Hi, I’m pretty brand new (less than a month in) to learning guitar. I’m learning on an acoutstic and I’ve completed Grade 1- Mod 2. I’m really interested in learning the fingerpicking style of playing as well as strumming. At what point in my learning would be a good starting point to dive into fingerpicking? Any guidance will be appreciated, so, thank you in advance.
Once you’ve a few open chords under your belt you could have a look over at the technique section:
If you know that that’s where you’re heading, I would say the sooner the better….
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Yes thank you so much liaty. Seems I should get the basic chords along with their notes learned, with some decent tempo in the chord changes. All with time and dedication to practice. Loving this new journey through Justinguitar, for sure, though, along with help from this great, guitar loving, community
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Welcome to the community @MPQ ! Great start, glad you found this course. I am about 1.25 years in with Justin’s course and it is a great foundation and tons of guidance through the course and this community as we grow and advance.
I also am more interested in finger picking or finger style, whatever it is labeled, and classical, which is a specialized variation of finger style IMO (or is it the other way around…
. In fact I tend to practice it a lot, and really need more time with basic rhythm and strumming. But there really is no right or wrong. Not in a rush and living for the process.
My thought, at your very early stage is to look a little ahead like @liaty suggested when you are ready and take the basic pattern Justin teaches and start with just that one and play it slowly and with a metronome. It will help you get the feel of fingerpicking and timing and can grow with you as you keep going.
What I wish I had done better was start with the metronome. Keeping pace and keeping timing with finger patterns isn’t easy, and I have started some remedial training. If you do that at the beginning, it will serve you well!
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Welcome to the community. When I started playing guitar all I was interested in was fingerstyle and that’s all I played for the first couple of years. When I did Justin’s lessons, I stuck to songs that were in 4/4 timing and played with my thumb on the bass string, then index on the next string, then pinched middle and ring and then back to index finger.
As time went on I learned fancier fingerstyle patterns and after a couple of years started using a pick as there are some songs that just sound great strummed.
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Hello @MPQ and welcome to the Community.
You have had a little bit of contrary advice - do it now / do it later.
I recommend what Justin teaches. The finger style lessons and the folk finger style modules are aimed at intermediate players who have gained the fundamental skills necessary for that type of play by following the beginner courses. The learning module @liaty has linked to now sits under the Technique section of the website. Under the old site, before the relaunch, it was a firm intermediate module.
My advice, follow Justin’s teaching path and learn to play from the ground up.
Hope that helps.
Cheers 
| Richard_close2u | JustinGuitar Official Guide
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Hello @Richard_close2u, thank you for the warm welcome and all the words of advice. After watching Justin’s intro video to fingerpicking, I agree that I should finish, at least, the beginner guitar course grades before learning the finger style path. As you mentioned, I should lay down a foundation of good fundamental skills and knowledge. And that’s just what I’ll do and enjoy every stepping stone along the way.
Thank you for taking time away from your own day to write a little something to me. It gives me a lot of encouragement and drive to push myself further and keep learning all I can
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@MPQ Justin does have a fingerstyle started course in Grade 2 module 11
So stay the course and get good at your chord change in Grade 1. you’ll be there in no time
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I think Richard is right. There is no substitute for the basics. But you can get your finger picks wet by practicing the pattern in the module mentioned by stitch.
Justin also has some songs like house of the rising sun and hallelujah that he discusses for fingerpicking. But, I would recommend getting the songs down a bit strumming and then moving to try finger picking. There is no rush and if you have clumsy fingers of stone like I have, this is a long game.
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