings in a position that fits the angle of your fingers. Other designs you might want to at least be familiar with include classical, arch top, twelve-string and resophonic guitars.
Classical and/or Flamenco guitars are built for nylon or gut strings. They usually feature a wide fretboard and, because gut and nylon strings are under less tension than steel strings, a light internal bracing system.
The lighter bracing makes using steel strings on classical guitars inadvisable. If you string up a classical guitar with steel strings you can destroy the instrument.
Arch-top guitars have carved tops much like a violin. Most archtops feature what is often referred to as a trapeze tailpiece attached to the endpin. Archtop guitars also have a removable bridge.
Twelve-string guitars are pretty much the same as standard six-string guitars except that every string is doubled.
Resophonic guitars were developed as an attempt to amplify acoustic guitars before the advent of the electric guitar and magnetic pickups. These instruments feature either one or three aluminum cones suspended in the body of the guitar. The body of resophonic guitars can be made of metal or wood.
I'll admit that I am partial to resophonic guitars. I own two classic Dobro metal bodies and I love them both about as much as I love chunky peanut butter and B-grade horror movies.
They have the warmth of a flattop box and tons of volume when you hit them hard. The fact that they look cool is just icing on the cake.
There are pros and cons to any guitar type or design. Instrument builders have been searching for the perfect guitar template for a long time.
The flattop box design is the most commonly used, but there are an almost unbelievable number of variations on the basic design from massive jumbo guitars to small body parlor guitars.
There is no "best" design. You will have to try some guitars of different sizes to find an instrument that sounds good and feels good to play.
One thing you will have to expect when you are shopping for a guitar is that everybody you run into will offer advice you what you want to buy.
People will tell you that an archtop guitar is only for jazz or that a resophonic guitar is only for the blues. They'll say that you have to play a dreadnought guitar to play bluegrass or that you need a guitar made of a specific kind of wood. None of it is really true.
A guitar is only capable of doing whatever you tell it to. Standardized designs are nice in terms of fitting in but nothing is cast in stone. You have to choose your guitar and do whatever you feel is right with it.
When my dad took me to buy my first good guitar everybody in the shop was kind of horrified that I chose a metal body resophonic guitar. They even tried to talk me out of buying it. They didn't know why I was drawn to that Dobro 33-H and I had a hard time getting through to them that this wasn't just the guitar I wanted, this was the guitar I had to have. I finally shut everybody up by simply asking if they wanted to make a sale or not.
Those guys meant well, but they didn't know the whole story behind why I chose that guitar. It wasn't just the way it felt in my hands or it's great sound. There was something else drawing me that I couldn't put into words then or now . . . well, I'll admit there was that, "ooh . . .shiny" reaction that usually happens to guys when they are faced with chrome. But it wasn't just that. There was something about that guitar that just felt right. If I had taken the well-intentioned advice and passed on that resophonic guitar I'm not sure I would have gone on to really learn how to play. A lot of things happened to me simply because people didn't know what to make of a teenager wandering around Philadelphia with this honking big shiny guitar strapped to his back. It made people want to stop and chat or show me a lick.
You are going to have your own reasons for choosing the guitar you wind up playing and I'm not going to tell you that you are right or wrong. Just weigh your options and try to make rational decisions. Don't choose a guitar only because it has a blue finish or fancy fretboard inlays. Choose the instrument that sort of says "Hey baby, let's cruise" when you pick it up.
Guitars can be expensive. A new or vintage top of the line guitar can cost as much as a three bedroom house in Crisfield, but expensive isn't always the same as better.
A lot of new players don't realize that some of the best guitar music ever recorded was played on cheap guitars. The early blues players used instruments from Sears and other mail order catalogs. One of the most popular brands back then was the Stella line of guitars that you could buy in furniture stores.
In the long run a guitar is just a contraption made up of wood and wire. You make the music. A great musician will sound good on any instrument.
You can buy a basically playable guitar for as little as fifty to seventy-five bucks and you can pick up a really nice acoustic or resophonic guitar that will play like a dream for around three or four hundred dollars.
High-end instruments are nice, but you don't want to make the mistake of thinking that you have to be in an upscale tax bracket to play the guitar.
One kind of interesting factoid about high-end vintage guitars is that rich folks who never got around to learning how to play bought a lot of the really elaborate instruments made before the Second World War. A friend of mine likes to point out that professional folk musicians never really get around to making enough money to buy ultra-fancy instruments, and that the main reason a lot of those instruments survive today is that they were hardly ever played!
The really cool thing about buying a cheap guitar nowadays is that the market is flooded with instruments. Manufacturers are fighting tooth and nail to produce the best selling affordable guitar and the resulting marketing chaos is a great thing for guitar players because it has really driven the prices down on decent instruments.
The other thing to keep in mind is that guitar players tend to be kind of rough on instruments. The odds are pretty good that you are going to travel with your guitar and weird stuff can happen to instruments on the road. Heat, cold, rain, snow and tipsy old ladies trying to do the chicken dance are going to attack your instrument individually and in groups. Some of the really expensive new and vintage instruments can be kind of fragile so when you are shopping ask yourself if the guitar you are looking at can take the abuse or if it's so fancy that a scratch or a ding would drive you crazy.
So shop around and don't get too wrapped up with the packaging, hype or froufrou. Buy the best instrument you can afford and make the most of what you have.
With guitars in any price bracket there are some trouble spots to look for. Make sure the neck is straight. With some older guitars, and some of the really bad new ones, there is a chance that the neck has warped or twisted. In some cases this isn't too big of a repair job but you want to be aware of that added expense when you buy the instrument.
If it's at all possible try to pick up an instrument with a solid wood top. Plywood, or even some of the new high-tech composite materials are acceptable for the back and sides of an entry-level guitar, but when used for the top they can result in a fairly weak or mushy sound. You see, on a flattop guitar the vibration of the strings causes the top to vibrate. Plywood does not react to those vibrations the way solid wood can so the sound tends to get a little bit funky.
When you are looking at a guitar it's easy to see whether the top is made of plywood or solid wood. All you have to do is hold the instrument so that you can see the edge of the sound hole. If it looks like a sandwich it's plywood.
Give the guitar a little bit of a shake to see if any of the braces are loose. Some guitars have a battery- powered pickup installed so make sure it's not the battery that's rolling around.
Make sure that the fret wires are not pulling out from the fingerboard and that the ends of the wires do not stick out from the side of the neck to possibly catch your fingers. Look out for cracks in the neck or body. Also look at the top to make sure the pickguard isn't peeling up or that the bridge isn't buckling the top in some way. Take a look at the action, or how high the strings are from the fretboard of the guitar. You want the strings high enough so that they don't buzz on the frets, but you don't want them so high that the guitar is hard to play. Ask at the store or bring along a guitar-playing friend for support.
Be cautious about buying online. Sometimes you may find an instrument for a few dollars less than at your local music store, but you never really know what you are getting until it's been paid for and delivered.
Look at it this way. When you buy from your local shop you can always stop by later for some setup advice or repair work. It's also a good place to hang out, shop for the latest accessories and talk music.
Trust me, after you have been picking for a few years and the guitar you have been using every day gets sick or generally messed up there is nothing quite as reassuring as being able to take it to a shop where the folks not only know your instrument, but will treat you like family.
The last thing to keep in mind is what I call the "junk factor." Sometimes people make the mistake of thinking that just because a guitar is old it must be a great instrument. The thing you have to realize is that something that was junk sixty years ago is still junk today. It's just old junk.
When people refer to the strings of a guitar they are almost
always numbered one through six with the sixth string being the heavy wound
string on top, closest to your chin.
In standard steel string acoustic guitar design you will usually find a pin bridge holding the strings to the body of the guitar.
The pin bridge supports the saddle and the bridge
pins. The saddle is the insert in the body of the bridge that raises the strings
above the body of the guitar and the bridge pins are used to keep the strings
attached to the guitar.
The diagram illustrates how bridge pins work. The ball end of the string is dropped into the hole. When the bridge pin is pushed down the string is locked into place.
Bridge pins can be pretty tight and hard to remove when you go to change the strings. I usually give them a gentle yank with a pair of pliers but you can pick up a pin-puller in any music store for a few bucks.
At the headstock the strings attach to the tuning
pegs. The diagram shows you how the tuners are laid out on most guitars and
the direction to wind them.
There are many techniques for securing the strings to the tuning pegs. I prefer to run the string from the bridge or tailpiece through the hole in the tuning peg and pull it tight. Then I hold the string at the first or second fret to keep it tight at the bridge or tailpiece while I loop the string back around to where I ran it through the peg. Run it through, pull it tight and then tune up. This method won't leave a lot of slack string around the tuning post and has worked well for the last twenty years or so on my guitar.
When you put on a new set of strings you are going to have some excess string hanging from the tuning pegs. You can clip it with a pair of wire cutters or you can run the excess string between your thumb and a nickel to give it a curl. It looks funky, but it works in a pinch.
Guitar strings come in a variety of styles and gauges. I use extra light gauge strings on my resophonic guitars but for a standard acoustic guitar you might need a slightly heavier gauge to make the top of the instrument respond and react to your playing. The thing to keep in mind is that you want to find the right balance between playability and volume. Heavier strings will add some volume to an acoustic guitar but they can also make the instrument harder to play.
There are a lot of options in terms of the kind of metal that strings are made of, not to mention coated strings that are supposed to resist corrosion. The pros and cons of that stuff is really a matter of opinion. Some players swear by phosphor bronze and others will tell you about the wonders of brass strings or strings that have been cryogenically frozen. What can I say? People like to talk.
Try a few different types, brands and gauges on your own and use what works best for you and your guitar. For fragile guitars or for people with fairly weak hands another cool option is to try silk and steel strings. These strings have silk strands in the core of the wound stings. This is done to make the string sound up to pitch at a lower tension. The sound isn't quite what you get with standard strings but they work great with some instruments and they can make the guitar easier to play.
You will need a strap for your guitar so that you can play standing up. A strap can also help you hang on to your guitar if you are playing sitting down but it is not a necessity.
One end of the strap attaches to the endpin and the other end . . . well, some guitars come with a strap button on or around the heel of the guitar. If your guitar doesn't have one you can get your local repair shop to install one for a few dollars. The other option is to tie the strap to your headstock. I'm not too fond of that method because it can hinder movement.
With any strap it's usually a good idea to use a straplock system. These little doodads slide over the endpin and the strap button after you have installed the strap to keep it from slipping off. I became a big believer in straplocks after my metal body resophonic guitar slipped off the strap and broke my foot!
A music stand is another great tool to have. It will be a lot easier to follow the exercises in this book or play a tune from a songbook if you use a music stand. You can pick one up in any music store for a few bucks.
Sooner or later you will also need a capo. A capo is a clamp that fits on the fingerboard to make it easier to play in different keys without having to change chord forms. You will probably want to check your tuning after you put on a capo. Most models have a habit of putting your guitar slightly out of tune.
There are many different types of capos on the market ranging from simple elastic band units that you can pick up for pocket change to ultra-fancy models costing several hundreds of dollars. The funny thing is that they all do pretty much the same job An instrument stand is a nice thing to have. While your guitar is a lot safer in its case I have found that an instrument that is always in a case doesn't get played as much as one kept within easy reach.
Another thing you need is a quiet place to practice with an armless straight-backed chair. As you get more proficient it won't matter what you sit on, how you sit or where you practice but in the very beginning you really want to have someplace to play without any distractions so you can concentrate.
In this chapter you will learn:
Holding Your GuitarI'm not going to go into a lot of detail about how to hold the guitar simply because so many factors are involved. The size and shape of the instrument pretty much dictate how the instrument is going to be held.
The most important thing when it comes to holding your guitar is balance. You don't want to have to hang on to the instrument to keep it from falling out of your lap and you don't want to support the neck with your fretting hand because your hands must be free to play the guitar.
Of all the skills required to play the guitar tuning is probably one of the most difficult to master. It is going to take you a while to get used to how your guitar is supposed to sound. I strongly recommend that you purchase an electronic tuner. It makes learning how to tune much easier.
There are two types of electronic tuners: guitar tuners and chromatic tuners. Guitar tuners only work for the six notes of the guitar. Chromatic tuners can be used to tune any instrument.
There are quite a few makes and models on the market with a pretty wide price range. I would not recommend buying the most expensive tuner because if you start playing out you will most likely lose or drop it. I've left more than one nice tuner sitting on a park bench or in a church hall never thinking about it until I was more than halfway home. If you don't have an electronic tuner don't sweat it. I'll go over how to tune the guitar to itself later on in this chapter.
For most of this book we are going to be working out of open G tuning. We will move on to standard tuning (E A D G B E) near the end of this book and continue with it through Volume Two.
An open tuning simply means that the guitar strings are tuned to the notes of a major or minor chord. This means that when you strum the strings without fretting a single note you get a chord.
Right about now you are asking yourself, "Why are we starting out with an open tuning?"
Well, since you asked, I decided to start with open G simply because it lets you start playing chords without a lot of left hand acrobatics. It also gives you a chance to work on right hand picking techniques without worrying about complicated chord changes.
See, when you start out on the guitar you are faced with several challenges and the most difficult of these is learning how to train your left and right hands to perform independent actions. Standard tuning is an amazingly versatile guitar tuning (that's one of the reasons it's the standard) but the chord forms can be pretty difficult for a beginner to master. By starting out in open G we can use simple chord forms that will give you a chance to build up the strength of your fretting hand.
This isn't new. Open G tuning has been around for a long time. Early blues and country guitar players used it extensively, sometimes giving it the name "Spanish Tuning" possibly because of the old dance tune Spanish Fandango, but nobody knows for sure. Open G is also one of the Hawaiian "slack key" tunings. Once you start working in open G you will understand how the term slack key came to be associated with this tuning. The strings are not exactly slack, but they are at a much lower tension than standard tuning.
As I mentioned before, this will be a lot easier to do if you have an electronic tuner. I will go over the steps to tune the guitar to itself but you should know ahead of time that it takes a while to develop the skills to do this quickly.
One other thing you need to keep in mind when you are tuning is that you should only turn the tuning machines on a string that is vibrating. Strike the string you want to tune and turn the tuning peg while it is sounding. This will save you a lot of broken strings.
In open G tuning:
If you don't have a tuner you can tune the guitar to itself by following these steps:
Take this slow and easy. Tuning a guitar is a skill that must be developed over time. When you are finished strum down (from the sixth string to the first) across the strings. If you are in tune you've just played an open G chord.
It sounds kind of cool, doesn't it? Now that we are in tune let's get started on picking hand technique.
The first picking pattern we are going to work with is the thumb-brush. It's really easy because all you have to do is; you guessed it, brush the strings with your thumb.
Place your right hand- or, to keep lefties from feeling left out (pun not intended) your "picking hand"- so that your thumb is resting on the sixth string and your little finger is resting on the top of the guitar below the first string. I usually plant my ring and little fingers when I am strumming. Some folks just plant the little finger. Either way works as you're only anchoring to give your hand little bit more stability.
Don't press down too hard with your hand or your fingers and don't get all tensed up. Get comfortable and set things up so that if you draw your thumb over towards your little finger you wind up strumming across all six strings.
Make sure the strings all ring out. If your anchor
fingers are muting the first string readjust your position.
When you draw your thumb across the strings avoid excessive arm or wrist movement. The action here is more from your thumb than anywhere else.
Try this lightly a few times and then give it a good
hard strum once or twice. Do not strum up with your thumb. After
you strum down just sort of roll your thumb back up to around the sixth string.
Now strum down across the strings four times fairly slowly.
When I say "slowly" I don't mean to drag your thumb across the strings so that each string rings out individually. Make the brush fairly crisp. Now we have to start thinking of the strum in terms of rhythm. What we are going to do is play the strum in sets of four. We will be counting out loud each time our thumb makes a downstroke. Make an honest effort to keep your speed the same all the way through.
Ready? Lets go!
Strum down while tapping your foot. Say "one".
Roll your thumb back to the sixth string.
Strum down while tapping your foot. Say "two".
Roll your thumb back to the sixth string.
Strum down while tapping your foot. Say "three".
Roll your thumb back to the sixth string.
Strum down while tapping your foot. Say "four".
Roll your thumb back to the sixth string.
Strum down while tapping your foot. Say "one".
Roll your thumb back to the sixth string.
Strum down while tapping your foot. Say "two".
And so on . . .
Now if you noticed, we didn't put any kind of a separation between the "four" stroke and the "one" stroke. We are playing the strum in sets of four, but you are not taking any kind of a break between sets. The count just keeps repeating.
What you are playing right now is a four quarter note strum.
What's that, you say? What's a quarter note? I'm glad you asked because it makes a nice lead into the next part of this chapter on note values and rhythm!
Do not panic when you see some sheet music in this section. We are not going cover reading music here (we won't go into reading music until the tail end of Volume Two). We are going to look at how note values are written in order to help you get a grip on the timing of the thumb-brush strum.
In other words, we are not worrying about notes in a melodic sense right now. We are simply looking at the time value of the note symbols in terms of rhythm.
Every note in a piece of music has a time value assigned to it. That can be a difficult concept to grasp at first because when you are just starting out on a musical instrument it's easy to assume that players just sort of pick up a guitar and start playing. As a matter of fact, I'm sure that when you first got your guitar you just picked it up and started banging on it. That's what almost everybody does because we remember the melody line of a song and kind of ignore the rhythm that holds that melody together.
I know that the idea of giving a value to each note sounds kind of complex at first, but in a lot of ways you have been working with similar concepts your whole life. For example, when we talk there is a rhythm to our speech. We separate words with pauses and sometimes we shorten or lengthen those pauses to create a dramatic effect. If we didn't use those pauses to measure out our speech everything we said would runtogetherlikethis.
That's why rhythm is so important in music. Rhythm is not only the engine that drives music, it is also kind of like a canvas that we use to create pictures in sound. Without rhythm the notes would have no context and everything would just come out like noise. When you were tapping your foot and strumming the "one, two, three, four" count you were playing a rhythm in 4/4 time. What 4/4 time "means" is that we are playing the equivalent of four quarter notes for every measure of music. In order to understand that we have to look at some basic definitions of how music is written down. The note value symbols are written in what is called standard music notation.
Music notation is written on a staff.
A staff is just five lines. Notes are written on the lines or in the spaces. The funky little squiggle at the beginning of the staff is a G clef. We will address what a G clef represents later on.
When you are writing music in standard notation each group of notes is broken up into a measure.
The time signature signifies the basic count for each measure. In this case the 4/4 on the staff represents 4/4 time. As I said before, that means four beats to a measure with the quarter note getting the beat.
A line running down through the staff marks measures or bars. I call them measures and some folks refer to them as bars like in the term "twelve bar blues." Either way is right. The example above shows three measures. In 4/4 time each measure is going to have four beats.
A beat is the term we use to describe the pulse of the music.
Don't think of the measure as a stop sign. Measures are really only a way to break music into more manageable chunks.
The count for a measure is continuous. Even when the music stops, like when we play a rest, the count continues. The easiest way to remember that is to remind yourself that Sonny & Cher were right. The Beat Goes On.
The really amazing thing about measures is that the beats can be broken up in all sorts of ways by using whole notes, half notes, quarter notes, eighth notes and sixteenth notes. Any combinations of notes can be used as long as the combined value of the notes fits the time signature.
Let's take a look at the usual suspects when it comes to note values.
A whole
note is just that, a note that is counted for the whole value of the measure.
To get the feeling of how a whole note works play one thumb-brush strum and count, "one two three four" for each measure:
In other words, if we were playing our thumb-brush strum as a whole note pattern in 4/4 time each strum would be held for four beats.
A half note has one half the time value of a whole note.
To get the feeling of how a half note works play a thumb-brush strum and count "one two." Then strum again and count "three four" in each measure:
So if we gave the thumb-brush strum a half note value each strum would be held for two beats.
A quarter note has one half the time value of a half
note.
This is the note value we are giving the thumb-brush strum. Each strum is held for one beat.
An eighth note has one half the time value of a quarter
note.
This can be hard to visualize at first because up to this point we have just been counting from one to four. When you are playing the thumb-brush strum you are tapping your foot for each count. You tap your foot on one, bring it back up and tap your foot on two. When you are playing eighth notes tap your foot to count "one" and as your foot comes back up say "and." Then count "two" as you bring it down again. This gives you the "1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &" count found in an eighth note strumming pattern.
It is crucial to keep an even count when you are playing. Every note is a quarter note so every note has to be held exactly as long as the note before it or the whole system gets out of whack.
Ok, work on the quarter note thumb brush for a little while and make an effort towards keeping the count steady. Be sure to count out loud and tap your foot. It will help you stay in rhythm.
Don't rush this. A lot of people I share this technique with will wave their thumb at the guitar a few times and say, "I've got this." It's always interesting to watch these folks when we move on to the next step and they realize that they don't have it. Give yourself a day or two just running through this with a focus on keeping a steady rhythm. Work on playing the strum steady for five to ten minutes at a time.
We have covered a lot of material in this chapter, but if you keep things slow and easy you will be making music in no time.
When you are ready head over to the next chapter where we will begin working with chords and start playing songs!
Let's go over what you know so far:
If you have been practicing the thumb-brush strum for a while I think it's safe to say that you and any people nearby are sick of hearing that open G chord. So let's give your left hand something to do by making and playing chords.
With six strings and only five fingers to work with learning chords on the guitar can be a real challenge. In order to make things a little easier we are going to take advantage of a feature in open G tuning that lets us make chords with one finger.
Look at the back of your guitar neck. Imagine that there is a line running down the middle of the neck from the back of the headstock to the heel. When you grasp the neck to make a chord you want to put the joint of your thumb along that imaginary line.
Now with the joint of your thumb
on that imaginary line lay your index finger across all six strings at the fifth
fret. Keep your finger just behind the fret-wire. It might help if you realize
that your finger is not doing anything but pushing the string onto the fret-wire.
The fret-wire is higher than the fretboard so when you push the string down
it stops vibrating right at the fret. That causes the string vibrations to shorten.
This results in a higher pitched note.
You don't have to apply a lot of pressure. Your thumb is only on the back of the neck as a guide. Don't go crazy trying to keep your index finger perfectly straight. As long as you are not right on top of the fret you should be good to go.
Now strum across all six strings. If you are fretting the strings properly each string should ring out clearly. You have just made a C chord.
Sounds pretty cool, doesn't it?
The technical term for this kind of a chord is a barre chord. It's called that because; well, look at your finger. You are laying your finger across the fretboard like a bar.
Try the thumb-brush strum while you hold the C barre chord and then experiment with changing from open G to barre C.
Once you get comfortable changing from open G to barre C you can add in a barre D at the seventh fret.
That's right, if you barre across the seventh fret you get a D chord.
Now you know three chords in open G tuning! It's time to start playing your first song.
Let's go over what you know so far:
Let's start making some music.
The old folk song "Skip To My Lou" is a great first song to sing and play because it only uses two chords:
G Lost my partner what'll I do? D Lost my partner what'll I do? G Lost my partner what'll I do? D G Skip to my Lou my darling.
"Skip To My Lou" is in 4/4 time. As we discussed earlier that means we will play four thumb-brush strums in each measure. Each line of "Skip To My Lou" is two measures long. That means each line of the song will get eight thumb-brush strums.
All we are going to do here is sing and play the thumb-brush strum. Right now all you really want to do is get used to changing chords, playing the thumb-brush strum and singing at the same time. We will get fancy with this song, and others, later on in the book.
In order to help you visualize the chords for
this song and some of the songs after it we are going to use chord diagrams.
A chord diagram is simply a picture of the fretboard telling you where to put
your fingers. Right now we are only using an open chord and two barre chords
so the diagrams are fairly simple.
In a chord diagram the strings are laid out 6 5 4 3 2 1. The black dots tell you where to put your fingers and the little number off to the side of some diagrams tells you at what fret to play the chord.
The C chord diagram has a little five next to it because, you guessed it, that chord is played at the fifth fret and the D chord has a seven next to it because we play that chord at the seventh fret.
For "Skip To My Lou" I have laid out each line of the song into two measures with the quarter note thumb-brush rhythm laid out over the lyrics.
If you look at the first line and play a thumb-brush strum for each quarter note you will see that the strums in the first measure fall on certain words, and that there is a single strum after "do?"
Tap your foot in a steady 4/4 count while you strum and sing your way through this song. You should be able to get into the flow of it without much fuss.
"Skip To My Lou"
4/4 Time, Key of G
Get that smooth and you can start adding more verses:
Skip, skip. Skip to my Lou. (3x*)
Skip to my Lou my darling.
I'll get another one prettier than you, etc.
Flies in the buttermilk shoo fly, shoo, etc.
Cat's in the cream jar what'll I do, etc.
*3x means sing it three times. I guess you could figure that out on your own, but I once heard a guy sing "THREE X!" at a jam session.
Spend some time with this song. The first few times you run through it the odds are pretty good that you will have to stop and fish around for a moment before snagging that D chord. Don't knock yourself because everybody goes through that in the beginning. Live with "Skip To My Lou" until you can run through it without speeding up or slowing down the rhythm and the chord changes flow smoothly.
It may take a few days or it may take a few weeks. Don't sweat it. Slow and steady wins the race.
Once you can play "Skip To My Lou" without any fuss we can move to a slightly more complicated song like "Boil Them Cabbage Down".
I know, you are probably wondering what could be so complicated about boiling cabbages? Well, buckle your seatbelts because this is a (gasp!) three-chord song!
All kidding aside, throwing another chord into the mix can be a little challenging at first. It is going to take some time to get your right and left hands working together in this song because you have less time between the chord changes. In "Skip To My Lou" we were holding the G for a while, moving to D for a while and back to G. With this new song the chords change more often and the seventh measure has two chords in it. Each chord in the seventh measure is given two beats.
So you strum open G and barre-D twice in the seventh measure.
Take this one slow and don't forget to sing!
"Boil Them Cabbage Down"
4/4 Time Key of G
Went up on the mountain
To give my horn a blow
Thought I heard my true love say
"Yonder comes my beau"
Someone stole my old coon dog
I wish they'd bring him back
He'd chase the big hogs through the fence
And the little ones through a crack
Let's go over what you know so far:
Before we move on to the next picking pattern and start learning some more songs I want to talk a little bit about the bar chords that you have been using. By now you know your open G, a barre-C and a barre-D chord but you don't know why these one-finger chords work.
In order to understand why and how these chords work we have to talk about the chromatic scale.
In Western music (as in "Western Civilization") there are twelve notes. The twelve notes are named after the letters A through G with a half-step between each pair of letters except between B & C and E & F:
A | B C | D | E F | G |
The " | " symbol is used to represent a half step
Your half step is either a sharp (#) or a flat (b)
The half step between A and B can be called either A# or Bb.
A# means that the A note is raised one half step higher. Bb is the B note lowered one half step. A# and Bb are the same note and the other half steps follow the same pattern.
So with all twelve notes laid out you have the chromatic scale:
A A#/Bb B C C#/Db D D#/Eb E F F#/Gb G G#/Ab 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
Once you understand the idea of half steps you can just write out your chromatic scale like this to save space and make it a tad clearer.
A | B C | D | E F | G |
The " | " symbol is used to represent a half step
There is an old saying that goes, "If you learn one thing you have learned ten thousand things." When it comes to the chromatic scale that is a true statement. Everything, and I mean everything, you do on the fretboard of your guitar is based on the chromatic scale.
One thing to keep in mind is that the chromatic scale can start on any note. We started with the A note in the example above, but on the guitar in open G we would write out the chromatic scale starting with a G. In fact, we're about to do just that.
The frets on your guitar are laid out in half-steps. When we tune a guitar to open G the barre chords wind up following the steps of the chromatic scale.
Fret: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
G | A | B C | D | E F | G
If your guitar is tuned to open G a barre chord at the first fret has to be G#/Ab and a barre chord at the second fret has to be A. If you look at how this is laid out your barre chord at the fifth fret is C and at the seventh fret you get D. Since everything repeats itself after twelve frets you can get another G chord by barring across the twelfth fret.
We know that G is an open chord, so starting with the first fret:
Is that cool or what?
The other amazing thing about this is that when you add a capo into the equation you can start playing in other keys without a lot of fuss.
You see, the capo works like your barre chords. If you capo at the second fret your guitar is now in open A tuning. The fifth fret and seventh fret chords we were using in open G both move down two frets.
So in G you were playing G, C and D. Capo at the second fret and everything changes to A, D and E.
Now look at the chord chart and see if you can figure out what you would play capoed at the third fret or the fourth fret. Try playing "Skip To My Lou" in A and "Boil Them Cabbage Down" in B.
This isn't just limited to chords. Each string on your guitar follows the chromatic scale. If you know what note the string is tuned to and you know the chromatic scale it's not a big deal to figure out all of the notes on the guitar.
In open G tuning the first string of your guitar is tuned to D:
D D#/Eb E F F#/Gb G G#/Ab A A#/Bb B C C#/Db D
Fret: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
And now you know every note on that string. It's that simple. The cool thing is that it works with any fretted instrument. If you know this inside out you can pick up almost anything and play it!
Don't go crazy memorizing this. Live with the concept for a while and roll some ideas through your head as we expand on your right hand technique. We will come back to the chromatic scale and some other music theory "stuff" once we start working on the alternating bass picking pattern.
But before we get into that, let's take a look at adding some bass notes to your basic thumb-brush strum.
By now you can play and sing a couple of songs while strumming four quarter notes per measure in 4/4 time. That's cool, but you are not limited to just strumming. We can start to make things a little bit more interesting by breaking up the strum and adding a little bass into the mix.
Relax. This pretty easy to do, and it also opens up some really cool stuff down the road.
Put your hand into the same
position that you use for the thumb-brush strum and rest your thumb on the sixth
string.
Now apply some pressure with your thumb on the sixth (bass) string until your thumb pops off the string and comes to rest on the fifth string. We are not playing a full strum here. All we are doing is letting our thumb sound the sixth string.
As you sound the sixth string count, "one".
Strum down from the fifth string. As you strum count, "two".
Do you see what we are doing here? We are changing the first quarter note strum in the thumb-brush into a single bass note with a quarter note value.
With our first picking pattern (the thumb-brush) we were strumming four quarter notes. With the bass strum we are still playing four quarter notes but now the pattern is bass, strum, bass, strum.
It might be easier to see this if I write it out. In order to illustrate the examples in this chapter I will have to introduce you to something called tablature. Tablature (or 'tab' for short) is just a way of writing a song down.
You have six lines. Each line represents a string on your guitar. The sixth string is at the bottom and the first string is on top.
When any string has a zero you play that string open. The number on a string tells you what fret to play. So in this example you would play your sixth string at the sixth fret, your fifth string at the fifth fret, your fourth string at the fourth fret, your third string at the third fret and so on. A series of numbers running one on top of the other tells you to strum a chord.
Two measures of the open G tuning four quarter note thumb brush strum tabbed out would look like this:
The tablature shows the four strums along with the note value for each strum.
The new strum we are looking at in this chapter, the bass strum, is tabbed out in the next example. As you can see it has a lot in common with the thumb-brush except that we are playing the first and the third quarter note as a single bass string rather than a full chord.
Work on this strum for a little while and try to keep everything even just like you did with the thumb brush strum. Try playing some chord changes. Run from open G to barre-C until you can change chords and keep the rhythm of the picking pattern smooth.
Let's give "Skip To My Lou" a shot with the bass strum.
"Skip To My Lou" sixth string bass
4/4 Time, Key of G
The bass note we are playing here works, but there are some simple things we can do to make the strum fit the chord progression.
In order to make the bass note fit in a little better with the strum it's usually a good idea to play the root of the chord as the first bass note. In the key of G it would be the fifth, or G, string because that is the root of the G chord.
"Skip To My Lou" fifth string bass
4/4 Time, Key of G
Notice how the fifth, or G, string fits in a little better with the song? That's the advantage of using the root of the chord for the bass note. Now that you are completely sick of "Skip To My Lou" let's try a new song. This one is called "Roving Gambler".
"Roving Gambler"
4/4 Time Key of G
I've gambled down in Washington,
I've gambled over in Spain;
I'm on my way to Georgia
To knock down my last game.
When I was down in Washington,
many more weeks than three,
I fell in love with a pretty little girl
and she fell in love with me.
She took me to her parlor
She cooled me with her fan.
She whispered to her mother dear,
"I love this gambling man"
"Oh, daughter dear, daughter dear,
how could you treat me so?
To leave your poor old mother here
and with a gambler go?"
I hear the train a-coming,
she's coming 'round the curve
She's a whistling and a-blowing
and straining every nerve.
"Oh mother dear, mother dear,
I'll tell you if I can;
If you see me coming back again
I'll be with a gambling man.
As you get more comfortable with the rhythm of this strum while you are changing chords and singing you can start accenting the count a little bit in each measure by putting the stress on the one and the three count.
"One two three four. One two three four. One two three four. One two three four."
This isn't a big deal. In some ways, because of the layout of the bass strum, you are already doing just that. It's just a good thing to be aware of as we start moving into more complex picking patterns.
We have come a long way but if you have been working on the material in the preceding chapters you are ready to get into what is probably the heart and soul of folk guitar; alternating bass.
The bass strum that we worked on in the last chapter was an example of monotonic, or repetitive bass.
Monotonic bass is a single bass note played throughout the song. Monotonic bass is a useful technique to know. Blues guitar players have used it in amazingly effective ways, but it does have the drawback sometimes of not pushing the music or creating a sense of drive.
That's where alternating bass comes into play. In alternating bass you are playing two or more different bass notes in each measure. The effect is just too cool to put into words.
Everything in terms of our right hand position is still the same. The pattern starts off exactly like the strum we used for "Roving Gambler." You strike the fifth string with your thumb on "one" and strum down with your thumb on "two." The pattern changes slightly when you strike the sixth string on "three" and strum down with your thumb on "four."
It's not hard, but keeping track of where you are in the measure can be confusing at first. You are going to have to practice this pattern quite a bit until you get comfortable enough with it that it's almost instinctive.
Try running the example tabbed out below a few times and then work at keeping it smooth through some chord changes. Run from G to C and on down to D. See if you can keep the picking pattern together without getting lost.
As in the basic bass strum the first note we are playing (G) is the root of the G scale. The second bass string (D) is the fifth note of the G scale. The rule of thumb for alternating bass is always "root-five". The cool thing about open G tuning is that when you play a barre chord the open "root-five" pattern stays the same.
This isn't the only alternating bass picking pattern but it illustrates the basic concept pretty well. We will look at some variations of this idea along with how and why the "root-five" idea works. We will also take an in-depth look at scales and chord progressions in upcoming chapters. Right now let's have some fun and put the basic alternating bass strum to work while we play some songs!
"Going Down That Road Feeling Bad"
4/4 Time Key of G
I'm going where the water tastes like wine.
I'm going where the water tastes like wine
I'm going where the water tastes like wine Lord Lord
And I ain't gonna be treated this a way.
I'm going where the weather suits my clothes, etc.
They fed me on cornbread and beans, etc.
Your Two dollar shoes hurt my feet, etc.
Takes a ten dollar shoe to fit my feet, etc.
I'm traveling down this long dusty road, etc.
I'm down in the jail on me knees, etc.
"The Red River Valley "
4/4 Time Key of G
Come and sit by my side, if you love me,
Do not hasten to bid me adieu,
Just remember the Red River Valley,
And the cowboy who loved you so true.
I've been thinking a long time, my darling,
Of the sweet words you never would say,
Now, alas, must my fond hopes all vanish?
For they say you are going away.
Do you think of the valley you're leaving?
Oh how lonely and dreary it will be.
Do you think of the kind hearts you're breaking?
And the pain you are causing to me?
They will bury me where you have wandered,
Near the hills where the daffodils grow,
When you're gone from the red river valley,
For I can't live without you I know.
"Rosewood Casket"
4/4 Time Key of G
There's a little rosewood casket
Sitting on a marble stand
And a packet of love letters
Written in my true love's hand
Come and read them to me, sister
come and sit beside my bed
lay your head upon my pillow
for tomorrow I'll be dead
When I'm dead and in my coffin
and my shroud's around me bound
and my narrow grave is ready
in some lonesome churchyard ground
The next two songs feature a new chord, the B
chord. It's easy.
All you have to do is barre the fourth fret, one fret above your C chord.
Railroad Bill
4/4 Time Key of G
Railroad Bill was a mighty mean man
he shot the midnight lantern out the breakman's hand
And it's ride old Railroad Bill
Going up a mountain going out west
38 special sticking out my vest
And it's ride old Railroad Bill
I've got a 38 special on a 45 frame
How can I miss when I've got dead aim?
And it's ride old Railroad Bill
Buy me a pistol long as my arm
So I can kill everybody who's done me harm
And it's ride old Railroad Bill
Railroad Bill too my wife
Said if I didn't like he would take my life
And it's ride old Railroad Bill
Darling, Oh Darling do you think I'm a fool?
Why would I leave you before the weather gets cool
And it's ride old Railroad Bill
"Careless Love"
4/4 Time Key of G
I love my momma and poppa too (3x)
But I'd leave them both to go with you
Oh what will my momma say (3x)
When she learns that I have gone astray
When I wore my apron low (3x)
You'd walk to me through rain and snow
Now my apron strings won't pin (3x)
You pass my door and don't come in
You might get by my garden gate (3x)
But you won't get by my 38
If you listen to the alternating bass pattern you might notice that the thumb-brush and the bass strum feel sort of static while alternating bass feels like it's moving. The back and forth notes of the bass create the feeling that the song is being pushed along. It also creates a "foot-tapping" rhythm.
Alternating bass is great, but like any technique there are times when it is not going to fit the song or, perhaps I should say, it is not going to fit how you feel a song should be played at a given moment.
With that in mind don't completely forget the picking patterns that led up to alternating bass. You are going to run into situations where you will need to draw on another picking pattern, or break up the rhythm of an existing pattern into something new. In other words, alternating bass is more of a spice than a main course.
As you get more and more comfortable strumming with your thumb you might want to try using a flatpick.
A flatpick, as the name implies, is a "flat pick" that you use to strum chords and pick out individual notes. You may run into old timers who refer to flatpicks as "plectrums."
Flatpicks come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes. In fact, some of the more modern flatpicks are not even flat! Today you can buy sculpted picks shaped out of bone or other materials in addition to the standard thin plastic pick. The best way to figure out what to use in terms of size, shape, weight and materials is to visit your local music shop and buy a whole bunch of picks. Everybody likes to use something different. For example, my father likes the teardrop shaped Fender thin tortoiseshell picks and my favorite pick is a super-heavy hard plastic generic pick that a publishing company was handing out as business cards.
Hold the flatpick between your thumb and index finger.
In the beginning it's usually a good idea to keep your hand position the same
as when you are playing the thumb brush strum with your anchor fingers resting
on the top of the guitar. Make sure that the pick is not hitting the strings
at an angle and don't let the pick flop around.
Other than that, the rest is pretty much up to you. You will have to experiment a little bit on your own to adjust your technique in terms of how to hold the pick to suit yourself. It's pretty intuitive, so go with your gut.
Do you have to use a flatpick? No, but I do think you should give it a try. With only one or two exceptions the rhythm patterns covered in this book can be played either with your fingers or a flatpick. It's a good idea to try both techniques just to help you get a better idea of what you may want to focus on down the road.
Start with four quarter note strums to each measure. Once you get comfortable with that try the bass strum and then the alternating bass strum. Up to this point we are only strumming down across the strings. Don't start strumming up and down just yet. We will get into upstrokes later on in the book.
Don't be afraid to play some songs with your fingers and other songs with the flatpick. In the long run it's a case of six of one, a half dozen of the other because in both cases the technique in question is simply a way to manipulate rhythm.
That's kind of cool when you think about it.
As we continue through the book experiment with the picking styles. As we address the 3/4 time strum in the next chapter be sure to try it with a flatpick.
Everything we have been playing up to this point has been played in 4/4 time. Now we are going to take a look at 3/4 time or "waltz time", the other popular time signature used in folk guitar. I know, right now you are thinking "time signature?" When I say that a song is in 4/4 time that four slash four or four over four is a time signature. Up to now we have just taken for granted that 4/4 means four beats to a measure. Now we are going to work on 3/4 time which is three beats to a measure. See the connection? 4/4 time equals four quarter notes to a measure and 3/4 equals three quarter notes to a measure. Nothing to it, right?
In 4/4 time we play four quarter note strums with a count of "one, two, three, four."
In 3/4 time we play three quarter note strums with a count of "one, two, three."
It's a simple idea, but getting used to this new rhythm can be a little tricky. You have spent so much time working on developing a picking pattern in 4/4 time that 3/4 is probably going to feel a little strange. Try just working on strumming three beats or strums per measure for a little while and as you get more comfortable start blending in the alternating bass pattern.
In a basic picking pattern for 3/4 time you are only playing one bass note in each measure. To alternate the bass string in this setting you simply change your bass string in each measure.
Some folks think it's easier to count a pattern like this out as "Five-two-three, Six-two-three" where five and six are the bass strings. Try playing "Who's Gonna Shoe Your Pretty Little Foot?" in 3/4 time. Play it at a fairly slow speed and work on keeping that waltz feel to the rhythm. If the alternating bass pattern drives you crazy you can just play a monotonic bass using the fifth string, or just play three thumb brush strums in each measure.
"Who's Gonna Shoe Your Pretty Little Foot?"
3/4 Time Key of G
Who's gonna shoe your pretty little foot?
Who's gonna glove your hand?
Who's gonna kiss your red ruby lips?
Who's gonna be your man?
Momma will glove my hand.
Sister will kiss my red ruby lips
I don't need no man.
I don't need no man poor boy
I don't need no man.
Poppa will shoe my pretty little foot
I don't need no man
The longest train I ever did see
Was sixteen coaches long.
The only girl I ever did love
Was on that train and gone.
By now you can play a picking pattern in two time signatures, 4/4 and 3/4. As you start to explore different kinds of music you are going to occasionally run into songs that are played in different time signatures. So it might be useful to understand just what that 4/4 time signature symbol really means.
The number on top of a time signature tells you how many beats to play in a measure. We already know that in 4/4 time we play four beats to a measure and in 3/4 time it is three beats to a measure.
The bottom number tells you what note to count. The two time signatures that we are already familiar with (4/4 & 3/4) both tell you that the quarter note gets the beat. However the bottom number does not always have to be 4. It can be 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, etc.
/1 - tells you that the whole note gets the beat
/2 - tells you that the half note gets the beat
/4 - tells you that the quarter note gets the beat
/8 - tells you that the eighth note gets the beat
/16 - tells you that the sixteenth note gets the beat
For example:
3/4 is 3 quarter notes per measure.
5/2 is 5 half notes per measure.
6/8 is 6 eighth notes per measure.
2/4 time is used often in marches and polkas. You may also find it in old time and bluegrass music. It's almost identical to 4/4 time except that in 2/4 time you play two quarter notes to a measure.
"Cut time" is a variation of 4/4 time. It is actually 2/2 time. The reason that it is called "cut time" is that the note values are cut in half. For example, a half note winds up with the time value of a quarter note and a whole note winds up with the time value of a half note.
6/8 time is a little bit tricky at first because it is so different from 2/4, 4/4 and 3/4 time. Your /4 time signatures are "duplet" time signatures. That just means that every beat is made up of two eighth notes (two eighth notes= one quarter note.) Your normal count in 4/4 time is 1 2 3 4 and your normal count for 3/4 time is 1 2 3.
In 6/8 time you wind up counting to three twice. In a single measure of 6/8 time we would count "one-two-three, two-two-three." If you look at it, playing in 6/8 time is really just a matter of doubling everything up from your count in 3/4 time.
You don't have to go crazy trying to memorize this. We are not going to go into 6/8 time in this book, but when you start heading out to jam sessions it may come up so it's a good idea to at least be aware of how things work.
So far we have kept our right hand picking patterns in groups of quarter notes. That's cool and you can play a lot of music that way, but there are some simple tricks that we can use to spice up the rhythm.
Every picking pattern that we have played up to this point has been made up of quarter notes. That's the logical place to start because, as I pointed out in the last chapter, the time signature tells you to play four quarter notes in 4/4 time and three quarter notes in 3/4 time.
That's a great framework to start with, but as I mentioned in our earlier discussion on note values you can use any combination of notes in a measure as long as they "add up" to the value dictated by the time signature. In 4/4 time we can hold a whole note for four beats, play two half notes, a half note and two quarter notes, eight eighth notes or any other combination that fits the instructions in the time signature. Once we can grasp that concept all kinds of really cool possibilities open up for picking patterns.
We started out playing four quarter note strums in 4/4 time and then we went on to bend that quarter note strum into an alternating bass pattern. What we are going to do now is cut two of those quarter notes in half. It's not as complicated as it might sound. All we have to do to cut a quarter note in half is replace it with two eighth notes. In this case we are going to replace the quarter notes on beats "two" and "four" with a pair of eighth notes.
As you might have noticed, this changes the rhythm for each measure. It is easy to understand how the rhythm changes if we go back and take another look at how we count measures composed of quarter notes and eighth notes.
In a measure of quarter notes you count out and tap our foot on each beat.
In a measure of eighth notes each beat in counted as "one and". You tap your foot on "one" and as your foot is coming back up you count the "and".
In this new picking pattern we are going to play a quarter note and two eighth notes twice in each measure. The new count is "one two and, three four and".
In order to break those quarter notes in half we are going to add an upstroke to our guitar Strum:
With your thumb pluck down on a bass string.
Tap your foot and count "one"
After the bass note strum down across the strings with your thumb.
Tap your foot and count "two"
As you bring up your foot after the "two" count, pick up on the first string
with your index finger.
Count "and"
The example below shows how the picking pattern comes together:
When you practice the Carter strum it will help you get into the rhythm if you call out the name for each part of the strum.
Let's give each major part of the Carter strum a label of some sort. We'll call the bass note "bump," the thumb-strum "dit" and the index finger picking the first string "ty." Because the strum and the thumb happen right after each other we'll write it out as bump dit-ty.
On the bump tap your foot. Bring your foot back up.
As you tap your foot again strum down for the dit.
As your foot is coming back up pick the first string for the ty.
Now, if the bump has a quarter note value and the dit and ty have eighth note values that means the dit and the ty part of the strum both have to be half as long as the bump. This is because with an eighth note value the dit and ty together equal one quarter note.
If you try this with a flatpick keep in mind that the "down, down, up" pattern remains the same. Let's take a shot at using the Carter strum on a song you already know.
"Skip To My Lou"
4/4 Time Key of G
Take it slow and easy. Getting the timing of this strum down to a point where you can keep a steady rhythm may take a while. Go back through the songs you already know and try them with the Carter strum.
Then give "Handsome Molly" a shot.
"Handsome Molly"
4/4 Time Key of G
While sailing on the ocean,
While sailing on the sea
I'd think of Handsome Molly
Wherever she might be.
She rode to church on Sunday,
She passed me on by
I could tell her mind was changing
By the roving of her eye
Like I said in the chapter on alternating bass, the Carter strum is way cool but it's not the be-all-end-all of guitar techniques. As you go back through the songs that you already know you will sometimes spot a tune where that picking pattern just won't fit. One of the things you have to constantly look at is whether the rhythm pattern you choose for a song is what the song really needs. Don't try to force things just because you want people to notice that you can play a fancy picking pattern.
Oh yea, I guess you are wondering why it's called the Carter strum. Maybelle Carter used a lick like this in her early recordings with the Carter Family. She didn't really "invent" the lick (banjo players had been using a similar idea for a long time before Maybelle) but she was so associated with it and people loved her so much it just sort of became "her" picking pattern.
This pattern also works great for some songs in 3/4 time. The only thing that really changes is that we have to break up two consecutive quarter notes into eighth notes.
In the standard 3/4 time strum we play three quarter notes in each measure.
Tabbed out that boils down to either three strums in a measure or, as in this example, a bass note followed by two strums in each measure.
When we start experimenting with playing the Carter strum in 3/4 time we can break up two of the quarter notes to get a rhythm of "1 2& 3&".
This is a quarter note followed by four eighth notes.
In tab you would get something like the pattern laid out on the right. The "down up" pattern we used for the eighth notes in 4/4 time still applies, but this time we have to do it twice.
There is an easy way to remember this. Keep in mind that with eighth notes the notes played while tapping your foot are strummed down and the notes played when you are bringing your foot up for the "&" are strummed up.
Let's try this pattern with "Danville Girl". It's a hobo song. You've got to know at least one hobo song if you play folk guitar. I think it's actually a law in some states.
To save space (it's kind of a long song) I left the chord diagrams out of this arrangement. By now you should be pretty comfortable with the barre chords so it shouldn't cause any problems. When you play "Danville Girl" don't rush the song. This is a pretty laid back song so just let it sort of mosey along.
Danville Girl 3/4
Time Key of G
My pocket book was empty
My heart was full of pain
Ten thousand miles away from home
Bumming the railroad train
I was standing on the platform
Smoking a cheap cigar
Listening for that next freight train
To carry an empty car
Well I got off in Danville
Got stuck on a Danville girl
You bet your life she's out of sight
She wore those Danville curls
She took me in her kitchen
She treated me nice and kind
She got me in the notion
Of bumming all the time
She wore her hair on the back of her head
Like high-toned people do
But the very next train that come down the line
I bid that girl adieu
I pulled my cap down over my eyes
Walked back down to the track
Then I caught a westbound freight
And never did look back
Like I said, you have to know a little bit of train lore if you play folk guitar. Guitars and trains are so joined in American folklore that it's almost mandatory to know a few train and hobo songs.
The good news is that a lot of the train songs out there are pretty cool. Songs like "The Wabash Cannonball", "The Wreck Of The Old 97" and a few of the others I have transcribed for you later on in the songbook section are a blast to play and people love to sing along.
Sometimes it helps to know a little bit of train-related folklore to introduce a song like this. I was playing "The Wreck Of The Old 97" with my dad outside of our tipi on a camping trip a few years ago when an old guy named Steptoe (is it me, or is that just about the coolest name you've ever heard?) wandered over and started talking about how he saw the Old 97 after the wreck when he was a boy in Virginia!
For a hobo song like "Danville Girl" you might want to talk to your audience about the hobo code.
See, the hoboes used to leave little symbols here and there so the next guy down the road would know where to go for a handout or to watch out for a mean railroad bull. My father is convinced that his dad's hoagie shop in suburban Philadelphia had a hobo code symbol marked on it somewhere because guys would be walking by the shop, stop dead in their tracks like they just spotted something and then head inside to ask for a meal. I am proud to say that my grandfather never turned them down.
Here are a few hobo code symbols to get you started. You can do some research on your own to learn more. It's not exactly guitar-related, but it is kind of cool.
Up to this point we have been focusing mostly on the picking hand while limiting the fretting hand to fairly simple barre chords. Now it's time to put the fretting hand to work with some new chord forms and other cool stuff. Before we start going crazy with chord forms it might be a good idea to learn a simple exercise that, among other things, will get you used to using your fingers on the fretboard.
This is a little snippet of the G scale. We'll get into the whole G scale a little later on, but for right now this is a nifty little run to work on.
The "two rules" I mentioned earlier in this chapter still apply. You want to fret the first fret with your index finger, the second fret with your middle finger and so on.
All we are really doing here is plucking single strings with our thumb, or with a flatpick.
Now lets take that exact same run, but this time we are going to play it with our index finger across the first fret. I changed the first note to a strum this time so you can "hear" the new chord before you play the lick.
Overall, not too much has changed except that now the "two rules" get twisted a little bit. With our index finger tied up making an Ab barre chord we are forced to play the lick with our middle and ring fingers.
At first this might seem really confusing, but if you spend some time practicing the lick you will get more comfortable with it.
Once you can play this in Ab move up to the second fret (we call it going "up the neck" because the notes are moving up in pitch) and play it in A. Then keep moving the pattern up the neck and back down.
Mess around with this for a little while and give yourself a chance to build up your finger strength. As I said before, when you start getting mushy or dead notes or if your hands start to hurt, stop and move things around a little bit. You will have to find the best hand position for your body.
If you want to "fancy up" things a little bit try picking this pattern with your fingers. I have marked out the first lick with some tips on what finger to pick the string with. T=thumb, I=index and M=middle. Keep your little finger resting on the top of your guitar and just take it easy.
By now you are probably sick and tired of playing barre chords. We are now going to look at some chords that use two and three fingers.
When you start making these new chords you should make an effort
to keep the thumb of your fretting hand in roughly the same position as when
you play barre chords. That is, with the ball of your thumb centered on the
back of the neck. That's a good position for your fretting hand with some chords,
but you will sometimes have to shift things around. In the image on the right
you can see where I have worn the finish off of my guitar neck. There is a worn
spot along the centerline of the neck, but there is a second worn spot where
my thumb sometimes rests closer to the edge of the fretboard.
We all have different sized hands and as a result each of us has to tailor chord forms to our individual needs. As long as you can fret strings cleanly and make chords that don't have any dead strings you should be fine.
One thing to avoid is the "no pain no gain" attitude. Guitar chords in any tuning can be a challenge to learn while building up your hand strength, but this isn't a situation where "feeling the burn" is going to toughen you up. Hand pain is your body's way of telling you that you are doing something wrong.
If your hands hurt when you hold a chord form for a measure or two stop what you are doing and move your hand around to a more comfortable position.
Another thing that you need to know before you start making chords is how to choose which fingers to use. There are two simple rules that you can fall back on. The first rule is that, where feasible, you work in four fret blocks with each finger assigned to a fret. In other words, you use your index finger on the first fret, your middle finger on the second fret, your ring finger on the third fret and your little finger on the fourth fret.
Unfortunately things are not always laid out in a way that will let you follow the first rule. Quite a few chords use several strings fretted at the same fret, and that's where the second rule comes into play.
If you have to fret several strings on the same fret,
as with the C chord diagrammed on the left, assign a finger to each string starting
with the sixth string. In other words, to make the C chord in the diagram your
index finger would fret the second string at the first fret, your middle finger
would fret the fourth string at the second fret and your ring finger would fret
the first string at the second fret.
The reason we have to lay things out this way is simply because we want to avoid crossing our fingers up on the fretboard. If everything was laid out in a random fashion making fast chord changes would be next to impossible. Making the C chord this way makes moving to our next chord much easier.
With this D chord you would fret the third string with
your index finger, the second string with your middle finger and, you guessed
it, the first string with your ring finger.
Nothing to it, right?
If you look at the chord diagram for the C chord you will see that the sixth string is marked with an x. That is telling you not to play that string. You could fret the sixth string with your thumb on the second fret, but I don't recommend trying that just yet. Give yourself some time to get more comfortable forming chords with your fingers before you start adding in the thumb.
Not using the sixth string in a C chord means that you have to change your "root five" bass pattern. You don't have a low C note available so you have to compromise things a little bit. Don't panic, in the long run art is really nothing more than creative compromising. Take a look at the G, C D chord progression tabbed out below. I have given one option for this "problem." Mess around with it a little bit and see what you can come up with on your own.
Let's try this pattern with a neat little Irish Song called "I'll Tell Me Ma" . The Irish band I used to play with years ago called this one "Playing Post Office" . It is a pretty straightforward three-chord song except that the song has three sets of two verses with a separate chorus for each set.
"I'll Tell Me Ma" Verse
4/4 Time Key of G
"I'll Tell Me Ma" chorus
4/4 Time Key of G
I'll tell me ma when I go home,
the boys won't leave the girls alone.
Pull my hair and stole my comb,
well that's all right 'till I get home.
She is handsome, she is pretty
She is the belle of Belfast City
She is courting one two three
Please wont you tell me who is she
Albert Mooney says he loves her so
and all the boys are fighting for her.
They knock the door and ring the bell
saying "oh my true love are you well?"
Out she comes as white as snow
rings on her fingers and bells on he toes.
Albert Mooney says he'll die
if he doesn't get the girl with the roving eye
You might find the fact that we are changing the bass picking pattern with each chord change a little challenging at first, but you might as well get used to the idea. When we move into standard guitar tuning this is going to be an almost constant thing. We kept things consistent measure to measure with barre chords so you could get used to the rhythm. The next step is to keep the rhythm steady no matter what you are doing with the bass line, and later on when you start adding melody into the mix.
Don't worry about mistakes. They go by so fast that people will most likely only notice if you stop and begin shaking your head trying to apologize. Just roll with the rhythm and be aware that in folk music you can't really hit a wrong note as long as you are in the rhythm and following the chord progression.
Our next step is to learn a few more chords. Then it will be time for you to start coming up with your own way to play some songs.
Before you head into the next chapter go back through the songs you already know and give yourself a chance to review the thumb-brush, bass strum, alternating bass and Carter strum picking patterns in 4/4 and 3/4 time
Early on in this book we went over the chromatic scale in terms of using it to figure out barre chords in open G tuning. We started with open G. When we bar across the first fret we get an A flat chord. If we keep moving along the fretboard we wind up with another G chord at the twelfth fret.
In order to discuss chord progressions, chord construction, transposing and melody we have to have an understanding of how major and minor scales are built. Don't worry, people make a big deal about music theory being difficult but with what you already know about the chromatic scale this is going to be pretty easy, and it will lead you into some really cool stuff down the road.
Major and minor scales are modes of the chromatic scale. To put it simply, major and minor scales are nothing more than a way of shuffling the chromatic scale to create specific patterns. When a song is in the key of G it means that the song is played out of the G scale. Actually the technical term is something like "the key of G is a major mode with a root of G", but talking that way makes my brain hurt. We are not going to get into modes just yet.
To figure out the notes of the G scale we need to lay out the chromatic scale starting with our root note. The root note in a major or minor scale is always t