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A music education system
applied to guitar
Tom Benjamin, PhD
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Australia License. To
view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/au/
Benefits of this method:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Play by ear
Plays with other instruments like recorder, harmonica
Start with one finger
Add new fingers and chords at your own pace
Recognise and play famous songs
Up and running within the first lesson
Cautions:
1. Modern songs are copyright, so you’d have to obtain
these separately
2. We start with famous old songs because they’re easy
and free of copyright
3. Midi rather than .mp3 for smaller, quicker download
4. Ersatz chord names are approximate, so don’t trust
them for music class assignments
How it works:
1. Adapt the music to the player, rather than viceversa
2. Play by ear rather than by chord or note names
3. Restricted alternatives –ie- “sing any key as long as
it’s D”
4. Drone, ersatz or pseudo-chords instead of more
difficult full or bar chords –ie- Cmaj9 instead of C
5. Five simple ‘shapes’ and a few major chords –ieonly about nine items to memorize
6. Familiar chord patterns easy to predict by ear
(blues, TinPan Alley, ballads, folk, rock, R&B .. )
7. Learn shapes and sounds to find the chord by ear
rather than trying to memorize chord lists
One-finger
Some folk songs require a mere two chords. If the open guitar sound
is allowed to play one of the chords (G or D), moving one finger up &
down creates the next chord (either D or E minor). Most of the notes
don’t change, hence act as drones as with dulcimer or bagpipe.
These special one-finger guitar chords require the accompanist
(either musician or software) to modify the traditional chords slightly
so that, for example:
•G is played as A11/G or as G69/E
•D is played as D2
•E minor is played as Em7
These special chords can have more than one drone sound to the ear
so that we may regard the same open chord as either A11/G or
D69sus4, depending on how we intend the ear to perceive it as a G
or D sound in the context of the song.
Open: ‘easy G chord’
D
(used as Chord A11/G)
(chord D2 or Dadd9 6th )
Many songs can be played just by lifting this one note
on and off. The note changes from G (open) to D
(down), switching the chord between A11/G and D2.
Playing with other instruments
Open: ‘easy G chord’
D
(used as Chord A11/G)
(chord D2 or Dadd9 6th )
As with guitar, moving one finger on a Keyboard switches chords (from note G
to A below). Any green keys below can be safely played along with guitar as
they correspond to the open strings of standard guitar tuning. This is how these
chords look on a piano keyboard or xylophone:
Open: ‘easy D chord’
E minor
(used as Dsus*)
(Em7 )
2-chord songs can also be played in a minor key.
The open chord has a number of sounds and is used
here as the D (Dsus*). The finger now takes the Em7
position, so the two chords are now D (Dsus*) and Em
(Em7).
*The full name of the open chord as used here is D69sus4
More One-finger Chords
Most people could start with simple 3-finger chords. But
the one-finger versions allow us to concentrate on timing,
listening to subtle differences in tone, and practice in
following a predictable pattern such as blues or ballad.
The chords produce a nice sound as only one string is
muffled and the rest are left open. But the training purpose
is to make the fret board (left hand) part easy so we can
train the ear and the strumming hand.
Finger positions on fretboard
Each of the white spots is a
position that creates a onefinger chord.
This is a very easy set of
positions to learn.
Finger positions for one-finger chords
Because of the way the
standard guitar is tuned they
lie along a crooked path.
The pattern is obvious, easy
to memorize, and easy to
feel on the fretboard without
even looking at it.
A11/G
G
C
(G6/9)
(CMaj9)
(G/E)
Em7
A7
D
(A7sus2)
(D2 )
One-finger pseudo-chords
(full names of the chords in parentheses)
D11 or C69
Strumming
Am7
F#
Music is written in terms of notes and chords as
at right.
Instead, to make it easier for you, we write out
just the general chord name and how many
times you strum that chord in the song, as
below:
GGGG |
GGGG |
GGGG|GGGG
CCCC |CCCC
GGGG|GGGG
DDDD |
CCCC |
GGGG|GGGG
In words this would be: “strum G
chord sixteen times then C eight
times, D four times, C four times,
and end with eight strums of the
G chord.”
One-finger blues
To plays the blues pattern
only requires the three finger
positions at right.
Below is the order in which
they are strummed:
GGGG |
GGGG |
GGGG|GGGG
CCCC |CCCC
GGGG|GGGG
DDDD |
CCCC |
GGGG|GGGG
G
C
D
Alternate finger position
The C chord can be played in
more than one way. This
version gives a higher pitch
and is easier to switch
between D and C
GGGG |
GGGG |
GGGG|GGGG
CCCC |CCCC
GGGG|GGGG
DDDD |
CCCC |
GGGG|GGGG
G
C
D
G
(G6/9)
C
(CMaj9)
D
(D2 )
One-finger three-chord Blues
The above notes in the following sequence give a
variant of the ‘blues progression’ common to pop
songs. (Each letter = one strum):
GGGG |
GGGG |
GGGG|GGGG
CCCC |CCCC
GGGG|GGGG
DDDD |
CCCC |
GGGG|GGGG
Click to listen
(played twice)
To play along with a full
instrumental midi version
(3 times) click below:
G
(G6/9)
C
(CMaj9)
D
(D2 )
Practice the One-finger Blues
The sequence to strum is below:
GGGG |
GGGG |
GGGG|GGGG
CCCC |CCCC
GGGG|GGGG
DDDD |
CCCC |
GGGG|GGGG
To play along with a midi
version of the guitar
chords click below:
G
(G6/9)
C
(CMaj9)
Em
(Em7)
One-finger
Ballad
Adding a few more
chords allows a
number of famous
tunes and
‘standards’ to be
approximated.
A7
D
( A7sus2)
(D2 )
D11
Summary chart to print out
Summary chart with optional chord positions
An example sequence of one-finger chords
The full 1-finger
chord system
C
G
This six chords at right are
the most relevant one-finger
chords. The full names of
chords in parentheses can
be substituted in digital
compositions so that other
instruments can play along
with little dischord.
Em
(CMaj9)
(G69)
(Em7)
A7
D
D11
( A7sus2)
(D2 )
(also C69)
G13
B
Bb
Gb
Db
G
(Fmaj9b5)
(Bm11)
(Bbmaj7b5)
(Gbm9)
(Dbm9b5)
(G69)
Less-commonly used chords
Summary: One-finger Chords
• These chords produce a nice sound. But their purpose is
to make it easy to concentrate on when to change
chords.
• In the 3-finger chord sets to follow, the one-finger
versions can be substituted at any time if you get lost or
want to change chords very quickly in a fast song.
• When you later learn 3-finger and full chords you can
substitute them and play the songs used for the onefinger versions. In a musical group a combination of
chords done well can give a full and interesting sound.
Songs for One-Finger chords
•Major: G and D
•Buffalo Gals
•Little Liza Jane
•Shoo Fly Don't Bother Me
•Skip To My Lou
•Grand Texas (Jambalaya)
•Polly wolly Doodle
•Darling Corey
•Banana Boat Song
•Hot Time in the Old Town
•Long, Long Ago
•Get Along Little Dogies
•Down in the Valley
•Farmer in the Dell
•Go Tell Aunt Rhody
•Merrily we Roll Along
•Row Row Row your Boat
•Tom Dooley
•He’s Got the Whole World
•Ezekial Saw the Wheel
•Old Paint
•London Bridge
•Jacob’s Ladder
•Minor: D and Em
•Shady Grove
•What Should we do with the Drunken Sailor
•Wade In the Water
•Haul Away
•Joshua fit the Battle of Jericho
•900 Miles
Below is a practice sample of famous songs that can be played with two chords:
Major: G and D
•Little Liza Jane
•Skip To My Lou
•Grand Texas (Jambalaya)
•Polly wolly Doodle
Minor: D and Em
To play along with a midi
version of some of these
songs click on the icons at
left :
•Shady Grove
•Down in the Valley
•Wade In the Water
And these are merely the ones out of copyright. There are many more modern 2-chord
songs copyrighted.