Johnny Hiland Band

When learning how to play the guitar, the chords tend to be the most difficult thing to master. Learning them can be a massive challenge. To begin with, you are using multiple fingers to play multiple strings all at once! The combinations and finger placements can appear very confusing.

There are a couple of misconceptions when it comes to finger placement. For instance, don’t think that the size of your fingers has anything to do with lack of success. This is absolutely not true. However, most of the problem when playing guitar chords is hand PLACEMENT. You especially need to learn how to properly place your left hand and fingers.

Are you struggling with your lessons? Check to see if your left thumb is positioned high up on the back of the guitar neck. If it is, then the placement is wrong. Your left thumb should sit on the LOWER portion of the back. It needs to be behind the second finger. Sure, it will probably feel uncomfortable at first, but it is the correct posture for many styles.

You need to remember this posture. Sure, it’s simple to play a couple of songs or notes and then return to your old habit, but that will only encourage the bad habit. Remember: practicing good habits is crucial when learning guitar chords.

Common Mistakes
Successfully learning is heavily prevented by lack of support and knowledge. When you are struggling to play a five string chord, you are probably making two big mistakes:
1.    For starters, attempting to master a five string chord is a mistake when you’re just learning. Instead, you should focus on a two or three string chord, as they are much easier to learn. Later on down the road you can move on to more complex chords.
2.    Secondly, proper placement of the fingers is essential. For instance, it wasn’t until after a few months of playing when I realized that I was practicing incorrectly. The tutorial videos at the Learn & Master Guitar website showed me that I was incorrect with my finger placement.

If you want to learn chords, it is important to learn the correct way, which can be tough without an expert, or at least some type of formal training. However, guitar lessons usually aren’t cheap.

You need to check out a resource such as Learn and Master Guitar. That way, you will have access to many techniques, lessons, and tips that you would learn from a private teacher. The best thing is, these online lessons are way more affordable!

Lessons + Practice = Tons of success!

Make sure you take some lessons, no matter what form they come in. You aren’t going to learn guitar chords and songs without good lessons. Whether you have the money and time for private lessons or simply come across a good lesson online isn’t relevant. Just find yourself a good lesson, learn from it, and practice!

Practice is crucial. It’s recommended that you set aside a half hour to an hour every single day for guitar practice. This may not seem like a lot of time, but it’s actually best to not play more than a half hour or so each day. This is because you may become more or pick up bad habits. Instead, just set aside 30 minutes or so every day and make sure there are no distractions.

Spend a good fifteen minutes focused exclusively on the chords. Begin with basic and simple chords. Within a couple of weeks, you will not only play them like a pro, but you will also switch back and forth between them with ease!

Successful guitar chords learning requires practice and dedication just as much as it requires skill. Make up your mind that you are going to learn no matter what! You really can do this. Remember that chords are pretty much the foundation for every song, therefore you should be able to play a TON of great songs once you learn the chords!

Are you ready to dive in and get some awesome video lessons so that you can learn from the pros?

Copyright Liam Gibson (Stage Guitarist)

You need to develop a good understanding of how to read and use diagrams if you want to learn to play guitar chords. Whether you’re an absolute beginner or a bit experienced, the easiest path to becoming a pro guitar player is by learning some simple chords. That way, you can apply them to learning to play the rhythm part of songs. Guitar chord diagrams will help you to do just that!

So, what is a chord diagram?

A guitar chord diagram is basically a visual representation of a single chord, which is often referred to as a “chord box”. It’s essentially a rectangle shaped box that shows you how to play a specific chord. It represents the fretboard on the guitar, and shows you precisely where your fingers need to go in order to form a chord. Needless to say, it can help make it playing guitar chords easier. It’s truly amazing just how a small package can present so much information!

How to read a guitar chord diagram.

There are a dozen or so different formats and styles, but all guitar chord diagrams have these common features:

·    There are 6 lines that symbolize the strings on a guitar. Depending on the format of the box, the strings either run across the page horizontally or up and down the page vertically.

·    When looking at a vertical diagram, the string on the left side represents the low “E” string, and the one on the right is the high “E” (the thinnest string).

·    There are lines running along the string lines at a right angle. These represent the frets. This is an important thing to remember when taking your guitar chords lessons.
·    Dots are placed on the grid to show which strings need to be pressed on which fret in order to play the chord.
While this is just basic information on a chord diagram, it can still be enough to teach you how to form and play a guitar chord. The greatest part is that you do not need to even know how to read standard music, or even guitar tabulature, to read a chord diagram!
Here are some more features of guitar chord diagrams that feature even more important info:
·    On the top part of the box there is a thick line representing the end of the neck—the nut.
·    An “x” symbol on top of the nut line means, “Don’t play this string!”
·    An o” symbol above the nut line means that the string is played open (not fingered).
·    Numbers 1-4 under the box (usually on the dots) indicate the finger you must use on that string. One is for the index finger, and four is the little finger.
·    A bar or line running across more than one string indicates a “barre chord”, which means one finger has to press more than one string.

To understand easy to learn guitar chords, here are some tips on reading the diagrams:

·    Make use of guitar chord diagrams, as they are the single most powerful resource for learning the guitar!

·    Individual chord diagrams can be combined together to form charts. These are a simple means to learn basic chords, families of chords, sequences, and songs.

·    Check into online resources and tools, such as The Guitar Players Toolbox, to help you learn about diagrams and charts. You will find out about all the easiest guitar chords to learn!

Good luck and play well!

Copyright Liam Gibsom (Pro Guitarist)

Learning guitar chords does not have to be difficult, but there are some mistakes that many beginners make that can be avoided.

The Top 10 Mistakes

1. Giving up too soon

No matter what you decide to learn, you will not get it right on the first try. This is especially true of guitar. When you learn the guitar chords, chances are that you will have some trouble, but you must stick with it. Many beginners give up on a chord at the worst possible time. They learn the finger position, and they can occasionally strum it cleanly, but they see no improvement from this point. Once you get to this point, it’s only a matter of time. You have the basics, you just need to keep practicing.

2. Lack of visualization

When you are forming a chord, visualization is very important. You have to “see” where each finger is going to move to before it happens. The best way to speed up your chord changes is to look at where your fingers currently are, and think about where they need to be. Then, you visualize the shortest route they need to take to get there. There are times when you won’t need to move much, because some of the basic chords use common notes.

3. Challenging yourself too much

Chord changes, or progressions, are the best way to master guitar chords. The problem is that many beginners choose difficult progressions, and get discouraged when they can’t get it right. Make sure you choose easier progressions, like G to A, E to A, or D to G. They might seem easy, but repetition will train you for the more advanced chord changes.

4. Lack of finger strength

Beginning guitarists do not understand the value of finger strength. This should be obvious, since the fingers are used to play the guitar. To build up your finger strength, a great thing to try is wide scale exercises. Also, there are other exercises involving pushing down hard on the string of your guitar, finger press-ups, or even finger weights.

5. Looking at your hands too often

Once you learn to play guitar chords, you should be able to do so without looking at your hands. The finger position should become second nature. You don’t see professionals looking down all the time while they’re playing, do you? You should be able to switch between open chords without looking at your hands.

6. Practicing one chord at a time

Through the use of books, videos, or even instructors, beginning guitarists have gotten into the habit of practicing only one guitar chord at a time. This is a huge mistake, and will actually take longer to learn. The best and fastest way to learn chords is in groups of three. When you give your brain a varying pattern of three chords to learn, this is more likely to solidify the information. It will help you remember the fingering, and it will help you learn chord progressions.

7. Hiding your pinky

It seems a little odd, but a great deal of beginners tend to move their pinky out of the way when it is not in use. All of your fingers should be hovering over the fretboard at all times. Getting into this habit will help you learn more advanced chords later.

8. Not understanding the root note

Many people do not know what the root note of a chord is. The root note is a chord’s bass note. It determines what string you begin strumming from. For example, the root note of an E chord is an E, played by strumming an open low E string, or your thickest string. What this means is that you begin strumming from the E string when you are playing an E chord.

9. Not picking the chord

When beginners are playing guitar chords, they will often notice dead notes within the chord. Usually, this is caused by a fingering problem. Many beginners will simply keep strumming the chord until they get it right. This is a brute force method of learning, and a great deal of wasted practice time. To avoid this, try picking the chord instead. By picking each individual string, you can isolate the problem area more efficiently. Then, you can apply more pressure on that string or fix your finger position to get a better note.

10. Not using all your senses

To make it easy to learn guitar chords, you should look at every angle. You should look at pictures of someone playing the chord, look at a chord chart, and even watch a video of someone playing the chord. This will help you learn where your fingers should be, and how to get them there. Of course, you can’t play a chord correctly until you have heard the way it is supposed to sound, as well. Processing all of this information will help you visualize the correct technique.

Copyright Liam Gibson (Pro Guitarist)