Easy lessons

Lesson 1

Ode to Joy by Beethoven.

With each of the lessons use these 4 steps, repeating as many times as necessary.

Step 1; play through the tune while ignoring the chords.

Step 2; Listen free to my recording by clicking on the LISTEN page link below and see how close you were. Were you too slow or too quick? How accurate were you?

Step 3; play again, this time strum just once across the chord stopping immediately after playing the melody note. This means that you may not actually need to complete the chord. In fact if you overshoot the melody note then the tune will get lost in the chord. This is because the human ear zooms in on the highest note it hears.

Step 4; Check the end result by listening once again. 

A22 22 23 10 E10 23 22 20

A32 32 20 22 E22.20 20 -

A22 22 23 10 E10 23 22 20

A32 32 20 22 E20.32 A32 -

E20 - A22 32 E20 22 23 A22 32

E20 22 23 A22 20 D32 20 E42 -

A22 22 23 E10 10 23 22 20

A32 32 20 22 E20.32 A32 -

When adding the chords you will need to add the PASSING NOTES. These are notes that do not live in the chord. Composers use then a great deal but the Good Lord has given us a spare finger, the pinkie, just for this purpose! Well what else can you use it for? In this tune there is a passing note in line 2 where the E chord needs a 22 added to it.

Playing the melody should come fairly quickly. The chords will however come much more slowly and will require hours of practice. Ideally you want all three fingers to land on the fingerboard at the same time not one after the other.

To listen to these lessons click here.  

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