As a country guitar player for quite some time now, I still can’t quite understand why most beginners pass up on essential skills such as guitar strumming.
Now there are several different types of strumming patterns out there. You’ve got chicken picking, bluegrass style, finger picking, simple rhythm strumming and more.
What it all comes down to is the simple fact that learning to strum basic rhythm patterns are essential if you plan on being a decent guitar player sometime down the road.
Those that avoid learning rhythm and strumming are doomed to all-time failure. Learning rhythm and strumming as a beginner should be one of the first lessons you focus on for awhile.
Put down all those chords and song tabs that you’ve been reading and downloading off the internet. They will do you no good if you don’t have a basic understanding of strumming under your belt.
Basic Guitar Strumming Is Essential
Now you may know how I love teaching the fundamentals. I’m not like most guitar instructors out there. I’m a big believer in the 80/20 rule in that if you spend 80% of your time learning how and why things work the way they do, you’ll only have to work hard 20% of the time.
Most people have this backwards. They spend 80% of their time working hard trying to master something and 20% of the time learning how something works and why it’s important.
Learning how to strum the guitar is an essential skill you’ll need to learn if you plan on being a guitar player. You need to be spending 80% of your time doing these boring strumming patterns and finger warm-ups.
Why?
Because when you spend the time developing and learning the fundamentals, everything else becomes easy.
So what are some basic strumming patterns you can try?
Well the first step is being able to hear and listen to the beats of a song. You can read more about rhythm on my guitar starter guide along with other beginners information.
Once you’ve learned the tempo to a song, you can start strumming to the beat of that song. Most songs have 4 beats per measure so you need to practice listening to the song for those 4 beats in each measure.
You probably already know the beats to the measure. Our brains are pretty good at figuring it out and it’s why music has been so powerful (especially the drum) for thousands of years.
When you’re listening to your favorite tunes and you start nodding your head to the beat of the song, you’re moving to the tempo of the song.
Try to translate that to the guitar. Strum downwards the same time you nod your head to the beat and you’ll soon be playing to the rhythm.
Strumming is one of those skills where once you figure it out it becomes simple. Light bulb moment.
Leave your comments and questions below and I’ll address them as best I can.
