My name is Ulises but everybody calls me Sony and today we're going to be going over the fundamental chords of guitar. The reason why we're doing these is 1. Most the songs that you want to play are being made up of these chords. So, the more of these you know the more like you are to play the song. 2. As you become more advanced, you're going to notice that we communicate as if you know these chords. The more you have these chords under control the more of an advanced player you're actually going to become. So, we're going to be tackling these one by one. And let's start with how I think you should be practicing these. There are three phases to how you should be practicing these chords. 1. Make sure that your fingers are in the right place. This is going to be extremely easy to mess up because these are very small distances and your hand is going to think that you're in the right place. It's going to say, "Hey, look! I'm on this string or that string. Eh! Same difference! Make sure your fingers are in the right place first. 2. Make sure you're pushing down as hard as you can. Now this is going to require finger strength and you're going to notice that your fingertips are not going to like this. I have never met anyone whose fingers actually bled while they were playing guitar. I'm pretty sure that's a myth. However, if you want to have stronger fingers, what I want you to do is put your all your fingers down on the fretboard on one single string. And what you're going to do is you're just going to make sure they're touching and you're going to hold it there for about 10 seconds. That's all. Now what you're going to do you're going to push down as hard as you can for 10 seconds. :: working out noises:: All right and then you let go. Do that two or three times on each string. These are called time static contractions. This is going to help you build up strength because you're going to have to get used to using your tendons more than your muscle. The tendons are stronger than your muscles. So as you get better it'll become more and more efficient for you to push down. This last one is the hardest. Making sure that you are playing the intended strings. So if you're playing a C chord your third finger is going to be on the A string third fret. It's okay if you don't understand what that means yet. However, because it's on this string it's going to want to touch the other string and it's going to end up muting that string. So you can hear one string but you can't hear the other one. So make sure that your third finger is only touching the string is supposed to be. Same thing with the rest of the fingers. It's also with the pick. As you get better we're going to start hitting fewer and fewer strings. At first, I want you to hit all the strings which is going to be fine. Might be weird, that's okay. But as you get better you're only supposed to be hitting five strings on certain chords. So that's what I want you working on at the end. Making sure you're hitting the intended strings. In order to learn chords we have to know strings. So let's start with the biggest string that one's referred to as E. Okay next one is a then D and then G and then B and then E. Now when I was first starting out I just had to memorize it and then another teacher told me there's a sentence that you could use. And he said Eddie Ate Dynamite Good Bye Eddie. All right, that's going from biggest string to smaller string. Another teacher said you go the other way, skinny string to biggest string. Easter Bunnies Get Drunk At Easter. If you want to be more PG about it Donuts. So Easter Bunnies Get Donuts At Easter. Whatever fits your head. Make sure when I say A String it pops into your head. Now some of you may have realized that they're two E strings. The high E is the skinny one. It's because it sounds like it's really high and the low E. That's because it's by pitch not necessarily altitude. So let's go through the Frets. Now frets refer to two different things. There's the metal itself which is called the Fret. However, when we say, let's say first fret or second fret, what we mean is the space behind the fret. A long time ago that you used to have what was known as scalloped necks. And you'd have to put your finger right behind where that mound of wood was to make sure your guitar was in tune. However, we don't need to do that anymore so as long as your finger is between the frets and not touching the other pieces of metal. You're totally fine. So when we say first finger first fret we want our finger somewhere over here. First finger second fret somewhere over here. But if we say our third finger third fret somewhere over there. That's all Let's go over an A chord and some of the pitfalls that actually come with it. So first finger is another D string second fret, our second finger is going to go on the G string second fret, and our third finger is going to go on the B string second fret. Now notice they're all in a straight line. And that gets kind of crowded. So if you want to use an alternate set of fingerings you can. So, for example, I usually use two fingers to hold down all these three strings because I have really big hands. But let's say your hand is big enough to actually hold down all three strings with one finger, that's totally fine too. What matters is that there's a finger on the correct fret. Another problem that tends to happen is that because it's so easy to play, our fingers tend to just float around. So we'll have everything on, like, we know it's supposed to be on this the same fret but then we put on the first fret. Make sure it's on the second fret. Okay now that we have that under control make sure your fingers are in the right place let's just strum everything. Right now that's level one level. Two let's push down as hard as we can hit everything. Cool. And then level three, see how there's a little X right there on that on the low E? That means don't hit that string. There we go, an A chord All right so when we do an E chord, it's gonna be kind of awkward because one finger is going to be behind the other fingers. So our first finger is going to be on the G string second fret. Our second finger is going to be at the A string second fret. And our third finger is going to be the D Street second fret. Now we're going to notice here that our first finger is behind the other ones. So what tends to happen is our third finger here is going to touch that other string. That's going to be a pain. However, it's not that big of a deal as long as we sound okay. So our fingers are in the right place, let's just go ahead and strum everything. Cool let's push down as hard as we can. Cool. And there's no X's. That means we've hit everything again, Cool an E chord. The D chord can be weird because we're starting to split fingers in an awkward way. So our first finger is going to go on the G string second fret, our second finger is going to go in the high e second fret, and then our third finger is going to go on the B string third fret. Now this is where people normally start threatening my safety because this is so awkward. I understand. Our fingers are not used to this. A is a natural formation. E is a natural formation. D ah not so much. It's like some weird grossness there like a gang symbol of some sort. So we're gonna make sure our fingers in the right place first I'll just hit everything. Okay now I'm going to push down as hard as we can. Starting to sound better. Now we have a X on the E and A so we don't hit those. And then there it is, a D chord. G is a fairly controversial chord and it's because of way the guitar evolved. after the 60s. In the 50s if you ask someone to play a G chord they would use three fingers but then these dirty hippies showed up, dirty hippies, and they started playing G with four fingers because they made it easier to switch certain chords. So, we're gonna be playing G with four fingers because in the long run it makes your life a lot easier. The other problem that starts to happen is that it's a very spread-out chord. I promise you your hand will get used to it. You just have to practice more. So let's put our first finger on the A string second fret, our second finger on the E string third fret, and then our third finger is going to go on the B string third fret. Yeah that's awkward right. And then our fourth finger is going to go on the High E third fret. Now that feels weird. We're gonna sit here for a second so that way you get used to it. I know you're probably yelling at the screen right now it's okay. So our fingers are in the right place let's just hit everything. Push down as hard as we can. There are no X's so we hit everything again. Cool. G. C is a fairly important chord for multiple reasons but is a total pain and we're about to figure out why. Our first finger is going to go on the B string first fret, our second finger is going to go on the D string second fret, and our third finger is going to go on the A string third fret. Now notice one finger is behind the other. What tends to happen is our third finger, second finger, our first finger are touching more strings than what we want. So you got to make sure that you're arching your fingers to make sure that they're not touching anything they're not supposed to be touching, Is that going to be a pain? Yes. Are you going to hate everybody for it? Yes. That's something you really have to practice to get better at? Yes. Am I gonna keep doing this? Yes. All right, so let's make sure our fingers are in the right place and just hit everything. Cool. Just push down as hard as we can. Ah, that's better. And then there's an X on the low E so that means we don't hit it. A lot of people hate F and there's a reason for it. We are going to be playing Fmajor7 instead of F. Is it that big of a deal? No. Will people freak out about it? Yes and we can tell those people to go eat dirt. And the reason why it what matters more is that we sound good more than we sound accurate. It's more important that we're being understood more than impressive. So what we're going to be doing is putting our first finger on the B string first fret, our second .finger on the G string second fret, and our third finger on the D string third fret. Now we're going to be hitting, let's make sure everything's in the right place first. Right. Hit. Cool. Push down as hard as you can. All right. And we have x's on E and A and that would mean we don't hit those. So That's what we're gonna be calling F even though technically it's an F major7. If you want to be playing a more traditional F, use your first finger to hold down the B string and the E string at the same time on the first fret. That's why it's such a pain. But notice it's not that big of a deal and especially when you start playing songs. It won't be that noticeable. So every time you see an F think of the first chord that we've played this F major7. Minor is not that big of a deal. I have no idea why people make it a big deal, it's not that big of a deal. So let's play A minor. Our first finger is going to go on the B string first fret, our second finger is going to go on the D string second fret, and our third finger is going to go on the G string second fret. Now you're going to notice it looks like E which is a good thing and a bad thing because sometimes our hand gets it backwards and it'll think that we're supposed to be playing E or A minor and it starts getting all confused and everything. So let's go ahead and put our fingers in the right place and hit everything. Cool. Push down as hard as we can. All right, now there's an x on the E, so we don't hit it. There we go. A minor. People seem to think that F is the hardest chord to play here it won't be it'll be D minor. And it's easiest one to forget because you don't run into it that often but let's play it anyway. So first finger goes on the high E first fret, our third finger is going to go on the B string third fret, and our second finger is going to go on the G string second fret. All right so make sure our fingers are in the right place. I know that feels awkward. All right hit everything. All right push down as hard as we can. Cool. And then we have an x on E and A so we don't hit them. D minor E minor is the hardest chord period. All right? If you cry, suck it up. All right, so first finger is going to go on the A string second fret and our second finger is going to go in the D string second fret. All right so make sure our fingers are in the right place strum everything. Cool. All right push down as far as we can, here we go. And then no X's so we hit it again. Told you it's gonna be difficult! Although these are the most fundamental chords, these are the ones that are most ignored by the advanced players. I'm going to stress make sure that you know these inside and out because as you become more advanced you notice we reference these more and more often. If you're looking for more ways to make your musical life easier, like and subscribe and, hopefully, I'll see you next time

My name is Ulises but everybody calls me Sony and changing chords can definitely be a pain. However! The more we understand the problem the more likely we are to solve it. In this video, we're going to be going over what is slowing down in our chord changing, what we can do to solve it, and some exercises to speed us up. All my students who have done these exercises have gotten to the point where they are changing chords too quickly. There is a table of contents in the description if you want to go ahead and jump to those exercises but I'm going to highly suggest you listen to the whole video so that way you have context. So, let's go over why in the world changing chords can be such a pain. There are three factors that are involved with chord changing and I don't think we're considering the third one. The first one is knowledge. That makes sense, do we know the chord? 2. Motion. Are we moving fast enough? And 3. Stress. And the stress part is something that I don't think we're considering enough of, So, let's analyze that. The reason why changing chords can be so stressful is because you're keeping up with multiple things at the exact same time. There's the chord that you're on which requires a finger a fret and a string. Then there's the chord that you're going to which requires a finger a fret and a string. And then there are the beats that you're trying to keep track of. Now what starts to happen is as you're keeping track of the beats, they start to act more as a countdown for a bomb more than it is where in the world you're supposed to be playing this chord. So your brain starts to panic, "Oh my God! Am I going to make it in time?! Am I going to make it in time?!" Now it's concentrating on the panicking, not on playing the next chord. Now there are ways of solving it but we're going to solve that in the next two sections of knowledge and motion. When the brain this under stress or starts to panic, the most common thing for it to do is to start to forget things. So let's say we're playing a chord progression that goes Em A C D. When you're not under pressure playing those chords, not that crazy. But when you start to put pressure, you start to put those beats in, it starts to do this. Em A C ... what is that last chord? You forget and then that's totally normal. And it's because it's trying to keep track of everything and it starts to toss things out because, "Hey I don't even know what the next chord is but I have the chord that I'm on right now and that's good enough." So how in the world do we keep track of the chords? My suggestion is to say the chords out loud. First, can you say the chords just in general? Em A C D over and over again. Then what you start to do, you should play the chords themselves while saying them out loud. Em A C D And this is going to link your mouth with your brain so that way when you do say it, your hand will just start to go to where it needs to go. And then you start to play those chords with the song. It's going to help focus your brain. It doesn't have time to panic because it knows it has to say the next chord. And because you've already linked saying the chord with playing the chord, you're more likely to play the chord. Now let's talk about motion. Efficiency of motion is better than pure speed. But keep in mind, repetition of the efficient motion will bring speed faster. What in the world am I talking about? Let's talk about the efficiency of motion. Let's say we're playing an E minor chord and we have to move to an A. Most of us, what we'll do is we'll lift our fingers completely off the fretboard and then bring them to back down. You've just created a gigantic movement twice that was not necessary. That's not efficient. Try to keep the movement down to a minimum. Another thing we like to do is turn our head. So what we'll do is, we'll have the E minor, we'll strum it by turning our head, and then we'll move her head back to make the core and then we keep moving our head back and forth. That's another motion that does not need to happen. Keep your eyes on the fretboard. You don't have to hit the right number of strings, at least not yet. We'll have exercises later to solve that but keep your eyes over here so you stop moving so much. Another one is the lack of commitment. Ao I'll give you an example of this. We're going to have an E minor going to an A and we send a signal to our hand, "Hey! Make an A chord!" And then we'll send the signal, "Put your first finger on the D string second fret." "Wait! How come you're not making the A chord?! Put your first finger on the D string second fret!" That's the same instruction over and over and over again. So your hand starts to paw at the fretboard. This is how I know this is how I know it's happening. Because it keeps doing what you tell it to do but you keep saying the same thing overall and over again. So how do we solve all those problems at the same time? Commit! First finger moves first! So I move my first string in the correct place first. Then second finger, then third finger. Once that finger is down, don't move it! Just let it sit there. You can fix it later. Doing this over and over and over again, efficiently, directly to where it's supposed to go, over and over and over again, will make you get really fast really fast. So now that we have those under control, how do we start practicing that pure speed concept? Now that we have the efficient movement now, we have to work on pure speed and that comes from repetition. That means practice. But we want to practice correctly. So here are the three rules that I have for practicing these exercises. 1. D not turn your head. Keep your eyes on the fretting hand. You're going to want to turn your head. It's a natural instinct. Don't do it! Second rule: Say the chord out loud when you're supposed to play the chord. Third rule: HIT NO MATTER WHAT! If you're supposed to play a chord on beat one, play something. Even if it's something really bad. That's totally fine. We have to give your brain a time limit and it doesn't understand what a time limit is until you hit when you're supposed to hit. At first it's going to sound really bad. It's totally fine. As you practice more and more and more it's going to get better. If you've noticed after two or three times your hand is not speeding up, practice that particular chord change five times. So for example, if we're playing from C to d, c and then D, and it's just not working, just play c d over and over and over again and then go back to the exercise. Now what is the exercise? That's a good question. We're gonna be playing the chords A C D E F G Am Dm Em. The reason why they're in alphabetical order is to make it easier to know what chord is we're going to be playing next. We're also going to be playing with a metronome at 60 beats per minute. If you have a drum machine, that'll be awesome. We're going to be playing each one of those chords four beats per chord. The moment you play the chord start making your way towards the next chord. This is extremely important because you don't want to be wasting time. Remember, move efficiently. Say the chords out loud and always hit no matter what! If you couldn't do the exercise, it's okay. Even Neo didn't make the first jump the first time, right? So let's do a couple of things to check up on if we're doing things correctly. Can you draw the chord diagrams from memory correctly? That's just to make sure you have the knowledge. Are you actually making the commitment that you think you are? Are you saying the chords out loud the way you think you are? Make sure that's actually happening. That's usually the culprit with my students. They think they're saying the chord and they're not. There's too many things happening at the same time. Make sure you're concentrating on saying it. Make sure you're still doing it 15 minutes a day. I promise you, by the end of the week you'll have it down. If you could do the exercise I want you to go into the description and find the randomizer. You're going to put the chords in there and do the exact same thing. Four beats per chord but with the order the randomizer put the chords in. This is going to help you gain more instinct towards what the chords are when you're playing. And then you won't; you'll notice that you're not thinking nearly as much as you're playing these chords. Now let's go to the second exercise. There are two ways to actually speed up. We can speed up the metronome from 60 to 61. But that's a tactic that we're not going to use right now. That's a tactic for more specific type of playing. What we're going to do is, we're going to teach our hand that it's always the same motion determined by our own speed. And the we do that is we cut the time in half. So instead of playing four beats per chord, you're gonna be playing two beats per chord. Now this also means you're gonna have to think farther ahead. You're covering twice as much ground in the same amount of time. So you're not just thinking A chord and then C chord. You got to think A C D and E because you're going to be moving faster. Once you start to feel more of what's going on, you're gonna notice your hands are going to move faster than what you can think. This is a good thing. This is why people start to play faster than what they intend because their mind thinks of the chord and their hand goes straight to it,.So two beats per chord if you couldn't do the exercise, that's totally normal. Go back to the four beats and get really comfortable with that one and then come back to the two beats and see where in the world your hand starts to fail. What normally starts to happen is that things are going by so fast that your head starts to get discombobulated (great word) by all the things that are moving so quickly. So we have to learn how to relax into those chord progressions. Maybe go back and do them individually d c d c d c e f e f e f. If you could do the exercise, let's go to the final one. Playing one beat per chord may seem excessive but you're gonna notice that it happens more and more often with certain genres of music. Particularly songs from the 70s and 80s. Not that songs today don't do that, it's just more likely to happen back then. Another thing that starts to is after happened is that we have to be used to moving quickly because we're moving in between strums. And this exercise is definitely gonna help with that. So one beat per chord If you couldn't do the exercise, you're not alone. A lot of people struggle on that one. Just keep doing it over and over again for 15 minutes and I promise you you're going to be able to change chords just as quickly as I can. But I want you to pay attention to is how things are feeling and how your hand is moving on automatic pilot. Don't try to control your hand. Let it go to where it wants to go. If you notice that it's not moving where you don't want it to, that means you have to go back down to the four and two beats to make sure you are moving correctly. That your hand does know where it's supposed to go. Hopefully, that made your musical life on guitar a little bit easier. If you have any questions, concerns, comments, death threats, or want to have something that you want me to go over please leave it in the comments section because I can't help you if you don't tell me anything. Alright! Hopefully, I see you next time!

my name is Ulysses but everybody calls me Sonny and Summit is probably the most misunderstood concept on guitar and in this video we'll be going very in depth as to what the basis of strumming is and how you can control the fundamentals so that way you can be more comfortable in whatever situation that you're going to be in when you strum the guitar you are turning the guitar into a percussive instrument because you are striking the string but a lot of us are striking the strings extremely hard because we're using our four reusioners and what starts to happen is that puts a lot of stress on our elbow and her shoulder and over a period of years that can actually cause some damage that I'm not joking can be unfixable so what you should be doing is using more of your wrist and more of a loosey-goosey don't be John Cena loosey-goosey and a good way of testing that is if you hold down your forearm you still still should be able to strum if you are going to use your forearm and you start to strum you'll notice it really quickly so make sure you use your wrist another factor is your pick when I'm strumming uh songs that have a lot of strumming involved in it I use a thinner pick the reason why is one if I have a thicker pick I'm more likely to drop it and most of us are dropping our picks because we're using such thick picks they're thinner so they'll actually form around my finger another reason why I use uh thinner picks is the thicker pick will start to rebound against my hand so I'll strike it and the string will come back and hit and it hurts a lot you can use sticker picks maybe like what I do when you start to do more solos or anything like that but if I would be doing a lot of strumming I'm gonna use a thinner pick and my wrist so that way one I'm not actually gonna wear out my joints two it makes me more accurate and three I can play for a lot longer period of time so thin picks wrist and just relax don't hit the string so hard the first thing we're going to have to control while we're strumming is knowing where the beat is and this is The Stereotype for guitar players because they have no idea where the beat is now what is the beat there is a pulse that's happening throughout a song that is steady that keeps all the musicians in place so let's say I'm singing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star there is a beat within that song that'll keep us even if you're not counting with me in the same place that's right twinkle twinkle little star how I wonder what you are you can feel where that Tempo is where that beat is the tempo is how fast I'm going I can speed it up twinkle twinkle little star how I wonder what you want or slow it down twinkle twinkle [Music] I think you get the idea and what guitar players are doing is they're paying attention more to their plane more than where the beat is and it's it's bad because we actually end up sounding horrible because the guitar player keeps speeding up and slowing down because they're not paying attention to the beat they're paying attention to what they're playing now there's a lot of factors involved with this there's this is such a complicated instrument that the first thing our brain starts to do is stop counting so what we have to start doing is be able to keep track of that beat with no thought the first thing I want you to do is I want you to listen to all your favorite songs and see if you can feel feel where that pulse where that beat is don't label it just yet just make sure you can feel where it's at if you are having a lot of trouble doing that with your favorite songs maybe go find some electronic music something that has a little bass in it like it's they're really emphasizing the beat there or make sure you listen more to the drummer because that is their whole job to make sure that everyone can really feel where that beat is so let's say you do have to be under control what do we do next so let's say you know where the beat is and you can feel it on all the songs now we have to start labeling it this can't get kind of controversial but you're gonna understand why in the world it matters that we're thinking simply most of the time we're counting to four so we'll count like this one two three four one two three four and we'll do that through the whole song and that's why the musicians know each other at we're all agreeing on what beat one is and we can start and stop whenever we want to because we all know we're all going to come in on one we're all going to stop on three it's not that wild unless we're not agreeing on what number we're counting to or which beat is which so for example if I'm calling something B1 and the other guitar player is calling it B2 it's not going to work out that well we're gonna be off the whole time we all have to agree on what we're counting to and how fast we're counting it now this can get kind of weird because most time will come to the four but sometimes we're counting to three or six and sometimes it's a crazier number that gets like really nutty what matters more than anything else is that the ones line up I've been in a lot of gigs where everyone on stage is counting differently but because we're all agreeing on where one is it's okay because our starting points all line up we just use bigger cycle counts so for example although I'm kind I'm counting one two three four someone else might be counting one two three four one two three four notice the ones still line up so it's okay so what are some exercises to help with this we're going to be using a metronome to do these exercises I'm going to be at 75 beats per minute if you have a drum machine that's great if you have a song around that same tempo that's even better what I want to make sure of is that you understand how we're going to be doing this I'm going to be counting this in saying two three four and then we're going to start the exercise in this case we're going to be clapping on one the reason why we're starting I'm starting to count on two is because everyone starts to get really excited if I say one and they start clapping as hard as they can so the first exercise is clap when you say one and pay attention to how that feels two three four two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four hopefully you could feel where you were supposed to clap after a while if you didn't it's okay just keep doing the exercise over and over again now this is going to lead us to our next exercise we're gonna clap on beat two remember after the countdown and I want you to really pay attention to how this is going to feel different [Music] two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four hopefully you can notice that that had a different sensation and that's how we know where B1 and B2 are at because they feel different from each other now a long time ago they would say beat one is a strong beat and B2 is the weak beat because one felt stronger to clap on well we don't play like Baroque music anymore so we don't know which beat will feel stronger for us so my teacher ought to say the strong beat is where you want to clap and the weak beat is where you don't want to clap and this is where strumming gets complicated because there's some places you do and do not want the strum and it feels really awkward so what we have to start doing is getting comfortable with all the beats and that's what the next two exercises are going to help us with we already did one and two so nothing to get comfortable with three and four so let's clap on B3 foreign two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four hopefully you notice that that felt similar to beat one so sometimes we'll get confused as two is the speed one or is the speed three it's totally normal the more often you do these exercises the better you're gonna be at them so now we have to do before thank you [Music] one two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four and hopefully you notice that that felt similar to B2 and you know we just keep doing those exercises over and over and over again until we feel comfortable with all four beats but that is what leads us to the most misunderstood concept on guitar I'm going to really emphasize you that you pay attention to this part of the video because this is the part that everyone is not understanding right now we're strumming what are known as quarter notes you're strumming one time per beat that's important because this turns it into what I think is called the binary system please correct me in the comments meaning we either strum on beat one or we don't strum up we either strum on beat two or we don't stream on B2 we strum on B3 we don't start my B3 or we strum on B4 and we don't strum on beat four so that means it's a one zero type of system which means we can estimate how many strubbing patterns we can have it ends up being two because it's either one or two of each drum or don't strum actually how many beats we have exponent so it's 2 to the fourth power why does that matter two to the fourth power is sixteen that means there are 16 strumming patterns that we have uh in this series but one of them doesn't count because that means you don't strum at all that makes it 15. now later on in the video we're going to do eighth notes okay what does that matter because that means you're going to have 2 to the eighth power variations that adds up to 256 variations on astronomy now one of them doesn't count because they don't strum at all 255 variations now when someone tells you that they're going to teach you a new strumming pattern they are implying that they have all 255 memorized hey you know what let's give them that let's say they have those 255 memorized after eighth notes is 16th notes so that means it's going to be 2 to the 16th power that is going to be over 60 000 variations on strumming now I promise you nobody has all of them memorized but we don't have to have the entire English dictionary memorized in order to speak English what we want to do is Master certain ones and then we can fill in the gaps for all the rest of them and that's what this exercise is about understanding that strumming is the control of the beat more than it is memorizing a bunch of patterns now a lot of you might be saying at the screen right now what about my pick Direction doesn't that matter not for right now what matters is that you're hitting at the right time will it be a little bit of a tone difference I promise you the people who can hear it we don't care about them what we care about is hitting at the right time once we practice these particular sets of exercises I promise you all sixty thousand of those variations will will open up to you but you have to understand it's not about memorizing all of them it's about mastering the ones that matter so the first set of variations is you only hit one time in the measure so we only cannot beat one B2 B3 or B4 now we're going to hit two times so now we hit on beat ones and two one and three one and four two three two four and then three four I'm going to stress to you that you pay attention to how things feel if you notice that you're gonna be lost slow it down using the play speed uh uh option at the bottom of the screen and the reason why you want to do this is that way you can pay attention or feel more and not get so discombobulated as to what's going on so let's do the first set of the second variation all right beats one and two two three four one two three four one two three four two three four one two three four if you felt comfortable with doing that exercise what I want you to start doing now is strumming these with whatever chords that you want to and it's just so we can get used to it I'm gonna continue clapping so that way you don't have any type of interference whatever cord that you're picking if I pick a G chord and you pick an E chord that's not going to end up really well but if you strung at the same time we're not going to interfere with each other so make sure you're either clapping or strumming along I'm gonna stress that you strum it though [Music] let's do one and three two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four this next one is definitely gonna be the hardest one of a whole series of quarter notes that's because those beats are so far apart and close together that it's really easy to get lost or forget when the rules you're supposed to be doing so one and four beats one and four two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four one two three if you struggle on that one it's totally fine that is definitely the hardest one so now we're gonna start hitting on beat two notice it's gonna require some patience on this one it's okay you just gotta practice it each two and three two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four hope you feel comfortable with that one hopefully you're also starting to feel more of what's going on so let's do the next one two four beats two and four two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four one two three if you want a little bit hint on that one that's also what the drummer tends to hit the snare drum so if it helps it helps let's now do Beats three and four B three and four two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four one two three our first variation was hitting one time in the four count or one time per measure the next one we did was two count we got two beats per measure now we'll be hitting three beats per measure this will start to get kind of weird so again use the Slowdown function at the bottom of the screen to make sure you're feeling comfortable so let's do that first variation [Music] one two three two three four one two three four one two three four one two four one two three four that one tends to be easier but you're going to notice this next one is going to be a little bit harder but let's go ahead and attempt it anyway one two four two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four one two three now that one felt awkward and it's because you're starting to get used to the momentum of strumming then you have to stop and then start back up again it's totally normal if you're struggling that way remember just slow it down or just do it on your own pace just keep practicing it let's go to the next one [Music] three four two three four one two three four one two three four one two three maybe that was easy for you hopefully all right let's do two three four [Music] two three four one two four one two three four one two three four one two three all right hopefully that wasn't too crazy but this next one definitely the hardest one because now we'll be hitting all the beats one two three four two three four one two three four one two three four one two three four one two three technically that should have been the hardest one but it was the easiest why there's no thought you just hit everywhere so it's not necessarily that strumming is difficult it's when you don't strong that it becomes difficult because those gaps make everything start to feel awkward however as you gain more control over them those are actually the cool ones so now let's start to tackle the eighth notes eighth notes can get pretty crazy remember the 255 variations but we don't have to know all 255 to control of 255. now this is where people start to get really silly with their strumming because they're going to start trying to tell you which direction to strong Technically when you say a number you're supposed to strum down and when you say an and you're supposed to strum up so if we're counting just quarter notes it would sound like this one [Music] 4. if you're doing eighth notes you're gonna strum up on the on the way back [Music] I'm counting I'm only changing how much I'm strumming I'm strumming twice as much and technically you're supposed to say and and people start to say which direction you should be strumming to help you strum so they'll say something like down down down up down but now you're paying attention more to what direction you're strumming more than the beat and then that's what a stereotype kicks in because what matters more your direction of this of the pick or the beat it's the beat so what I want you to pay attention to is are you hitting when you're supposed to hit it doesn't matter which direction you're going in if you want to get really picky about it yes numbers are down ants are up but I'm going to stress don't worry about that worry about hitting at the right time and making it feel correct I'm going to really stress that you start strumming all the rest of these exercises because you want to start getting comfortable with going down and up try really hard not to do too many Downs just make sure that you've thrown it up every once in a while regardless if it's a downbeat or an upbeat our first variation is going to be an eighth note on the third beat so it's going to sound something more like this um [Music] remember it doesn't matter which direction you're going in just make sure it's not always the same direction every time [Music] eclipse on three two three four one two three and four one two three and four one two three four one two three and four hopefully that felt comfortable for you if it didn't slow it down or just make sure that you're doing it over and over and over again to get comfortable with it so let's go to the next variation eight round two two three four one two and three four one two and three four one two and three four one two and three hopefully that felt comfortable for you now let's put the eighth note on one eighth and one one two three four one and two three four one and two four one and two three four one two three all right let's do the eighth note on four now is it on four two three four one two three four and one two three four and one two three four and one two three four hopefully that wasn't too wild for you if it was remember we all had to get used to this anyway so just keep doing it over and over again until you feel more comfortable foreign [Music] opposite of what we were doing before what we're going to be doing is doing straight eighth notes and then taking away strums so we could eat used to a larger amount so before while we're adding in one eighth note now we're going to be doing all eighth notes putting in a quarter notes you'll see what I mean straight eighth notes for now two three four one and two and three and four and one and two and three and four and one and two and three and four it's okay if your head did not want to keep up just remember Loosey Goosey not John Cena so let's go to the next exercise eighth notes everywhere but B4 two three four one and two and three and four one and two and three four one and two and three one and two and three and four weird weird I know I know but just keep practicing it all right let's do the next exercise eighth notes everywhere but B3 two three four one and two and three four and one and two and three four and one and two and three four and one and two and three four I know it's getting Wilder let's now do it on beat two eighth notes everywhere but two two three four one and two three and four and one and two three and four and two four and one and two three and four keep working it I know I know it's a pain keep working it you're doing well all right last one I think you can guess what it is eighth notes everywhere but one two three four one two and three and four and one two and three and four and one two and three and four and one two and three okay hopefully you have those under control and if you don't it's totally fine we all have to practice this stuff anyway and if you do have them under control let's go to the last set this last set is where I get the most death threats for my students because we're going to deal with what's known as syncopated rhythms and syncopated means I hate this we are very comfortable with downbeats so when we start taking away those downbeats we start taking with those numbers our hands really don't like it and this is where you get words like offbeat or upbeat and people are like this is weird yeah because our styles of music tend to emphasize downbeats head bangers bang their head down people like to dance down however what we're about to do is emphasize up and it starts to become awkward so if you notice that you want to start punching babies because it's so difficult again you're not alone just slow it down get comfortable comfortable with it and feel what's going on [Music] this exercise we're going to strum straight eighth notes except we're not going to struggle on the downbeat of two we're going to strum on the upbeat of two but not the downbeat this is gonna be awful it's not you it's just awkward straight eights ignore B2 2 3 4 1 and and three and four and one and three and four and one and and three and four and one and and three and four and I know you wanted to shoot me it's okay I I await your gunshots however keep practicing it slow it down if you have to I promise you will get used to it [Music] ignoring B3 if there's everywhere else two three four one and two and and four and one and two and and four and one and two and and four and one and two and floor I'm assuming some of you have already slashed my tires it's okay it's okay I I always I have insurance it's gonna be great eighth notes everywhere but before two three four one and two and three and and one and two and three and one and two and three and and one and two and three and I'm going to request that the person who has stolen my dog and left me the ransom note because of these trimming patterns just make sure you feed them the right dog food all right and let's do the last one [Music] eighth notes everywhere above beat one two three four five the biggest problem that I see with this is that people are ignoring the end of four and it's because everyone says four and they think it's done it's totally normal remember there's some stuff that's happening afterwards the other one I noticed that people are doing is they're trying to go too fast I pick 75 beats per minute because it's slow enough and fast enough but if you notice that it's too slow for you or too fast for you just adjust the tempo that's all you have to do the other one is if you pick the song and it starts to sound awkward to the song it's because either the song is in a different time signature meaning they're not counting to four they're counting to three or something else or the genre doesn't like that type of strumming pattern so if you're picking a downbeat type strumming pattern in a reggae it sounds kind of awkward or you're doing more of a reggae and a pop song again it sounds kind of awkward so just make sure you can do them at least with the metronome first and then start to apply them to your favorite songs foreign trick that all the doctors don't want you to know about is to apply these strumming patterns to as many different genres as you possibly can this is where the genre start to open up to you because you will start to feel how each genre applies these streaming patterns differently a pop song will have a certain set of strumming patterns that sound well with it but a reggae not so much and then Rock again they don't all mix and match however if you can control each one of those genres you're going to notice that all of your genres sound better because you understand how each one is working Rock sounds really aggressive so when you start to strum a pop song The Rock will start to come out because you understand how the rock works so the pop is trying to sound aggressive you'll pull out the aggression if you're trying to sound more laid back like a reggae you'll know how to do that because you're already used to the genre take all the strumming patterns and apply them to as many songs as you possibly [Music] hopefully that made your musical life a little bit easier if you have any questions concerns comments death threats or have something you want me to go over please leave them in the comments section because I can't help you if you don't tell me all right take these guys

My name is Ulises but everybody calls me Sony and I know the internet says that we should be learning tons and tons of songs, and I I agree with the intent of that, but instead of learning songs we should be growing songs. And that's what we're gonna be going over in this video. So, what's the difference between learning a song and growing a song? When most of us are trying to learn a song, we are trying to duplicate exactly what the guitar player did in the original recording. And I find this to be kind of silly because of how the recording process works. They'll put the guitar player in the recording studio and they're going to play that part over and over and over and over again and the best take that they have is the one that goes on the album. And now we are trying to duplicate that particular part. If it took them hours and hours and hours and hours it's also probably going to take us hours and hours. But there's a drawback to this. So let's say you're playing the exact guitar part the exact way that the original guitar player played it. Well, people are still going to be expecting you to sing along. So look at all that effort that you just did but it doesn't matter because you weren't singing. There's also the factor of the entire band. Most people think there's just one person making all that noise but no it's it's a group effort. And they're going to be expecting you to duplicate all that noise with one instrument. So it doesn't make sense to me to learn a song that way. Instead, we can grow a song. We can make sure that the pieces, the proper pieces are in the right place and then make them expand out the way we want them to. So that way we can sound more like the song without actually duplicating what the original guitar player did. And it seemed to be easier that way and people seem to have more enjoyment and express themselves more out of that as well people who are listening to you tend to enjoy it more because you sound more like the original song. So how well do we go about this? The most important thing for a guitar player is to hit the right chords at the right time. Now hopefully you watched the fundamental guitar chords and how to change chords faster. Right? You did, you did watch that. Right? If you did it's gonna make this part a lot easier. Most of the time we're counting the four when we're playing a song and our chords are going to fall somewhere within that four count. Let's use Three Little Birds the verse as an example for our first part. So each chord in that verse is going to get four beats. We're gonna use the first four chords so a e a d. We start to sound more like the song because we're we're putting the right chord at the right time. Now are all our chords gonna get four beats? Not necessarily. Let's say you're playing Let Her Go with no capo. Those chords are getting two beats. So for example the first few chords are C G D Em. That's gonna go Notice those got those going by a lot faster. Well not necessarily faster, they're getting less time. And that's what's going on and that's why we have to be able to change chords faster with that exercise. We don't know necessarily know how fast each chord is going to be going. So it might be four beats, it might be two beats, it might be three, or one. We don't know yet. Now how do you know which where each chord is going to be with how many beats? You're actually gonna have to listen to this song and try to read the chords as they're going by and make sure that you're counting along. And that's going to be really tough because most of the time when we look up these chord charts you're gonna see the lyrics underneath and we're gonna try to put the lyric lined up with the chord. And they're not necessarily always in the right place. You have to remember most these websites were started a long time ago and they're expecting you to be counting while you are playing and if you're not counting you won't know if the chord's in the right place or not. Chords are not based off of where the singer is, they're based off where the beat is. And hopefully, they line up. That's why you have to be counting. So make sure you hit the right chord at the right time by listening and counting with the song. The claim that I'm about to make is going to be extremely controversial. Your strumming pattern does not matter as long as it is on beat. I'll give an example of this. Let's say I'm doing the Three Little Birds thing again. Right, I'm going to strum quarter notes you're going to notice that I sound fine okay so we have to do eighth notes right I strum down and up let's see what happens Yeah that sounds perfectly fine. Okay now what if I maybe I mixed it up a little bit maybe I put a quarter two eighths and then a quarter so one two three and four one two Yeah that sounds fine too. And you're gonna find that most songs work like this. And it's because as long as we are on beat the chord and the melody line aren't starting to contradict each other. If you notice that your strumming pattern is not working, that well, that probably means you're strumming too much or not enough or you're probably emphasizing a beat that's in an awkward place. But I really doubt that's gonna happen because most of the songs we want to play are on the radio or very popular. And those songs can't get too crazy because it becomes less accessible to the general public, So as long as you are on beat and you have a comfortable set of strumming patterns doesn't matter which one you do. Now I'm going to suggest that you use different patterns for different songs that way all the songs don't run into each other. But as long as you're on beat it's okay. Now if you're looking for strumming patterns, look at that, I actually have a whole video on strumming patterns that you can actually access right now. You should probably check that one out So let's say you have the right chord at the right time you have a good streaming pattern but it's just still not smooth. It still sounds kind of rough. So a couple things that are happening. First thing you have to keep in mind is you are multitasking at a very very high level. You're keeping track of a lot of things and everything's going to start getting confused and it starts starting and stopping and it's hitting too hard and going too fast it's too slow. It's a lot of stuff so the best way of practicing it, I feel, is to make sure you only practice the verse until you have it smooth. Right? Don't try to rush it. Just throw on something in like a television show or stream something on Netflix or more YouTube stuff and just keep practicing it until you feel comfortable with it. Smooth it out. And who knows how long it's going to take but the whole point is just to do it over and over and over again until it's smooth until you're relaxed. Once you have that one down then you move to the chorus and once you have that one down you move to the bridge. Once you can play them by yourself then you move to play with the song. So that way you know that you can play it at tempo and under pressure. The pressure of the song is going to be a lot more than what you think it might be. You just do it over and over again. Now what's going to start to happen is let's say the first song takes you about a week to get comfortable with. I guarantee you the next song, as long as it's on the same level meaning you have open chords and simple strumming patterns, instead of taking seven days it's gonna take six days. And then it's gonna take five days. We're gonna get to the point where you can play songs just by looking at it and hearing it. And I'm not exaggerating that by the way. It happens to all my students. I push them really hard at that because what starts to happen is you are getting more confident in where you are at. Right now you are unsure because is this beat one? Is this beat two? Is this an a? Am I in the right place? After a while once you know where you're at, you gonna be able to read any song just as well as you read any book. Maybe not any book. Maybe not any song. Some books get crazy some songs get crazy. The ones that matter, you will definitely be able to do. So there is one more level and I'm going to strongly suggest that you put your helmet on for it This is advice that I wish someone had told me when I first started playing. Learn all the words to all the songs that you're gonna play because you're going to sing all of them from memory. Now I didn't say sing well. I said sing along. As long as you are somewhere around where the note is you're gonna be fine,I promise. But the reason why we're doing this is we're trying to create your own Real Book. What's a Real Book? It's a gigantic book of jazz songs that many musicians play around the world. The problem with this is, let's say, you memorize the entire real book. All those songs are really old songs which is which is gonna make you sound really old. Not that it's bad if you're into the real book in jazz you're gonna sound great. But most of us aren't trying to sound like Charlie Parke,r most of us are just trying to play our favorite songs. And we're trying to play them faster. So if we make our own real book we are going to sound like ourselves. But the only way you could do that is if you actually have the songs memorized. So if you, let's say, you're really into Beyonce, right? If you learn a ton of Beyonce songs you're gonna sound more like Beyonce. But maybe you're not trying to sound just like Beyonce, Let's say you're also into um who's another popular person, Sam Smith. All right. So you learn a bunch of Beyonce and Sam Smith. Well now you start to sound like a hybrid of those of those musicians. And the more you learn and memorize the more likely you are to sound like you and the faster you're gonna learn these songs. Now as you become more advanced it actually becomes a really good pool to pull information from because you're going to be learning more of how music interacts with each other and itself. Because you have the songs to pull from in your head. So make sure you know all the words to all the songs you know and you can sing them from memory Hopefully this made your musical life a little bit easier. If you have any questions concerns comments death threats or want me to go over something please leave a comment down below. Because I can't help you if I don't know what's going on. All right. Take it easy guys