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The first thing you need to learn how to do on the guitar is to mute
the strings with your left hand so you can practice muted strums.
First get it to where you can deaden the strings cleanly. That means
your fingers have to be flat. Find a spot where you don’t hear
overtones. You want a nice, clean “X.”
Hold the pick with your first finger and thumb so your other fingers
will be free for hybrid picking later on.
Rest your forearm on the bout of the guitar. Your elbow joint won’t fit
right on the edge of the body of the guitar unless it’s a huge guitar
for your body. You’ll probably just have your forearm on the guitar.
Don’t press it in, just balance it comfortably.
Let your right hand hang super loose, become acutely aware of
what’s going on with the muscles of your arm. Curl your fingers into
your palm, you’ll feel tension. Relax. Extend your fingers and you’ll
feel tension too. Find that relaxed place in between curling in and
extending out. Watch for your top thumb knuckle–it should be
relaxed as well, not bent.
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Your index finger has a natural arch. Bring the index finger over to
your thumb so it’s gently touching in a relaxed way. Put the pick on
the side (sort of on the corner) of your index finger. Half of the pick
will be above your thumb and half below. The pick should be able to
rock in between your fingers. Don’t squeeze with your index finger–
you don’t want to hyper-extend it. When you squeeze with your
thumb, notice how the bottom knuckle (connecting to the hand)
moves.
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1. Pick flat (parallel to the strings). You’ll play your bass strings
this way to avoid a scraping sound and to have a clean entry and
exit on the string–if you angle it too much it takes up the space
between the strings which might cause you to inadvertently pick
strings you don’t mean to pick. On the higher strings, you’ll want to
angle it a little to get a warmer tone. Picking flat on the high string
gives a less attractive tone. As you pick the higher strings keep your
thumb flexible and slightly draw the pick off the strings to get a
smoother sound (you’ll want that harsher sound on bluegrass, rock,
funk, etc.). That “drawing off” technique is also useful when you’re
playing with high gain and you want a smooth sound.
2. Angled toward the neck side of the pick on the downstrokes.
This is what Brad recommends when you want to angle the pick
because you can maintain the pick grip he teaches.
3. Angled toward bridge side of the pick on the downstroke.
This gives a light airy sound good in jazz. It requires a different pick
grip that Brad teaches.
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only strum the lower strings). It is NOT a speed exercise. Take the
time to do this early in your playing because it’s harder to fix your
technique once you’re set in your ways.
Think about it, listen to your tone, anticipate the next note. Play
lightly. Let it glide over the strings. Spend several minutes a day,
gradually increasing speed but always maintaining complete
control. The line of force should be diagonally into the face of the
guitar. This is especially prominent when your wrist is up off the
bridge. The weight of your hand makes the guitar speak, you aren’t
pressing down.
Palm mute: Start behind the bridge. Pick the note and slowly move
your towards the sound hole and you’ll feel the onset of palm mute.
It rings, but is not as metallic sounding. You don’t want it to sound
like a rubber band, you want it to sound light and airy, you want it to
breathe.
Palm slap: where you bring out the backbeat (to be covered later)
Choke: You strum and then you come in and mute the strings. It’s
accomplished by being a little more toward the fingerboard with
your palm mute posture and also laying it down flat. It’s the whole
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side of the your hand that lays on the strings. Just place it lightly on
the strings.
• Up stroke: You don’t want the pick slanted downwards. You keep
your index DIP joint very supple, and as you play, it has to flex
back. You don’t want it to do that when you squeeze the pick with
the thumb as above, but on the upstroke, that joint is like a
spring. Don’t strum any more than 3 strings on the upstroke. DO
NOT practice pulling your pick up all six strings at once. [My note:
while you don’t want to do that in ordinary strumming, the
backwards rake is a nice expressive tool to know how to do] DO
practice it with different string groups (123, 234, 345, etc.)
Daily practice
• Driving over the speed bumps
• Practice getting a change in volume by squeezing the pick as you
get to the higher strings
• Practice picking down and up strokes with different groups of
strings, both with little mini strums with a couple of strings, and
just practice moving around. Don’t look at your fretting hand.
Look at your strumming hand. You need to watch what you’re
doing until you learn to feel it instinctively.
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If you have open strings in the chord, make sure you’re not leaning
your hand or fingers over or wrapping your thumb around and
muffling them.
Always keep going back to the bottom of the chord to check your
clarity. Play rest strokes 6-5, 6-5-4, 6-5-4-3, 6-5-4-3-2, 6-5-4-3-2-1.
Once you get the chord clean, take a mental snapshot: see what it
feels like physically, look at your hand and your arm and everything
about what you’re doing. If you get it clean once, there’s no reason
you can’t always get it clean–you just have to repeat that exact
same move. Make sure you’re thinking as you’re practicing.
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Don’t practice for long periods for time. Your attention span isn’t
ready yet and your fingers will hurt and you risk getting
discouraged. Practice in a lot of short segments every day.
Make sure you are always listening–not just to whether or not the
chord is clear, but also to the sonority of the chord, the mood it
evokes. Ear training starts from Day 1.
Play lightly. Don’t lean into the chords. Don’t be too loud or too
timid.
Hear things and critique your own playing. The teacher is just the
coach. Ultimately you have to learn to teach yourself.
Another top mistake people make (other than moving too much) is
not respecting the bass note. Beginners should always play the root
in the bass. Play it slightly louder. To play a chord with the bass on
the A string, practice while looking at your picking hand to build up
your accuracy.
Brad feels the triangle fingering for A is the best and that the 1-2-3
fingering is bogus.
Use the pinky on the D minor to free up your third finger for added
notes (like the F on the D string) later on. It will feel weak at first, but
the sooner you get used to using it the better.
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For certain chords, you might be able to let your thumb glide
around. For other chords that are more stretched out, you may
need to put it more in the back. G isn’t easy for a beginner because
of that stretch.
Stretching exercises (see around the 15:00 mark). You can practice
stretching along the string axis or along the fret axis. Do it gently,
don’t hurt yourself.
For the 4-voice G5 (G-6 X-5, D-4, G-3, D-2 X-1), you have to mute
the high E string. You can rest your pinky on it and/or come in with
your left hand to mute it.
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RHYTHMS
When you practiced riding over the speed bumps, you started slow
and gradually got faster. The time it takes to execute a strum can
vary, depending on whether you want to roll the chord or have them
sound more simultaneously. At a slow tempo you want to roll them a
bit more. It’ll sound inappropriate to strum it too fast. At a faster
tempo, you’ll strum. Adjust the time it takes you to execute one
strum to the tempo.
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Make sure your foot is going down on the click (some people do the
opposite)
Practice each of your chords with the metronome. Start at 60, then
go to 92, then 110, then 130. Some tempos will feel comfortable to
lock into and others won’t. Listen and become sensitive to where
you’re rushing and slowing down. Never go on auto-pilot. You want
to stay crisp and tight, in the pocket.
Focus on the rhythm, anticipate the groove in your head, count off
before you play. It’s sort of like this: you’re a little kid and there’s a
merry go-round and you like the purple horse, and it’s the only
purple horse on the merry go-round. And you’re going to get on.
The thing’s just barely moving around. What do you do? You have
to wait until it comes around, cause if it’s on the other side, you
can’t jump on it. It’s the same thing in this–you have to get that
groove, so you’re focusing not on playing, you’re focusing on the
rhythm, then you get in. It’s like a relay race. If you’re the second
leg of a relay race and I’m running up along side of you, are you
going to stand still and then take off for me to hand off the baton?
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No, you’re going to start running and get to the same speed so we
can do the hand off.
Level 1: Strum the chord on beat one and allow yourself the
following three beats of the measure (muted with your pick hand–
don’t do “x” strums) to execute your chord change.
Level 2: Strum the chord for two beats and allow yourself only two
beats for the chord change.
Level 3: Three strums with only one beat for the chord change.
Level 4: Strum all for beats and then quickly change to the new
chord
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Very slow tempos are some of the hardest to play and stay in the
pocket. Even an experienced pro can drift. You have to subdivide it
and hear it in a different grid work.
Count One-and-Two-and-Three-and-Four-and
You don’t always have to strum the whole chord. Practice using
down-up strokes picking separate notes of the chord, such as down
on the bass note and up on each successive note from the top and
back. Or you can do a pattern where you pedal the high E string
and cycle through the other notes. This is where your floating hand
position will come into play. Roll your hand while pivoting from the
wrist. You don’t want to be always thinking of that wall of sound
where you’re playing the whole chord.
Count out the rhythm first, because if you can count it you can then
hear what it’s supposed to sound like. You have to be engaged
mentally. Set the tempo slowly enough so you can focus and
anticipate where you’re supposed to be. Using example 4 below,
count like this if you don’t know the rhythm:
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4. Once you know you’re locked up with your rhythm, then play the
chord
Make sure you can play all the combinations of eighth notes and
quarter notes with every chord that you’re learning, concentrating
on hitting the right number of strings. Especially practice the ones
you find tricky. Use the metronome at a variety of tempos.
Adding the occasional quarter note into an all eight note strum
breaks up the monotony.
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ACCENTS
Review of playing the guitar as a drum kit
You can use the lower strings as the kick drum, the higher as the
snare, and ghost strokes as the high hat. Depending on the rhythm
and the tempo, you may want to use consecutive down strokes for
your kick drum, as in the example Brad plays in the beginning of the
video–that gives you a more driving sound.
Use ghost strokes (very light strokes on the 6th string) for the high
hat groove. For example (K=kick on lower strings, S=snare on
higher strings, hh=ghost strokes on 6th string):
1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +
K hh S hh K hh S hh
Squeeze the pick with your thumb to bring out the accents.
There are eight 8th note slots in the measure and you can have
potential accents on any of those (see examples below).
Practice your eighth note rhythms and accents with both down and
up strokes and all down strokes. The ghost strokes help you stay in
the pocket.
Accents aren’t just a matter of playing more loudly, it’s also a matter
of playing more strings because that’ll give it more punch. It’s like
having 5 or 6 horns playing instead of 2.
You need to know where you are in the measure at all times.
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Use different parts of the guitar, such as playing the lower strings for
the basic rhythm and the higher strings for the accents. The higher
strings can make a backbeat stand out even if you’re not really
accenting (playing them more loudly) because of the tone
difference.
Make sure you’re in balance–you don’t want to hit the accent too
loud or too soft. Experiment with dynamics, work on dropping back
the basic groove. Don’t play loud all the time: You want to have
somewhere to go dynamically in order to place your accents. You
want a balanced sound–don’t hit the accents excessively hard
compared to the rest of the dynamic level.
Practice on chords with roots on the 6th, 5th, & 4th strings to
improve your accuracy.
Another word for accents on the upbeats is a “kick.” They bring a lot
of forward momentum and surprise so that the rhythms are not so
predictable.
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Your accents don’t always have to be loud, they can be subtle too.
Experiment with dynamics.
Experiment with legato and staccato (rings and deads), using fret
hand and picking hand muting. (see 28:30) You have to have the
ability to mute your strings to make percussive “x” strums so your
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strings are not all ringing all the time. It makes your rings stand out
a lot more.
You can use the fretting hand and/or mute with your palm,
depending on the chord you’re playing.
With the pick hand muting, you come down on the strings as in a
choke but since you’re strumming it’s going to be too awkward to
lay your palm completely flat to mute all the strings so you work in
conjunction with your fretting hand. If you’re playing an open chord,
lean your hand over towards the treble side to mute the higher
strings.
You don’t have to strum all the strings, you can do it even on just
one string. But you can also play more strings and have that
“chucka” sound because you’re muting most of the strings.
Don’t fall into the rut of just knowing a couple of strums and playing
the same thing over every song. Practice songs with different feels.
The examples given below are just a few possibilities out of many.
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THE BACKBEAT
The Palm Slap: your snare drum for the backbeat
1. Make your wrist totally relaxed, arch it up gently off the face of
the guitar and then bend your wrist in back in onto the strings. Do it
back and forth several times. You’re not taking your arm completely
off the guitar–maintain the contact near the elbow.
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2. Thump your palm on the strings. You can also hit the face of the
guitar with your pinky and ring finger at the same time.
3. Then add in the ghost stroke. Don’t tense your wrist up, it’s
critical that it stay loose–just let it fall in. Brad has his students
practice this in a slouching position, almost laying down in the chair
with the guitar and letting their hand fall on the guitar.
MUTED STRUMMING
Playing big chords all the time gets texturally boring and you can’t
get that “in and out” sound where it sounds like you’re playing two
things at once.
Muting of the strings with the fretting hand is the challenging part of
this technique. Because of the occurrence of natural harmonics at
various node points along the string, you may get bell tones even
when you’re muting the strings. You have to use different parts of
different fingers to mute the strings in locations that don’t have
these node points. You also have to acquire a light touch so they
are not pressing down any strings enough that they can ring. If you
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Don’t play your X’s too loudly. They can be one string or just a
couple of strings.
Fretted notes are ideal for bubble parts (muted single note
grooves). Practice this–it’s a huge part of rhythm guitar.
Take adjacent pairs of strings within chords and play them with
muted strumming in various rhythms.
Make sure you can play the rhythm on deadened strings with the
proper accents before trying it with chords.
Get the extra open string strum “Uh” out of your playing–that little
open string strum that people use to buy themselves time to make
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their chord changes. Instead, if you need more time to make the
change, eliminate the last sixteenth note or shorten it.
Keep the 16th note motion going throughout your tied notes and
rests.
Don’t play all the strings–choose your string groups for different
effects.
BASS-CHORD STRUMMING
Even if you’re not a bluegrass player, this tool is such an essential
tool in a guitar player’s arsenal, you would be foolish to overlook it.
It will increase your precision in your picking hand and you can
apply this technique to any kind of music.
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Start by playing the root note on beats 1 and 3 and play the top 3
strings as your chord on beats 2 and 4. With 6th string root chords,
you can also play the octave root.
Set your metronome at a slow tempo, never play any faster than
you can play cleanly.
Your alternate bass note is the 5th. Practice playing the root on beat
1 and the fifth on beat 3 with the chord on beats 2 & 4.
You can practice palm muting on the bass notes, fret hand staccato
on the chords, etc.
When you play the low open E after the A bass on an A chord, mute
the E string after you play it so it’s not ringing when you go back to
the A bass note–you don’t want it to sound too rumbly. Practice
muting that low E string with your palm at the same time that you
place your pick against the 5th string to play the A note.
It’s good to play Dm with your pinky on the D note so your third
finger will be free to play bass notes.
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You can apply the scale as a bass line under the chord. See the
example at 7:50 using a Dm chord with D, A, C, F, and G
Memorize the interval patterns, such as 5th string root, 5th on the
6th string same fret, or 6th string root, the 5th on the 5th string two
frets above, 4th string root, 5th on the same fret a string below.
You won’t normally use notes on the top 3 strings for bass notes,
the exception being sometimes with a D-type chord to get the 5th
on the G string.
You can also use the 3 of the chord as a bass note for major and
dominant chords and the b3 for minor chords.
Plot out the available scale notes on each string for each diatonic
chord (so the notes for a G chord in the key of C won’t be the same
for the notes for a G chord in the key of G, and an A minor chord in
the key of G won’t have the same available notes as Am in the key
of C). Then practice adding them in as accents and embellishments
(slurs, bass lines, melodies, etc.). This is a great way to add
accents to you rhythms.
TRIPLET RHYTHM
In 4/4, count them one-trip-let two-trip-let three-trip-let four-trip-
let.
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Triplets in 4/4 and 12/8 are two ways of notating the same sound.
To play shuffle eighths, count triplets but don’t play the “trip” and
pick downstrokes on both eighth notes
Make sure you understand the difference in sound and feel between
straight 8ths and the shuffle.
Experiment with all three picking schemes and the different sounds
they give you.
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CHORD CHANGES
Practice until they’re seamless and flawless. Use these two
fingering principles:
Pivot fingers: same finger, same string same fret. If you’re playing
a C chord and go to an A minor, that last thing you want to do is lift
up your 1st and 2nd fingers, that’s just wasted motion, you lose your
point of reference. You can shift them. A pivot finger can shift within
the space between the frets, but you don’t take it off the string, you
don’t go over the fret bar.
Guide fingers: same finger, same string, different fret. If you were
playing an E chord and wanted to change to a D, you’d pick up your
2nd & 3rd fingers and slide your first finger and then come down to
your D chord.
Brad makes sure that all his students that they can explain and
demonstrate move by move the sequential changing of one chord
to another. For example if you were on an E and you want to go to a
D, here’s what happens step by step:
1. You relax your fretting hand and pick up your 2nd & your 3rd
fingers.
2. You slide up with your first finger and also move your 2nd & 3rd
fingers into position to come down for the D chord.
3. Come down and execute the D chord.
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Instead of using the “uh” (the open string strum, which Brad
loathes), leave out the last upstroke (or entire beat, if necessary) of
your strumming pattern (while staying in rhythm) to give yourself
time to make the change.
You can also let the open strings continue to ring if you’ve played an
open chord. (see 5:03). Don’t yank your fingers off, quickly but
carefully release your fingers so the previously fretted notes don’t
continue to sound, only the notes that were on open strings (ex. in
an Em chord, the 1st, 2nd, 3rd & 6th strings are open–you want to
let those sound while carefully lifting your fingers off the b & e notes
on the 5th & 6th strings so those strings won’t sound).
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DIATONIC TRIADS IN C
Scale Playing
Look at all the available notes you have in open position, regardless
of whether it starts with the root. For example, in C your first note
will be the low E.
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If you’re playing slowly, you can use free stroke down strokes and
practice drawing the pick off the strings. Don’t use rest strokes to
play your scales, use free strokes.
Observe the patterns made by the notes: the same fingering (open,
1st finger, 3rd finger) occurs on the two E strings and the B string,
open-2nd finger-3rd finger occurs on the A and D strings, open-2nd
finger on the G string–only 3 different fingerings.
In the beginning it’s okay to just learn the patterns to get up and
running, but you will have to eventually learn the names of the
notes as well.
Practice in rhythm. Start with whole notes, then half notes, the
quarter notes, then eighth notes, then16th notes
Get to where you can see the notes, play them, and know where
you are at all times
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The point of learning the scale is to show you the notes you can use
when playing in a given key to link things together when you play
melodies, or you want to throw in different notes to embellish the
chord, or if you want to play moving bass lines.
Go through each diatonic chord and see what notes are in each
chord. Memorize each chord with its number in the scale: i.e. “C is
the I chord, Dm is the ii chord, etc. You don’t have to memorize the
chord spellings right away, but you will eventually.
You don’t have to make C the home base when you’re playing
diatonic chords in C. See 15:25. For example you can make Dm
your home base and use the C chord as an accent. In this case C
would be the theoretical home key and Dm would be the street key.
Instead of playing a iii minor you can play a I chord with the 3rd of
the chord in the bass (ex. in the key of C, that would be C/E). That
also makes a good passing chord to link to an F chord.
You only have the 6 diatonic triads to deal with–get really solid on
them and spend a lot of time in one key before you move on to the
next so you can thoroughly understand the patterns–they will
translate to subsequent keys. Don’t worry about the triad built off
the 7th chord–it doesn’t stand as a chord its own.
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DIATONIC PROGRESSIONS IN C
Practice the two-chord building blocks with all sorts of patterns and
time feels, accents, palm slaps, etc. Every day, try to find a different
way to play the progression. Listen while you play and get the
sounds in your head. Say the names of the chord functions to
yourself. If you’re a beginner, go through the 4 levels of practicing
chord changes given in the quarter note rhythm lesson. Make a
note of what songs, if any, each combination reminds you of.
In each row, the chord on the left is “home base.”
I ii I iii I IV IV I vi
ii iii ii IV ii V ii vi ii I
IV V IV vi IV I IV ii IV iii
V vi VI V ii V iii V IV
vi I vi ii vi iii vi IV vi V
The iii chord is the weakest chord of all 6 chords. It’s more of a
passing chord, and if you’re playing iii-I out of context of a chord
progression, it sounds ambiguous, like it could be from another key
(ex. iii-I in the key of C can sound like vi-IV in the key of G). There
are other combinations that can sound ambiguous, like IV-ii, in that
case you can add other chords to lead it back to the I so you can
hear it in context. You can also substitute the I chord with the 3rd in
the bass for the iii.
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When you find a combination and rhythm you like, record it and use
it as a jam track.
You want to have your ears fully tuned in and not just be cerebral
about it.
DIATONIC TRIADS IN G
You don’t have to learn a whole new scale from the C scale, you
only have to change one note–change the Fs to F#s.
Think of both the letter names and the scale degrees. Sing them as
you practice the scale (i.e. “G is one, A is two, B is three,” etc. Do
this with every scale you learn).
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DIATONIC PROGRESSIONS IN G
See 1:38-2:34 for elaboration on giving the illusion of legato and the
importance of “defingering” a chord.
See 2:34-2:55 for musical ways of making the chord changes easier
on yourself, such as adding pauses and muting.
Any of the chord progressions with the iii in them, add other chords
to make the key center clear.
Get to where you can use the scales and chords as one unit, rather
than thinking of them as separate entities.
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DIATONIC TRIADS IN D
Take all the C notes from the G major scale and raise them to C#.
In every key, practice playing scales from each note of the scale
(that will give you the modes). Then play the corresponding mode
over the corresponding chord (D ionian over D, E dorian over Em,
F# phrygian over F#m, etc.)
Scales
• Noticing the fingering patterns
• Varying dynamics
• Say the letter names and the scale degrees as you play the scale
• Superimpose the scale over each diatonic chord
• Play the modes off of each root over its corresponding diatonic
chord
Diatonic Progressions
• Take pairs of diatonic chords and experiment with mixing them
together in different orders with different rhythms and feels and
tempos. Then do the same with 3 chords, 4 chords, etc.
• Play once through each pair one after the other (I ii, I iii, I IV, I V, I
vi, etc.), being aware of the names and functions of the chords
you’re playing.
• Try different diatonic chords as home base
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• Instead of playing a iii minor you can play a I chord with the 3rd of
the chord in the bass
• Practice the two-chord building blocks with all sorts of patterns
and time feels, accents, palm slaps, etc. Every day, try to find a
different way to play the progression. Listen while you play and
get the sounds in your head. Say the names of the chord
functions to yourself.
• Change up the bass notes using notes from the scale
• Create common tones between chords by using drones and color
tones
• Freely mix in slurs, accents, walking bass, etc.
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