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Christian Guitar Tab & Bass Tab

Uncle Bob's Guitar Lessons
Lesson 5 - Strumming
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Getting Just a Bit More Tricky

Let's face it - a simple up and down strumming pattern does not make a great song. So let's liven things up a bit by varying the way we are strumming.

Strumming On The Eighth Notes

In this example we are playing on the eighth notes, or playing twice per beat of the song. Consider the following illustration...

Note: You should practice this while strumming both directions. If you were playing a song at a faster tempo, this pattern would be extremely difficult to play using only a down-stroke.

"Dropping" A Few Eighth Notes While Strumming

Example #1

In this next example, we drop a few eighth notes from the pattern to give the song a different feel...

When playing this example, pay careful attention to the strumming pattern because it changes.

Example #2

As in the previous illustration, this next example varies the strumming pattern and drops a few different eighth notes to create a nice, lazy strumming pattern...

Example #3

Just to mess everything up, the next example changes from the 4/4 patterns that we've been looking at to a 3/4 pattern...

Note: This pattern works nicely with a 6/8 song as well.