Category : guitar

Stretching

Take any four-note chord. Place it high on the neck, say around the 12^th fret.

 

Here’s mine. This is a major 9 chord. The numbers under the diagram indicate which fingers to use. Add the open strings to give it a fuller sound.

 

Example

 

Strum slowly through the chord, letting each note ring. Make sure that no strings buzz. Move the fingers toward the nut in this order:

 

• First finger
• Second finger
• Third finger
• Fourth finger

 

Dissonance

If you use the open strings, you’ll move through some fairly dissonant chords. These will alternate with chords that sound pretty good. This allows you to get comfortable with dissonance, and to get experience playing with tension and resolution. This is a really important aspect of music in general.

 

Doing this allows you to find some new chords you might like, and you get to warm up your fingers in the process.

 

Don’t hurt yourself

Don’t go any further than is comfortable. If you make it from the 12th fret to the 10th fret, and it starts to feel uncomfortable, stop. You could injure yourself. Do it every day and after a couple of weeks (maybe sooner) you’ll see a noticeable difference in your stretching ability.

 

Now invent your own four-note chords. Then use those chords as a stretching exercise like I did above. Invention works your creative muscles and gives you new resources for doing the exercise.

 

It might even give you ideas for new pieces.

 

How many ways can you use your fingers?

Question: What do your fingers do on the guitar?

 

Answer: Whatever you train them to do.

 

Which leads to this question: what are you training them to do?

 

What fingers do

 

• They press
• They stretch
• They form patterns (otherwise known as chords)
• They move one at a time (solos and riffs)
• They move as groups of 2, 3, or 4 (moving between chords)

 

These are broad categories. Thinking broadly allows you to open up your thinking. For instance, thinking “pattern” instead of “chord” can lead you to chord shapes you may not have considered. Thinking “chord” usually triggers your brain to do what you already know.

 

Pressing and stretching

The first two things on the list – pressing and stretching – can be worked on in exercises. The last three things are involved in making stuff.

 

A lot of people ignore the exercises. Too bad, because they allow you do to more with the creative tools. They also keep your hands healthy.

 

Pressing

How hard do you need to press on the strings? Most people don’t ask this question. They should because the harder you press, the harder it is to move the fingers.

 

Here’s a simple exercise that helps you discover the optimal amount of pressure you need to exert in order to make a sound on the guitar. It’s probably less than you think.

 

1. Place your index finger lightly on the 6^th string. Don’t press.
2. Now start playing that string. Don’t press. You should only get muted notes.
3. Keep playing and start pressing very gradually. If you’re doing this properly, you’ll continue to get a lot of muted notes.
4. Keep pressing gradually, and the notes will start buzzing. Don’t press suddenly in order to get rid of the buzz. Go slow.
5. Eventually, you’ll get a clear note. Maintain the pressure you’re using at that point.

 

Resist the temptation to press harder. Most people discover that they’ve been pressing harder than they need. Pressing hard becomes habit and feels natural. It’s not natural.

 

With this lighter feeling in your hand, try playing a few chords or a scale. Concentrate on pressing only as hard as you need. As this begins to feel natural, your playing will feel better and you’ll have less chance of injury.

 

Don’t play a lot at first. It’s easy to fall back on old habits without realizing it. Keep your concentration and stay light.

 

Next post: stretching the creative way.

 

Open Chords: New Shapes

You can think of the shape below as the opposite of the power chord shape from the last post. As with the power chord shape, there’s one simple shape, but lots of different chords.

 

 

 

Experiment by moving the shape to different strings (i.e. place the shape on the 1^st and 2^nd strings, the 2^nd and 3^rd strings, etc), and different frets. Same procedure as last post.

 

Invention

Now invent your own shapes. Just use two fingers for now. Try placing open strings between the fingers.

 

 

 

 

This opens up a lot more possibilities. Again, move the shape to different strings, and to different frets.

 

One note at a time

Some of these chords will sound dissonant and unusable if you strum them.  Strumming uses all the notes simultaneously. Try playing the notes in the chord one at a time.

 

Play each note from the 6^th string to the first. Leave space between each note, letting them ring. Then play from the 1^st string to the 6^th  string, again letting them ring. Approaching the same chord in different ways will give you new ideas.

 

Listen closely as each string is played. Stopping after you play the first 3 (or 2, or 4) notes might sound great. Don’t feel like you have to play all the notes in the chord to get what you want.

 

Foreign country

Don’t approach this as if you’re looking for a certain sound. Approach it as if you’re travelling in a foreign country without a map. Assume that you know nothing. Stop and listen. You might discover something you didn’t expect.

 

For instance, the first two notes might sound great as an alternating figure. You might skip over strings  (i.e. play from 1^st string to 3^rd string, or from 1^st string to 4^th string) and go back and forth between those. Instead of a chord, you get a repeating idea that might work great as a hook, or a background figure. You’ve gone from chords to hooks and background figures simply by not restricting yourself to the idea of “chord.”

Three notes

Now do all of the above with three notes. Don’t get overwhelmed. Do it until you find one or two things that you like. Enjoy the process, and write down the stuff you think you’ll use. After a while, you’ll have a notebook full of ideas you like.

 

Example

 

 

 

 

 

Spacey open chords

Open chords (as distinct from open-string chords) are chords that have more open strings then fretted strings. They sound beautiful and they’re easy to play. Their drawback (and their strength) is that they exist in a sound-world of their own. Using them in progressions with standard open-string chords can be tricky.

 

But doing the work to explore the possibilities can be a lot of fun.

 

Moving around

Open chord shapes are simple shapes that you move around on the fretboard to create different chords.  For example, take a 2-finger shape and play it at the 3^rd fret. Now move that shape to another fret and play it there.

 

Example

Here’s a simple power chord shape. Normally, this shape is used on the 6^th and 5^th strings or on the 5^th and 4^th strings. Open strings are rarely used. Here, they’re a necessary part of the chord.

This chord has the power chord shape on the 4^th and 3^rd strings at the 3^rd fret.

 

 

Try strumming across all six strings, or across strings 5 to 1. Move the entire shape to different places on the fretboard. You’ll find other sounds you like, and it’ll be easy.

 

From open-string chords to open chords

By open string chords, I mean these. Just to be perfectly clear…

 

 

Try going from the Dmajor open string chord to the open chord above. Now do the same thing with a Dmajsus4 chord (just play the Dmajor, but lift the finger on the high E string).  Which do you like better?

 

A lot of people like the Dmajsus4, because it has more open strings than the Dmajor. That helps it move more smoothly to the open chord. Depending on what you’re writing, you may not want that smoothness.

 

Experiment

As always, there’s a lot of experimenting to do. Play the Dmajor or the Dmajsus4, and then move to open chords at different locations on the neck. Place an open chord between two open string chords, or vice-versa.

 

Take a progression you know and randomly stick open chords between adjacent chords of that progression. You might get something you like. You might not.

 

Now move the shape to the 2^nd and 3^rd strings and try that at different locations on the fretboard.