Hi
One month in. Enjoying the journey. Module 1 working on A and D chord. Still trying to avoid muting notes
I have a question about the angle of the fingers. Do they come in at an angle on the freeboard or head on??
Thanks
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When Justin went through it they were at an angle, and he said don’t come onto the fretboard straight on.
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Thanks. I’ve been trying to bring them up vertically on the fret board and it’s been a challenge. I’ll keep practicing
Hi @Conor78 ,
I will offer a different viewpoint than @jezz. Let me preface this by saying I have not followed Justin’s beginning lessons on open chords, this is just my own experience.
I think as a general rule, when playing open chords, you want to curl up your fingers as much as possible. This is another way of saying that your fingertip, where it touches the fretboard, should be close to vertical. How important this is will depend on the chord and the finger. For example, for the open D chord, it’s pretty important that your 3rd finger is pretty much vertical on the fretboard. Otherwise, it will lean over and mute the high E string. On the contrary, for the index finger (fret 2, G string), it doesn’t matter, because the B string is fretted at fret 3 and touching it at fret 2 has no effect.
Another example is the index finger on the open C chord. If not close to vertical, it will tend to mute the high E string.
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Hi @Conor78, before you get all flustered by these different answers: both @jezz and @jjw have a point, it just depends on which plane you are talking about. I will try to explain (with emphasis on ‘try’). Let’s take the D chord as an example.
Your fingers can come in on an angle, in the sense that they can point upwards and forwards towards the body of your guitar. If you try to avoid this angle, you will probably not be able to get your 3rd finger close to the fret. That’s wat @jezz is referring at.
But you want the tip of your fingers (i.e. the 1st phalanx) to come to the fretboard as perpendicular as possible. If you don’t do that, you will be muting the high E-string. That’s what @jjw is referring at.
Pretty much everyone has problems with muting strings on the D chord at the beginning. To solve this, it is important to analyse the source of the muting (or buzz) by playing each string separately. When you locate the muted/buzzing string, try to find out why it’s muted/buzzing. Is your finger not close enough to the fret? Is your finger on the string above touching the muted/buzzing string? Does your palm touch the high E?
Once you have located the problem, try to find out how to solve it. For a lot of people, the answer is ‘getting to the fretboard in a more perpendicular way’. In order to solve this, you hav to get enough of a curl in your fingers. The (a) way to solve this and which is often overlooked, is to slide your palm further forwards under the neck of your guitar. That way, you create more room for your fingers, allowing you to curl them and to get that angle you need.
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Hi Conor,
Questions about fingering and related difficulties come up from time to time. You might want to check these threads about the first few open chords as well, there are several pieces of valuable advice to be found in them.
@Richard_close2u Since this is not an app-related question, it might be worth moving it to a different category.
Hi Conor @Conor78, I’m what we call an “advancing beginner” around here, and I still sometimes struggle with finger placement/angles on many chords - including open C and D. Els @LadyOfTheCastle provided a good analysis of the two main concerns. When I’m feeling stuck, I review Justin’s lessons, focusing on how he forms the chords. Of course those are very conscious demonstrations so after that I often go look at a demo that Justin does at the beginning of song lessons (a beginner lesson!), and watch how he forms the chords in that situation. It really helps me to see how these practices are applied in a “real world” situation while keeping in mind the specifics discussed in the technique lesson.
I like @LadyOfTheCastle explanation. Here is a picture of my D chord. This is a classical guitar so I have more room.
The fingers slant a bit (knuckles behind the tips) and the fingers curl to keep the tips on the strings the need to be in and off the others. As mentioned the index finger can touch the B string since it won’t mute it there behind the middle finger.
My index finger is probably not quite right and I get away with it because of the wide string spacing. On an electric with a 42mm neck, I bet this picture would be muting the high e, but I have 50mm to play with! Yay!
I remember a lot of trouble and a long time getting here, though. At first the fingers slant more and don’t curl. The separation between the 3rd (ring) finger and the others was hard won and takes time.
Spend some time just placing (not transition from another chord) your fingers in as close to a perfect position as you can and explore how it feels and slight variations. I do this for all chords so I know where the eventual goals may be.
I also found I have a strong tendency to want to lead into a chord with a specific finger and then lay my fingers down in a certain order. This slows the change way down and creates inefficiencies depending on where each finger is coming from. If that makes sense.
I helped me a ton to practice slow, careful chord changes leading with different fingers and also trying not to lead with any finger (landing all at roughly the same time. This pulls everything closer together. It also helps because, at least so far, I can really land all fingers at once fast enough, so I can lead with whichever finger frets the note that will be played first. Especially in finger style.
For example, my natural tendency in a Bm barre chord (looks Ike e shape barre starting on the 5 th string) is to set the 3rd and 4th fingers first and the barre with 1st finger last, but the first note is often the B on the 5th string. So I have to get that 1st finger down first. But in another song, the second sting is played first so I need to get my 2nd (middle) finger down quickly. So it helps to be able to get them all down immediately, but since that is really hard, getting the one you want down in time is important.
I have strayed from the topic, so one last rant. In guitar we call the index finger 1st, little finger 4th, so there is no “middle” finger. The middle finger exist in anatomy, because outside of guitar, the thumb is the 1st finger. If there was no middle finger, how would we drive our cars?
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Hi Conor
I have a confession, I miss read your question and thought you were talking about string bending and not chords. I am sorry about that, because I was practicing my own bends at the time. This proves that I still struggle to do two things at once.
Jezz
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Actually having most trouble with index finger on A chord.
I’m finding it hard to press it without triggering a buzz. Trying to keep my wobble close to my body to prevent it coming in an angle…
Bloody frustrating… but onwards
Hi Conor
Is that the A chord with all three fingers in the third fret.
Jezz
I always found that it worked better for me using the third finger as a bar across the S234 and as you go up the neck with a whole bar chord first finger across S12345 and the third finger on S234.
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Another good use for the driving finger!
Hi @Conor78, looking at the picture you posted, I’m pretty sure you get buzzing because your finger sits too far from the fret. 2 things:
- Make sure your middle finger is right up against the fret. This will allow your index finger to get closer to the fret.
- Try slightly changing your hand position to create just that bit more room for your index finger. Sliding the palm of your hand a bit more forward under the neck might help.
Above, Jezz has given you a different fingering for the A chord. Justine will teach you that variation further on in your journey. For now, I would advise you to stick to the fingering Justine teaches you. There’s a reason why he starts with this. For one, it allows you to use your index finger as an anchor to change between A, D and E, making those changes way easier.
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Thanks folks grest advice. I ve been finding the A chord tricky
Which string is buzzing?
Your 3rd finger is spilling across the fret wire slightly.
It is impossible to have your 1st finger anywhere but behind the other two fingers but it should still be able to make a clean note on that string.
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For an open position A chord there are a dozen reasons not to play the barre with 2nd or 3rd or 4th finger.
A 1st finger barre on strings 4, 3 & 2 is fine and is the better choice in some circumstances. But in those circumstances you may also want fingers 2 or 3 or 4 available so making the barre with any of them is bad form.
Yes, for A-shape barre chords, your 3rd or 4th finger needs to be barred across three strings. But avoid doing it for the A chord.
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Note that this can also be a guitar setup problem, not a technique problem. I’ve seen this in person at least twice (my girlfriend and I both had it), and suspect some other Community members have as well.
If you put a capo on the first fret, and the buzzing goes away, that would indicate you need to check the setup.
For me, the cure was a free setup from the store where I bought the guitar. For my GF, installing a set of Silk and Steel strings solved it.
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