This lesson takes a run through ten popular strumming patterns for rhythm guitar. The main idea behind the lesson is to build a solid sense of time when strumming guitar parts while coordinating the various left and right hand strumming skills…
Q: I watched your, “Syncopated Melody and Rhythm Guitar,” lesson on your other YouTube channel. I had trouble playing the rhythm examples. It made me realize I need some kind of routine for developing my rhythm guitar.
I can’t count time and also play, plus my strumming is all over the place (it isn’t smooth and consistent like yours). I need someplace to start practicing this skill from. A place that covers strum direction and the important beats I need to learn to count. Could I request from you a general rhythm guitar exercise routine to start at for learning all of this?
Joe – Salt Lake City, UT. USA
A: Rhythm guitar can be difficult to learn for most guitar players. Very seldom do guitarists find rhythm “easy.” There are guitar students out there who seem to be “naturals” when it comes to this subject. However, in general, nearly every player will need to devote a lot of practice into it.
In order to develop the skills that are required to nail-down rhythm guitar strumming patterns (or rhythm styles), it will require time spent working with a metronome, and some careful study on getting strumming patterns to feel instinctive.
This is why it’s very important for every guitar player to spend time studying grooves that involve; triplets, sixteenth-notes, and syncopation.
Most importantly, a student should learn how to “tap their foot” to the underlying pulse (to the beat of the music), and be able to count through the proper timing of any rhythm pattern that crosses their path.
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