Playing more Chords and Revisiting Chord Change

Hello everyone! For my last blog post, I'll be playing "complicated chords" and returning to chord changing. Even till this day I still struggle from chord changing but after reading a tip from the book, it helped me much more.

"To play a Dm chord, place your middle finger on the second-fret space of the third string and your ring finger on the third-fret of the second string. Then reach up with your index finger to place it on the first-fret space of the first string" (DuBrock 38). At first, playing this chord wasn't as difficult to do, but as I tried to play other chords with it, I was having trouble with the chord changing. Going from a G chord to a Dm chord is not easy, it becomes confusing on where I should place my fingers on the guitar strings and fret.

But as I kept reading through the book, I found a solution to my problem. "Remember that you can change your chord a little early, and strum though the open strings while you're doing that. That open-stringed strum goes by so quickly that it's hardly noticeable, and guitarists of all levels do this all the time" (DuBrock 42). This tip from the book actually helps me a lot and is good to keep in mind. From this tip my transition from the Dm chord to the G chord or any chord is improving. Keeping this method as a habit of mine might help me grow more in the future as a guitarist.

"To play an F7 chord, place your ring finger on the third-fret space of the fourth string and your middle finger on the second-fret space of the third string. Then add your pinky finger to the fourth-fret space of the second string and your index finger to the first-fret space of the first string" (DuBrock 84). In my opinion and as a beginner, this was the hardest chord I've played so far. This chord requires my fingers to stretch really far from each other which was hard for my small fingers to do and was pretty painful to do. In the book, Andrew informs to slowly strum through this chord to get used to it, but if i was still struggling, i would have to readjust my fingers position on the fret board (DuBrock 85).

Which chord looks the hardest to play by looking at the pictures? F7 or Dm?

DuBrock, Andrew. Play Acoustic Guitar in Minutes. Milwaukee, WI: Hal Leonard, 2014. Print.

Switching Between Chords

Hello everyone! For this blog post, I will be learning how to switch between chords with my guitar. I've been playing the guitar for about 3 years and still have trouble switching from certain chords such as the E chord back to the D chord. But reading this part of the book helped me to switch in between chords.

"One trick that's good to know is that you can't possibly move your fretting hand exactly at the same time as your picking hand strums. That means you'll need to get that fretting hand in place before the strum. So, any time after you count beat "four," you can start moving those fretting fingers into place for the next chord" (DuBrock 11). Since I usually had trouble switching between chords, this trick helped me by telling me what beat to change from a chord to another. In the book it was teaching me how to switch from an A chord to a D chord. It was sort of challenging at first but the tip Andrew gave helped me.

D chord

A chord

"If you use the first A chord fingering shown, notice how your ring finger frets notes on the second string for both the A and D chord; it holds down the second fret for the A chord and the third fret for the D chord. You can use this finger as a guide by leaving it on the string when you switch chords" (DuBrock 11). This tip is important to know because it gave me a sense on how to transition from the A chord to the D chord without having trouble on where to place my fingers on the fret board of the guitar. The tip of using guide fingers can help me a lot because the only fingers I am lifting when I'm switching to another chord, are the fingers that doesn't use the same string as the previous chord. But the guide finger can slide to any fret if the previous chord uses the same string as the chord I am going to transition to.

"Remember that you can slow down the tempo until you're able to make the switch in rhythm" (DuBrock 11). This tip is also important to have in mind because when I play to fast and try to switch to a different chord i tend to mess up by having my fingers on the wrong fret or string. It is always a good thing to start slow and to slowly work my way on strumming in different speeds to be able to strum at the right rhythm without any mistakes.

After reading this section of the book I made sure to count beats while strumming to properly switch chords, use the tip of using guiding fingers to make it easier to transition to other chords and to play in my own pace to switch from a chord to another without going off the rhythm of a song.

Since I had some hardships while playing/learning the guitar, would you also have the same hardships I have went through?

Piano: Minor Vs. Major?

What sounds better; major chords or minor chords?

I rarely use minor chords in my personal music, I stick with the same C scale, and all of its major chords. But this doesn't necessarly mean i like the sound the best. Any experienced piano player would tell you they love minor chords, and the reasoning is simple. They sound good. Major chords don't express emotion as well as minor chords. Every time you are watching a movie or show, and you begin to cry at whatever scene you're watching; there is a 99.99% chance that the composer was using minor chords in that segment. For those who don't know, minor chords are theoretically the opposite of major chords, and they have a strong influence of sharps and flats. According to Mr. Palmer, "Every MAJOR KEY has a RELATIVE MINOR KEY" (Palmer 128). So which one sounds better? the answer is neither.

Now, i could throw quotes at you such as "Music is a preference", but the truth is, change is the true beauty. This can be applied to any form of music. If you play the same 3 chords an entire song, chances are that it will be boring. Truly good music introduces different feels, different rhythms, different sounds. 

Mr. Palmer has started to develop this idea in the book. I've noticed a pattern in is work. After every major scale, he teaches the contrary minor scale. Then shortly after that, he combines the two scales into a song. Shortly after mastering A minor, we were introduced to "The Stranger" (Palmer 129), and shortly after learning D minor, we were introduced to "Scarborough Fair" (Palmer  135).

Mr. Palmer is trying to get the readers to play music with influence in both minor and major keys, which personally, is a great importance in good sounding music.

Me playing a major chord

Me playing a minor chord