This may sound like a strange question but it relates to the situation where you playing along with others at say the guitar club. You are working from a chord sheet that only shows where the chords change with the lyrics, no indication of bars and you are not in control of the tempo. So you have to change at a random point in the pattern you are playing, when the lyrics dictate. Must confess I tend to play a very simple pattern but would like to try something more complicated.
If you are going to do this then you may end up with open strings but I think it is more important to keep the rhythm going, am I right and is there any other advice.
Michael
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I wonder about this too as Iâm reading from Justinâs beginner songbook. It just has the chords with lyrics and Iâm left wondering when exactly do the chords change.
Also, the songbook doesnât indicate how many bars of each chord.
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Michael, I have exactly the same problem. I am getting better at changing chords at the right time by using the lyrics and changing at a particular word. I have to keep the strumming simple else it all goes wrong. I go to a jam session at a community center and there can be 4 of us. I managed to get a white board with the intention of writing out the chord sequence for each bar, which would help me plus everyone can easily see it. Not had a session with this yet but it may help⌠hopefully.
Things go much better when I lead a song as I know it so changes happen at the right time and I can play a more complicated strumming pattern. Offer to lead a song you know and see what happens.
Be interested to see what more experienced players say.
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Hi Michael, my humble opinionâŚfor what itâs worthâŚthe only way to do that is to train your self to tap your foot when practicing your strumming, and tap your foot on the beat while jammingâŚin this way if your hand is consistent, the fretting hand will followâŚIâve been guilty to make the strumming hand follow the fretting hand, but it seems to me exactly the other way round. No matter if you miss a chord, just stay in the groove while strummingâŚif you could have the chance to prepare in advance you could work that out with a metronome until you get used to it. One thing that worked for me when I encountered this same problem has been to add strums if the pattern was synchopated like Old FaithfulâŚadding beat 3 (usually when the chord changes unespectedely) helps me to keep timing.
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Hi Michael,
When that happens, the rhythm is always the most important ⌠but sometimes you just have to change very quickly, like with Faith by George You 
It is the best way, but not the only one 
âŚI have only recently been able to move my foot a little and not even every dayâŚ
Greetings
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Ciao Rogier! 
Your time feeling must be at the top level (the lesson about this is in the strumming sos course) when you donât need to tap to feel the time. That actually shows in your improvising videos. Ideally we want to develop an internal time feelingâŚif I look at my favourite classical guitar players they donât move at all and can be so accurate and so very expressive at the same time. Me: I still need to tap and work everyday with my friend the metronome . But I do agree with you, itâs one way, not the only one and each one of us needs to find out his/her individual strategy.
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Buonasera ragazza 
is something that I have a lot (I need to learn to cross out words from texts like Brian does so often 
)
and for example, I have practiced myself crazy with that song and in/with my head I tap along or something like that âŚnot totally sure what I do when playing fingerstyle or else , and it also goes wrong when I play alone with other songs of course ⌠I have to work with it this way from the beginning and it is not ideal, it takes me more time. But with this handicap things often go well, and what if I am soon able to do so when my feet/ankles improve a little and I can âjustâ tap along ??? ⌠so far I have done everything without it, so if you Sometimes you will soon hear that it is going out of date, you know why that is âŚ
But there are already practice sessions where the foot can sometimes tap a bit⌠and I have also seen people without legs who play (okay, even without hands 
).
and yes a lot of that classical folk ??? mmmm⌠If you can tap tap taperdetap
I have to stop tapping⌠on the keyboard now , eyes tired, head full and tummy is hungry
Greetings
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@MAT1953 Michael, I am not sure what level you have progressed in the course, but Justin provides a lot of strumming advice in the grade 1 lessons. As others have said, the important thing is to maintain the steady rhythm but continuing to move your hand up and down for the strum. In module 6, Justin says: â1. Keep your hands moving. Even if you miss a chord, just keep going with the rhythm. Skip a chord if you need to, but donât stop the strumming hand from moving. I promise - the majority of people wonât notice if you miss a chord!â
When you have learned to add âup strumsâ you have more options for playing a chord, since you can start playing the chord on the up strum at any point in the measure to match the lyrics. If you are playing with a group, it helps to play the song a few times by yourself ahead of tune and see where the chord changes and strum patterns sound most natural. I tend to overuse THE strumming pattern from module 4, since if I am not thinking, that is the strum that I use automatically, but I will add extra up strums sometimes to make the rhythm match the lyrics. With practice, this will happen automatically for you.
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Strumming patterns are over rated. When playing with others you need to fit in with what they are playing and most songs donât adhere to strict patterns. This is the down side to learning from the internet, people have forgotten to listen to music and watch it instead.
It is good to learn strumming pattern but like scales they are only suggestion not the rule. Listen to the original songs you want to learn(live performance videos are the best) and learn to feel whatâs going on. Try and strum along with the original while muting the string with your fretting hand. It will be hard at first but will become more natural the more you do it.
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When you donât know haw many bars of a chord there are, youâll have to listen to the melody. When more experienced youâll hear the chord change coming. But usually you should know the chord youâre playing, people you play with should tell youâŚ
And if you donât really know the chord, just mute the strings and youâll have a percussive sound
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What @stitch said.
Also, to answer the question. Yes, you should be able to change chords whenever throughout a bar. Itâs not a random point though, it will be on a beat (or eighth, or maybe 16th) of a bar.
Iâve noticed some statements in this thread that make me think a couple of you might be thinking about music & strumming backwards. Chords donât change at a certain point in the lyrics. The lyrics are sang over the rhythm and chords laid down by the band (or just the guitar).
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Yeah its not at random but it helps being able to change chords quickly.
When you start its usually a chord every bar or two, but not all songs go that way.
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Iâm going to steal this from you JK. This is a very good point that most donât think of.
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Steal away, everything I know Iâve stolen/learnt from someone elseâŚ
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Theres some caveman who started all this a bit angry at everyone stealing their stuff
The caveman:
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This is a really good point @MAT1953. I seem to done a 360 on my strumming recently. Originally I used to strum whatever pattern or mix of patterns that I thought felt and sounded like they fitted the song.
Then I became all focussed on using a set strumming pattern, and that has been really good for my progress, but when Iâm actually playing a song most of the time I have come back to strumming and changing chords in keeping with what feels good and sounds good.
I only work from lyric sheets with chords over the lyrics, and Iâll usually play through and alter this slightly with what feels better.
Iâm liking what @stitch says, the only place this may fall over is if I were playing with someone else, as I would then need to follow a set pattern really to fit in but weâll see how that goes when the time comes.
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For a lot of songs the chord changes are going to happen at the end of the bar, or half way through. Use that as a starting point.
You can try looking at proper sheet music as that will clearly show the bars and where the chord changes happen. Even if you canât read sheet music, youâll be able to see where the chord change happens.
Keeping the rhythm is most important. Open strings may or may not work, depending on the song. You can always skip a strum in order to make the chord change in time. For example, if the strumming pattern is 1, 2, 3 & 4 & then you could skip the & after 4 to give yourself more time.
You can also use different fingering for the chords in order to make the chord changes easier. Just google the chord and youâll see the different options.
Your chord changes will eventually get very fast.
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This is a solid point.
We notice hiccups in rhythm far far more than the wrong chord.
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Itâs all about the timing.
If the song is in 4/4 time then everything - the tempo, the chords, the rhythm, the melody, the lyrics - should all fit this simple structureâŚâŚ
One two three four
One is king.
Align everything with one and you wonât go far wrong.
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If youâre using chord sheets, Iâd simply ask before starting:
How many bars for each chord? and make a note of it.
As @jkahn said upstairs, itâs the singers job to work out the phrasing of the lyrics.
(and an off-topic lesson for @roger_holland:
- You get the strikethrough effect by typing two âsquiggly linesâ ~~ (tilde symbols) before and after the relevant section.
- Notice the way I used the work âtypingâ when referring to a keyboard, instead or the word âtappingâ which I do with my foot when playing music
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