TECHNIQUE FOCUS

Rhythm guitar

One of the most important aspects of playing good rhythm guitar is to keep the strumming hand moving: up and down, in time, regardless of whether it is needed to hit the strings or not. If you keep the strumming hand moving it works very much like a pendulum. It is very difficult to nail a groove consistently by guessing with single strums here and there. Using the strumming hand to ‘ghost’ the rhythmic sub-division is a far more mechanical way of making sure your time-keeping is sound. Check out the funky, Em7 verse groove in our Minor jam.The rhythm part is a repeating, two-bar pattern that is played with a 16th note (semiquaver) feel. This means that all the eighth notes are played with a down stroke and the 16th notes that fall outside of this are played with up stokes. The funky rhythm also starts on beat two; this may throw you if you are used to playing music that predominantly starts on beat one. The length of the chords is also a factor and can be controlled with the pressure you apply with the fretting-hand fingers. If you release the pressure of the fretting hand but leave the fingers in contact with the strings, the chord will be cut short and the strings will be muted. The last two strums of the Em7 part are staccato (played short) so as soon as you press down to finger the chord it will be time to lift off.