song selection; Barre chords

How about a little bit of Brit pop "coffee and tv" by Blur you could check out the Justin guitar lesson on it http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=G4V9YBLj0II . Its got a rhythm a bit like Green days "Maceys day parade" another good tune for practicing barres.

Creep by Radiohead, There are two tabs for it in the Easy Song Index on this site. Barre G, B, C & Cm. A cool tune and will give you practice on a B chord barre. I happen to like the E shaped barres worked up the neck from Third to Seventh to Eighth fret so It will give you practice sliding those barres up and down. At least it did for me.
Robbie

The acoustic/unplugged version of 'Layla' has lots of A shaped barres moved around the first five frets mixed in with some open chords.

"Another brick in the wall" has several barre chords along the neck and some quick and tricky changes in some parts.

"Serenade from the stars" or "Serenade" by Steve Miller. It uses Am, G and F as one of your songs. You can play all the chords like barre and the F using a C shape and barring in the 5th.

"I shot the sheriff" by Bob Marley (and Clapton). Playing in Gm it has three nice barre chords as well.

Any blues in A, G, B, etc. Play them with barres and try to find new voices.

You can make the open to barre changes ? That's great !

I was able to do barre to barre change but open to barre and back was tough for me.

Now just keep practising the songs you have listed. Hotel California is a great song to learn barres. You can even play the Gmajor as a barre and then the following Dmajor as a barre too in the chorus. Will be good practice.

Lets us know how it goes.

I was able to do barre to barre change but open to barre and back was tough for me.

I'm trying to ease the transition by playing my open chords as if they were barres at the 0 fret. This gives open-to-barre the same difficulty as barre-to-barre, but it means I have to find substitutes for the open G (since I can't play a barred G shape). Usually I go with the barred E at the 3rd fret.

My next challenge is changing from one barre chord to another barre. The bm to F# is not too bad as it is on the same fret. I find it challenging moving the barre up the neck and have it play clean.

Any song recommendation for practicing barre chords up and down the neck? I like Rock and Pop.

Thanks in advance.
T

I am curious and would like to know HOW you hold a plain old open E chord...is your pointing finger on a string??? If it is...I suggest you "relearn" holding it with your last three fingers, instead. Pretty elementary, I know, but it does make a world of difference!

Cat

My next challenge is changing from one barre chord to another barre. The bm to F# is not too bad as it is on the same fret. I find it challenging moving the barre up the neck and have it play clean.

Any song recommendation for practicing barre chords up and down the neck? I like Rock and Pop.

Thanks in advance.
T

I am curious and would like to know HOW you hold a plain old open E chord...is your pointing finger on a string??? If it is...I suggest you "relearn" holding it with your last three fingers, instead. Pretty elementary, I know, but it does make a world of difference!

Cat

Wow, what a gem! instant success! i know it wasnt meant for me but still! these are the kinds of things you only learn from other players, i swear! :lol:

I kinda had this revelation myself, as soon as I began to play barre chords I recognised that I should get used to the last 3 fingers since my pointer is always going to be barring a chord. Always is probably the wrong word, but since I was poor at barre chords I thought "Why practice it two ways when one will do for both!". I had the same revelation when the small F (cheating F) came up, I thought I might as well do a full barre F since I need the practice. Its paid off for me, no learning things twice.

As for a barre chord song, try Banana Pancakes by Jack Johnson. It wrecked me after a minute or two, but now I can happily play the whole tune.

Ultimately, you'll want to be comfortable playing that chord both ways. (1st three fingers and last three) You will be better prepared for the next chord in the progression. You'll also be able to apply the same technique to other chords like Am (using the last 3 fingers) or Em (using the last 2 fingers).

You'll also be able to apply the same technique to other chords like Am (using the last 3 fingers)

I learned how to be comfortable doing that learning "Moondance", it's an easy song to learn that uses that technique to go from Am to Bm7, or Bm

Just a song suggestion for moving barre chords is The General by Dispatch. The main progression is Bb F Cm Gm Eb A# F and intro riff is a fun one.

AND!!! There's a nice technique I use with my "free" finger...whether it be the 1st or the 4th...and believe me when I say the effect will get you to stand out and have other six stringers say "How'd you DO that?????"

IF YOU ARE CAREFULL...and you are playing LIGHTLY so as NOT to overpower the effect...you can most often chime out an open string with that freed up fingertip. If you are able to accomplish this...and you are playing "hot" out of a tube amp...slowly step into the speaker and that chime will feed back but the rest of the chord won't.

I know I've gone on and on about using .008's and a super thin pick...and this is one of the reasons why!

This is by NO MEANS easy to do...but it'll amaze you once you can pull it off! :wink:

This is even more AMAZING if you can co-ordinate an R/5 between you and the bassist. (I take it for granted the bassist is competant!) Be aware that you are pretty much "stuck" with whatever open string is available (standard tuning) so it's the bassist that needs to sit on the 5th...or the ROOT.

Cat