Beginners Lounge

Well Howdy Kaine, and welcome to Chordie!

  Sounds like a good idea... kind of like a jam session without the jam part.  This is a great place to get a lot of good advise (and some jokes), but you will find that most of the folks around here are helpful and active in music.  A bunch of us over in the recording section tried to jam over the net, but found that the time lag was impossible to get around, but conferencing with googletalk, or skype works pretty good if you are just chatting and knocking around ideas, sharing tips and tricks, or helping with riffs.

  As for the exercises thing?  Practice!  Scales and chord changes, alternate picking styles, pretty much everything will get there with practice.  10 to 15 minutes  two or three times daily.... don't make yourself sore or cramp up, but do a little bit often and the hands will develop a "memory" for chord shapes and start to work it out on their own so you don't have to think about it so much.
Speed will come naturally as your brain steps back to let your hands do the placement.

  Getting into barre chords, I found it helpful to take the index finger out of the equation and learn all of the open chord shapes using only the other three fingers.  When you add the barre with the index it is easier to hit those movable shapes if those fingers already have an idea of where to go.... otherwise it can be like learning all those open chords again.

Visit often,  seek help and ye shall find it.  Chordie has got it all!

Take Care;
Doug

hello

been playing since easter i think.. messing about for a while then decided to have some lessons and do.... its alot easier than i imagined... thought i'd be getting my fingers all tangled up with the chords! ooh barre chords... more pain and blisters... i can't wait!
have an ibanez gax30 which i love to bits... she is like my child hmm f is one chord i have problems changing to and from... i suppose with practaice we will all get it in the end
xx