Topic: Trouble understanding
I am a new guitar player, and have a question about how to read the chords above the songs. Do I play the chord above for each word until another chord or just hit the chord once? I'm just a little confused. Thank you.
- topdown
- Margarator
- Offline
Re: Trouble understanding
Hi rollingthunder1 and welcome to Chordie!
The best thing I can say is listen to the song to get the feel for the strumming pattern. Most beginners struggle with this at first and often request a specific pattern to follow. Down Up Down Up (DUDU) or D-DUD - there are many different patterns. My advise is don't get hung up on a pattern, play what feels and sounds right - it'll click one day and you'll have it.
But to your question, yes generally you repeat the chord above the word until the chord changes. Depending on the song it could be just 1 beat per measure, but usually it is 4 or 8 more. For 8 beats per measure, count 1 AND 2 AND 3 AND 4 AND.
A very common strumming pattern (someone called it the "folk strum pattern") is
D D U U D U
1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +
Heres a few vids you might find helpful
http://www.expertvillage.com/information_779_guitar.htm
Rule No. 1 - If it sounds good - it is good!
Re: Trouble understanding
Thanks. I appreciate the help.
- upyerkilt
- Unofficial king of Scotland
- Offline
Re: Trouble understanding
rolling,
hi and welcome to chordie.
Further to topdown's reply...
The chord above a certain word is not always the correct place.
It depends on the person that wrote it out. I have found a few that are wrong. This is not a fault in chordie, this is to do with the person that put it on a website that chordie takes the song from.
It can be ammended in the option to correct the song or if you have it in your songbook you can edit the song.
But like Topdown says, yer better listening to the song to get the feel of the rythum. Only use the lyrics and chords as a guide to help you with the song. Sometimes the chords are wrong too but can be corrected by "transposing"
Cheers
Ken
ye get some that are cut out for the job and others just get by from pretending
Re: Trouble understanding
upyerkilt wrote:
rolling,
hi and welcome to chordie.
Further to topdown's reply...The chord above a certain word is not always the correct place.
It depends on the person that wrote it out. I have found a few that are wrong. This is not a fault in chordie, this is to do with the person that put it on a website that chordie takes the song from.
It can be ammended in the option to correct the song or if you have it in your songbook you can edit the song.But like Topdown says, yer better listening to the song to get the feel of the rythum. Only use the lyrics and chords as a guide to help you with the song. Sometimes the chords are wrong too but can be corrected by "transposing"
Cheers
Ken
QFT. I also found a few that were wrong. But, listening to the song, feeling it out as you go along will help. Your ear and your instincts will come into play with time and practice.
"I don't have pet peeves...I have whole kennels of irritation." --Whoopi Goldberg