hey! i'm new here and new to the guitar...actually its been a little over week since i bought my very first guitar! and i have a problem....
When I bought my guitar it came with a book 'the fender guitar method'. The first thing it does is teach you how to play E F & G notes on the first string then it goes on to teaching notes on the B G & D string. And it said not to worry about doing the chords because they will get to that part later. Then I get to page 17 and its playing chords. They show you how to play the C and G7 chord and it tells you to strum and I get that part BUT then it goes on to say "Now apply this strum to the song below" and it shows a C above the staff and then on the staff it has the notes G G A C. So as retarded as this sounds I'm not sure how I would go about playing it. Because there is no way I can keep my fingers in the C chord postion and then play on an individual string too...
I must be missing something, obviously hahah so can anyone tell me where i have gone wrong and how i would go about playing it?
I think you can either strum the full chords or play the individual notes (the melody).
Skip it and move on!
BJ
also, welcome to the site and did you get a CD with the book?
whereas it is important to understand the notes on each string.
I think it more important to know what three notes make a triad...chord.
so skip the single string stuff and learn how to play simple open chords, how to strum them, and how to change chords without taking two minutes to find where your fingers go.*
I had a teacher for the first nine months of learning how to play. valuable stuff.
I would think it hard to learn by oneself. too much of a vacuum.
*using your single string exercise you should be able to learn what notes make a C chord, for example.
thanks! :)
no i didnt get a cd with the book
and i will start learning some chords but if you were to play a song you would use the notes on a string more than chords.... right?
not really. you sing the melody, which could be notes on the string(s).
you play the chords. the melody rides over the chords.
the melody is based on notes within the chord.
licks are played string to string note to note. sometimes two notes and two strings ate played at the same time. that's called a double stop BTW.
play the chords. get good at that. get smooth. get the rythm (strum) down pat.
later you can pick single notes out with an extra finger when playing chords. that's later.
teach yourself the notes in a triad.
C =C E G for example.
one thing to contemplate on entering this fickle world of guitar is not to try and overwhelm yourself with all the pieces of the puzzle at once.. i would suggest .. as previously stated.. take the chords and learn the fingerings first get your hand to transition through the different chords.. then scale patterns.. just get the fingers moving to where they need to be.. take it real slow when your fingers can move to a from patterns then begin to take on the notes that build the chords and scales... to get the twisted fingers whilst attempting to learn the foundation will frustrate and compell one to kill small woodland creatures.
LIVELY UP YOURSELVES!!
i'll try that then
thanks again!
ohh and guitar tabs are they the same as notes on a string?
As I understand what you've said is that you have something like this:
Which means that while one person is playing the G-G-A-C melody, another person is playing a C chord, as accompaniment.
I haven't given a strumming pattern (because I don't know the song and you may have a pattern shown), but I would play one strum for every other note (one strum on the first G and one on the A), to start with. Later, I'd go on to one strum for each note.
I started with nothing - and I've still got most of it left.
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i'll try that then
thanks again!
ohh and guitar tabs are they the same as notes on a string?
TABS are laid out simply.
the horizontal lines are the six strings.
the number on a line is the fret where you put your finger.
sheet music or notation is quite different.
in notation I remember the lines as
Every Good Boy Does Fine
and
FACE
the first letter in each word is the note.
FACE denotes the lines and EGBDF denotes the spaces between the lines.
your guitar strings relate to those.
very different from TABS.
I read music. I dont like TABS.
the book doesn't have tabs on that example, it shows how to form a C and G7, then shows a simple 4 strum per bar pattern using / , then it has the example with notes on the staff with the chords denoted above.
C and G7 are one string away. sort of.
make a C chord . your index finger should be on the first fret second string.
move that finger to the first string first fret and you have G7.
easy as pie that one.
your other two fingers on the lower strings stay in the same shape but change position sightly.
ring finger drops to the sixth string same fret and the middle finger drops to string five same fret position.
if there is a staf symbol perhaps you are looking at notation instead of TABs.
once again, the example doesn't have tabs, the poster is asking what he plays as there is a staff with the chord names above it..
I have the same book.
