Accompaniment, Strumming

When you are strumming, you are part of the rythm section so play in time. Try to lock in with the drummer and the bass player, and don't overplay! I am overplaying on most of the recordings in this section because there are no other instruments to back up the strumming. When you are playing with a band, relax a little and go for quality over quantity. Consider using a thin pick, even if you normally use a heavy pick. It produces a soft, pleasant sound, even when the sweeping motion is not entirely clean.

Below is a list of some performance requirements for strumming.

• Prevent open strings from ringing. You will rarely play very dense chord because they tend to sound muddy. Most practical fingerings have four, some have five, and a few have six. Often three notes are sufficient. Since it is impossible to avoid strumming across unfretted notes occasionally you must prevent the open strings from ringing by using either your left hand fingers or the palm of your picking hand. I highly recommend a string dampener as well. You can wrap a piece of soft cloth, such as a handkerchief or a sock, around the first fret. It takes out most of the offending noise. It works well but it obviously looks amateurish. Do you want to be seen on stage with your glamourous guitar wearing one of your old tennis socks? I wouldn't mind allowing my guitar to wear a Federer bandana but I just can't find one in my local shopping centre.
• Prevent unwanted fretted notes from ringing. Some chords are difficult to play cleanly because the fingerings are just not as comfortable as you would have liked. There isn't much you can do about it, except practice those chords a lot. If possible, put the top note on the 1st string, then you can at least 'swing through' on the downstroke without worrying about unwanted sound from any strings below.
• Use repeated notes with caution. Octaves are okay to 'fatten' a chord but don't exaggerate it because it tends to create a monotonous sound without harmonic substance. Aestethics aside, it also gives you terrible problems when your guitar is not exactly in tune.
• Use economical bar chords. You often fret several notes with one finger, typically your index finger. Don't make a habit of letting your index finger go across the entire fretboard. You can easily fret two notes on adjacent strings with the tip of your finger. Cover only the strings that are necessary, including the ones you want to mute.
• Be selective with voicings. Pay attention to the top note in the chord. In a chord progression the top notes function very much as a melody. Furthermore, be careful with chord extensions. Jazz-minded folks have a natural tendency to add all sorts of interesting notes to a basic chord. However, if the melody is on the root note, and you play a chord with the 7th or the 9th in the top, you will probably be unhappy with the result.

The examples in this section are extracts from pop songs that most people should be familiar with. They are provided with chord diagrams and tablature (png, pdf, gp5, and gp6), audio (mp3), and video (streaming and mp4). The format gp5 is read by the free programs TefView and Tux Guitar, and gp6 is read by the commercial package Guitar Pro 6. My audio recordings are very basic, with the melody added to the strumming (except for Hey Joe and Sultans of Swing which contain rythm guitar only). The video recordings are even more basic since they include the rythm part only. All examples are played on a 7-string but the chord diagrams also show the fingerings for the 6-string.