Chords for Finger Picking Exercise to Build Thumb Independence | Tuesday Blues #003

[A] _ [E] Hey, welcome to lesson 3 [C] in the Tuesday Blues series.
I'm John Hatcher and today
I want to [B] talk to you about a
[Gb] Question that I get asked a lot over on blues [D] guitar Institute [Gb] calm and that is [A] you know people really interested in
Getting started with finger picking, but their fingers just [C] don't want to seem to move freely.
They want to seem to move all together
_ [Eb] So what [Am] I want to do [E] today is share [Eb] with you a quick exercise
It [D] really helps get the thumb to be sort of automatic [C] and independent doing its own thing and _
And then we'll keep the other fingers [Gb] together and just strum a chord [B] and we'll find that as we [Am] move this
Chord around in sense of [C] the rhythm of when [E] we strike the chord
[C] It's going to really start to [A] free these fingers [C] from your thumb so that you don't always want [A] to move in one motion
So I [G] really recommend practicing [B] this over and over and over and over and over again [C] until that thumb becomes completely
Independent of your other fingers then you can [Bb] work up to playing some melodies where these fingers are actually independent from each [A] other
but step one is to get the thumb pounding out the bass and
[C] Here we go.
I want to show you the exercise [B] and I'll walk [A] you through it.
Thanks _ _ _
_ [E] _ _ Okay, so this [B] exercise [E] is all about keeping a steady beat going with your thumb
So what I want to do is just [B] grab the guitar and I don't even have to fret anything
You can almost [Bb] just forget about this hand for a while and really focus on getting a good steady
Bass note [F] at whatever tempo just [Bb] pumping out with your thumb.
[F] You want to strike the low six [E] string here _ _ _ _
[C] And get that thud now
I [B] am sort of putting my palm down [Em] here and getting a palm you going which is nice to do because it sounds [F] more like Thud [E] here
_ _ _ _ [Bb] And I recommend playing [Eb] just this it sounds silly [Em] but just strike this string in time along with [F] a metronome
_ And once you can do that and have really good solid contact with the string for several [Bb] several bars _
[C] Without a break in the [E] rhythm or the pace or [F] hitting some sort of you know
Love the note [Bb] then let's move on and fret up [B] an E chord.
We can do just a [E] regular
E major chord here and
_ _ _ _ _ _ let's pick the top [Bb] three strings with my
Picking hand.
I'm talking [D] about the first finger [Am] second finger and third [Bb] finger
so index [A] middle and ring put those on the top three [Bb] strings and
[E] _
Let's do one two, three four pinch
Just close your hand when we come back around to the one beat again one two, three four one
Let those ring [C] and keep your thumb going one two, three four [E] pinch two three
Four pinch two three four pinch two three four
So [B] what we've done is we just put this little chord shape on beat [E] one
Now let's move it to beat two
one two three four one two three four one two three
Four one two three four cool now keep practicing that and [F] guess what's coming next we're gonna move this to beat three
_ _ _ one [E] two three four one two three four one two three
Four one two three four and then we'll move it on to beat four [B] so you know the drill so far
But here's where things start to [F] really get interesting once you can do that
[Eb] So that you're hitting [E] the chord on one of these down beats when the thumb is hitting
Then [Eb] we want to displace [B] the chord in between
the bass so
[Ab] That's going to sound something [E] like this one two, three four one two
Three four one and two three four one two three four one two
Three four one two, and three four one
_ _ Two and three four [B] one two three and four one two [E] three and four one two
Three four and one two three four and one two three four and one _
_ _ [Ab] All right, so you can see that [E] just moving that around
_ _ To the [F] different points [C] in a bars rhythm [Eb] will really help you build some independence
Especially [B] when you start striking in between the bars, [C] but I really think that this
Exercise should be very [Ab] sequential for you
And I'll post up some [C] tab showing you exactly what the [Bb] rhythm looks like on
On a PDF and on some guitar pro [Am] files so you can actually hear it if you have a guitar pro
But [E] anyway what we want to do is just [F] practice
Going through and [Cm] moving the chord to different [Bb] beats along that bar and that
[B] Seriously will [Am] build up that the great muscle memory in your thumb because this [Bb] thing's just cranking out [Eb] a bass line the whole time
[E] But then also you don't want to just play like this
_ _ [Cm] So playing in between the [C] notes really starts to break the [B] habit that these fingers have of wanting to play
Exactly along with the thumb so give that a try
[G] _ All right, so I really [C] hope that that was pretty helpful to you
I [D] know that you know practicing this might seem boring [E] if you do it over and over and [A] over again
And trust me my [Am] wife hated hearing this stuff because it was [A] non-stop when I was first getting going
[Am] But I can't [A] recommend it to you [D] enough
It really helped me build up the dexterity that I'm looking for in my finger [A] picking blues.
So hope you dig it and
Hope it works out for you.
If so swing on by Blues Guitar [E] Institute's Facebook page hit the like button [A] and leave me a comment
I'd really love to hear how this is working out [E] for you
All [A] right until lesson four.
I'll see you next Tuesday _ _
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