Right Hand Help!

[taygull]

I need to practice and get better with right hand rhythm technique.

What I would really like to do is have either a drum machine or a software program that I could program in a pattern and practice along with it.

Anyone else do this?

[Tom S.]

There are some really interesting web sites for strum patterns that might be interesting to program. They are hard to play just looking at notation.

[815C]

Here's something to try. Remember is elementary school how all the boys would play bongos on the top of their desks - slapping rythyms with their bare hands on the desktops? Take that to the guitar. Mute all the strings with your left hand and strum the muted strings with your pick thinking of your guitar as a percussion instrument. Start with basic rythyms and then get a little more complex as you go. Try unmuting the strings every X number of beats with a single chop chord (like mandolin players) and then go back to muting immediately after one chop.

[brownrd]

Originally Posted by ITArchitect

There are some really interesting web sites for strum patterns that might be interesting to program. They are hard to play just looking at notation.

would you mind posting a couple of these? I need some work on this too, and I think I might find these websites helpful.

thanks,

Bob

[Tom S.]

Here are some interesting strum patterns sites:

http://www.grouptherapy.guernsey.net/strumming.html

http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~d.../strumming.htm

[brownrd]

Originally Posted by ITArchitect

Here are some interesting strum patterns sites:

http://www.grouptherapy.guernsey.net/strumming.html

http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~d.../strumming.htm

thanks, ITArchitect.

bob

[jeffrey]

One thing I might be able to help with is a little technique.

One of the biggest mistakes I see newer players make when strumming is strumming down or up twice consecutively.

What happens is it breaks your natural up/down motion which is keeping you in time and it's just plain kind of awkward.

Think about it this way:

Let's say this basic beginner strum pattern for example: Down / Down / Up / Up / Down / Up

Now, if you were to play this as it looks, sort of, you might be tempted to literally pick down twice, up twice, then a down and an up. That would be very awkward and choppy sounding and lose the fluidity we all want with strumming.

Think of it like this: if you are running at a good clip and take to Left steps, what happens? SLAM! Right on yer kisser. Strumming is sort of the same way (minus the falling down part).

So instead of doing two downstrokes your actually going to strum DOWN / UP / DOWN. The difference is, when it comes to the upstroke, you just pull your arm away from the strings. Think of it like a phonograph needle. That way you keep the up/down pendulum of your arm to keep you in time and keep your strumming fluid.

So for that strumming pattern, practice playing it with consistent DOWN/UP strumming motions (do not pause or stop or strum twice in one direction) only pulling your hand away from the strings and "missing" them when you don't want a hit.

So the pattern would actually be played like this: (brackets are ghost or mised strums for keeping time and fluidity)

Down / [Up] / Down / Up / [Down] / Up / Down / Up

So you keep a consistant Down/Up strumming pattern and have two ghosted or implied strums for time keeping and fluidity between the 1st and 2nd beats and on the 3rd beat (assuming 4/4 time).

If you hammer this out and get comfortable with the constant motion, other strum patterns become as simple as pulling your hand away when you want it and when you don't.

Hope this helps some.