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By David Hodge
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Use these simple tricks to switch between common chords. With audio examples
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You’ll learn a lot by just playing through these exercises, but to really shave seconds off your playing time, apply these techniques to songs, such as the ones listed below, as soon as you can.
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Tune Up
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Introduction
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Minimize Your Movements: 5 minutes
The easiest way to pick up speed with your chord changes is to do nothing—or at least, do as little as possible! Let’s look at the standard chord progression of A, D, and E to see how you can minimize your finger movements.
Most books suggest that you play the A chord with your ring, middle, and index fingers in an ordered row. But when you switch to the D and E chords, the other main chords in the key of A, you have to move all your fingers.
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| Instead of playing your chord as pictured above, try the fingering below.
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Try switching the positions of your index and middle fingers on the A chord, as in the photo above. Now, when you switch from A to D, you don’t have to move your index finger at all; you can use it as a pivot finger. Likewise, when you change from A to E, your index finger should stay on the G string; just slide it over a fret. Use this new A chord fingering on PIVOT FROM A, and see how it makes changing from A to D and E easier and quicker.
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Pivot from A
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Pivot from A, Played Slowly
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Take a Beat of Boom-Chuck: 10 minutes
Another way to rev up your chord-changing speed is to buy yourself a moment or two while you’re switching chords. For example, if you’re playing a boom-chuck pattern, most beginners wait until they’ve formed the next chord to hit the new bass note. That kind of defeats the purpose. It’s more efficient to fret the chord while you hit the bass note. Try this with the A, D, and E chords in GAIN A BEAT IN A. Since the bass notes are open strings, you have a whole beat where you don’t have to fret anything.
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Gain a Beat in A
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Gain a Beat in A, Played Slowly
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We’ll combine this approach and the pivot finger to move from E to B7, as demonstrated in EXTRA BEAT E. Here the pivot is the middle finger; it sits nicely on the second fret of the A string while your index and ring fingers make their respective string changes.
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Extra Beat E
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Extra Beat E, Played Slowly
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Play No Note Before Its Time: 15 minutes
If you play your G chord like most folks (with your index, middle, and ring fingers), you have to completely change your fingers around when you switch from G to C. This is why some people play the G chord with the middle and ring fingers and pinky; in this position, your middle and ring fingers are just one string away from their positions for the C chord.
If you find this shape uncomfortable (or if you’re still working on your pinky strength), there are other ways to speed up this common chord change and use the no-pinky fingering. Switch from G to C in slow motion and look at your fingers. When you fret the C chord, which finger do you put down first? For most people, it’s the index finger. But you strum from the sixth string down, so you have to wait until all your fingers are in place before you strum.
What you want to do is to get your fingers on the lower strings first. For a C chord, your ring finger should be the first one down. An easy way to get used to doing this is to play a walking bass line from G to C, as in BOTTOMS UP. Play the G chord, then slowly and deliberately walk up to the C note (fifth string, third fret). As you fret that note, drop your middle and index fingers down to form the rest of the C chord.
If you practice this exercise for a concentrated period of time, you’ll find yourself always making the C chord with the ring finger first, even when you drop the walking bass line.
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Botttoms Up
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Bottoms Up, Played Slowly
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Printable Version
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