I’m trying to optimize my chording and get more speed changing chords. Any guitar player knows the simple three finger C. You don’t play the 6th string. Mute it or avoid it when strumming.
C/G is an inverted chord where the bass note is a G. Extremely useful in country strumming with alternating bass notes. The root (C note) and the 5th (G note) are played in the boom chuck strum. The open G string just doesn’t sound right. The bass G note works much better.
Should I always finger a C/G? Get that muscle memory going from G to C developed. I can always strum it as a normal C by missing the top string. Or strum all six for C/G.
The only downside might be a C7. The pinky is needed for that.
I’m curious how others play C. The three finger style or 4 finger style?
I wish I could transition from G to C in both fingerings equally well. But it plays havoc with my muscle memory.
I’m learning some Christmas songs. O Come Let Us Adore Him has quite a few quarter note chord changes.
G(4 beats) | D(4 beats) | G D G C | G(2 beats) D(2 beats) |
thats the first line. one measure of G, one measure D, then a measure of quarter notes, 2 beats of G and D in the last measure.
the whole song has those 1 beat chord changes G D G C or G C G D on the last line. I tend to rush them. Then they sound ragged and choppy. I’m working daily to get them smooth and on tempo.
My hand gets confused if I’ve played another song with a 4 fingered C. Then play this one with the regular C. There’s just enough hesitation to screw me up.
I probably play the C four-finger style most of the time. It’s only occasionally that the extra G at the bottom really sounds bad. Most of the time, it results in a nice full chord. As you say, for sure leaving the bottom E string open sounds bad.
You mentioned going from G to C. Doing this transition is actually very easy if you play the G the way you should learn to play it.
What I mean by this is playing the G in a way that doesn’t involve your index finger at all. The way most folks learn G when they first play is:
Middle finger on the third fret of the low E string
Index finger on the second fret of the A string
Ring finger on the third fret of the high E string
But the alternate way of playing G, the one you should learn, is:
Ring finger on the third fret of the low E string
Middle finger on the second fret of the A string
Pinkie finger on the third fret of the high E string
If you play G this way, then transitioning to a three-finger C is a piece of cake. You simply keep your ring and middle fingers in exactly the same position, but move them over one string. Then put your index finger on the first fret of the B string and take off your pinkie, leaving the high E open. (You can even leave your pinkie anchored on the high E to play another variant of C with a fifth on top.)
Transitioning from that fingering to the four-finger C may be a little trickier, but with enough practice that will become second nature too.
I lean more to acoustic than electric guitar. And I put in a lot of time mastering finger picking. So, unless I’m going to make a C7 or use that pinky on the 1st or 2nd string for some melody notes, I’ll play a C/G. For Alice’s Restaurant, though, I have to bounce the ring finger from C to G in the bass so I can play some melody notes with my pinky.
And playing a G major with the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th fingers on the left hand is pretty convenient too. It leaves the index finger free for hammer-ons, and for both the G and the C/G, your ring finger remains on the 6th string, 3rd fret.
I’ve been practicing the G to C/G transition tonight. It’s not bad once I started remembering to lift my pinky up to the A string. Sure sounds a lot fuller and much better.
I’m still struggling to get my speed up past 75 bpm. That’s a big improvement from a few months ago. But, fast tempo songs can easily require 100 bpm. I got to optimize every finger movement and find ways to get faster. Really good players are up there at 120 bpm. I’ll be happy to reach a 100 bpm myself.
I don’t recall having this kind of trouble playing in college. I guess my hands stiffened up over the decades. They’ll get faster.
When I was practicing to develop my speed at changing chords many years ago, I did something that helped a lot that I will try to describe. I used to “hammer on” entire chords. In other words, I would play a C chord or an F chord or whatever, then lift my fingers off of the strings and quickly and repeatedly hammer my fingers back on to the strings in the chord shape. I think this built the muscle memory you’re striving for.
On the question of which version of various chords to play: learn all of them. Some are better in certain situations than others, and some are good to slip in when you can to give your finger some relief. For instance, I almost always barre the F chord, but if my hand gets tired I will slip in a 4 string F where I can.
I only play that chord as C/G if the tune actually demands a G bass note. Otherwise it sounds wrong, to me. With the regular three-string open C, I mute the sixth string by making the adjacent finger touch it lightly, to prevent an inadvertent E note.
I play it 3-fingered most of the time I think. I play a lot of fingerstyle stuff with an alternating bass line in the thumb and move my ring finger between the A and E string - like this. That requires use of the pinky for the melody. The G chord fingering as described by **DChord568 **is also extremely useful.
For the record, though I prefer the C/G, the C/E isn’t terrible if you’re just strumming. The notes in a C major chord are C, E, and G, after all. If you’re doing an alternating bass note strum, on the other hand, you might want to mute the E. Or not.
And when I get tired of making the barre F, I’ll usually go to a 4 finger F, with the index finger just barring the 1st and 2nd string. It still changes my grip and if I want a real bass F I can hang my thumb over the fingerboard and nail the 6th string that way. And I don’t have especially long fingers.
I can’t think of a situation where hitting the open bottom E when playing a C chord would sound anything other than awful, but to each his own.
I agree with you to a point on F. I actually find a four-string F extremely awkward to play, so I usually play it as 133211, with my thumb on the low E string first fret, or occasionally as a full barre chord.
The earlier poster who said learn as many different ways to play chords as you can hit the nail on the head.
There was a discussion awhile ago…I think it was on this board…about how to play an A chord. I seemed to be the only one who said I play it any of three different ways depending on the chords in the song that are adjacent to it. That is, playing the D, G and B strings:
[ul]
[li]as a barre straight across with my index finger[/li][li]with my middle, ring and pinkie fingers[/li][li]middle finger D string, index finger G string, ring finger B string (handy for changing to the, uh, D chord!)[/li][/ul]
I think we also had a discussion in that thread on what I call the G5 chord (though technically it isn’t, since there is a third in it on the A string).
That would be 320033, a very useful, full-sounding chord if you’re not playing G in a more folkie context.
Helpful hint when playing from sheet music: The vast majority of the time, those guitar chords weren’t written in by a guitarist. They were written in by a piano player who had little or no understanding of how a guitar is actually played. So what they’re doing is looking at what they’re playing, or at the 4-part vocal harmony, and just writing down the names of the chords they see.
For the purpose of strumming the song on a guitar (and I’m assuming you’re just strumming the chords to accompany a vocal, not trying to actually play the song melodically on the guitar), when you see chords changing on every beat like that, try just playing the first chord for all four beats. With “O Come All Ye Faithful”, in particular, those four beats go by quickly enough that strumming the “G” where it says “C” or “D” is not going to cause any problems.
We called that a “Country G”. I don’t know why. It was useful in “You’ve Got To Hide Your Love Away” or most songs where you change to or from a G from or to a D. Cause you don’t have to move your ring finger.
I appreciate the tips. I’m steadily improving. Giving myself a specific project of completing several Christmas songs has been great motivation. I love this music anyhow and it’s fun playing it again.
I’ve noticed sheet music doesn’t seem very guitarist friendly. As Mister Rik said they don’t put much thought into how a guitar is played. They just interpret the piano chords and expect us to play them.
Another great slash chord is the D/F# D tends to suffer from a lack of bass when it’s only played on the bottom 4 strings. Adding the F# fills it in. I just hook my thumb over the neck to play the F# and mute the A string. http://www.justinguitar.com/images/BCv2_images/191-D_Fsharp-chord.gif
Interesting. I’m not primarily a guitarist (my base instrument is keyboards), but D/F# only sounds good to me when passing through from G to Em or something like that. I don’t like it as a general “strumming” chord. (Of course, you can always just use a Drop D tuning and avoid all those problems. )
D/F# is primarily a passing chord. I just like the sound.
Open D is my least favorite chord. It’s so thin with just the bottom 4 strings. I use Drop D tuning whenever possible or use a capo and use different chord shapes to play in the key of D.
I use that G all the time - and yeah, Hide Your Love is a perfect reason why. That added fifth just makes it sound nice.
No one has mentioned the C/G you can do over that? You play Ranger Jeff’s Country G (I haven’t got a better name ;)) and just move the index and middle fingers each up a string for the C, keeping ring and pinky where they are on the E and B strings, 3rd fret… Love that chord.
As Mister Rik said they don’t put much thought into how a guitar is played. They just interpret the piano chords and expect us to play them.
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