There are no anchor fingers for the changes:
Am → Em
Em → D
You need to practice correct formation of the chords using chord perfect practice and you need to do one minute changes and you need to try air changes.
Finding difficulty forming and changing between certain chords is a very common issue. It can be different chords for different people. Why not try a different approach too?
To improve the formation of a chosen chord (let’s use E minor here):
Hold your fingers near to but not touching the strings.
Touch the fingers where the chord is but do not press.
Once you have all three touching at the correct place then press them down.
Do not strum - this is a fretting hand exercise only.
Release the pressure after a few seconds but keep touching the strings.
Then move your hand away from the strings by a small amount. All fingers away.
Repeat the process.
Then, to improve changes to and from the chosen chord and other commonly grouped chords, repeat the above process with one alteration. After the final step of lifting all fingers away, the next cycle would be to move fingers over the chord that you are changing to. Once that chord has been done and fingers are lifted away, go back to the first chord of the pair.
Wash, rinse, repeat. Make this exercise last about five minutes.
Example - E minor chord plus some associated chords
1 minute - Em alone
1 minute - Em & Am
1 minute - Em and D
1 minute - Em alone
Practice daily and within a week you will be smashing it.
Hope that helps.
Cheers
| Richard_close2u | Community Moderator, Official Guide, JustinGuitar Approved Teacher
Trying to change between chords without an anchor finger is highlighting how the guitar isn’t as stable in my hold as I thought it was. It’s quite frustrating. It seems that every time I sit down with it I need to find a new position to hold it in to get it stable. I’ve had a few sessions where it didn’t move, but trying to recreate it doesn’t work… I am losing weight currently so I know my anatomy while sitting will change but I’m not shedding the kilos day by day… and it doesn’t seem to be affected by my pants moving around since I’ve had good and bad days in the same ones… aside from glueing the damn thing to myself I’m not sure what else I can do to get it stable. It can’t be too big for me because I’m 6ft and long-limbed. I dunno. The non-slip material I use has made a huge difference, but I’m wondering if it’ll get better as I get more toned, since muscle holds firm where fat jiggles.
Also, upper-body strength, or at least, the strength of your shoulder and upper arms, really affects proprioception. As does being a little hyper-flexible. Which knocks on to muscle-memory for chord shapes. While I’m focussing on getting the chord I forget to think about holding up my arm, the elbow drops down and in and I put tension on my wrist. I fix that back up and then I find the guitar has moved a little or I have to change my finger angle. And on it goes. I wonder if guitars could do with a stand or something so that it stays put while I learn!
Hello Constance, have you already checked the angle of your hip as well as your knees? I’ve noticed, that I need a 90°angle to keep my guitar in position. Maybe that’s also a factor in your case.
I like this advice. I’m in module 4 (grade 1 level 1) and have found I can play strumming patterns while practicing chord changes but I’m not yet able to use the strum patterns while playing a song on the guitareo app. Glad to know that’s ok for now.
Hey! I started learning guitar from scratch 4 days ago since I had a classical guitar collecting dust in my room. I really appreciate this course, I like metal and want to play that in the future, but I figured that I need to learn the basics first. I also feel like Im going a bit too fast this is my 4th day and I think I’ll go to module 4 in a day or two since I fulfill the recommended requirements.
Rommel, whether you should do that or not mainly depends on the questions how much your fingers are hurting and how much time you can invest in practicing
If your fingers are fine and you have the time and motivation, then yes, of course why not?
If your fingers are hurting and you don’t have time for some additional minutes of practice time, then it’s surely a good idea to concentrate on the new chords.
Should I be able to play the songs with continuous strumming and tapping my foot now? as I still can’t with module 2’s song ‘for what it’s worth’. Is it better to wait and fix that before moving on to module 4?
Hi Clementine, there will be time to fix problems with strumming at the end of grade 1 when you are suggested to spend several months just working on strumming, chords and playing songs. As long as you can pass the requirements in the “ YOU’LL BE READY TO MOVE ON WHEN…” list then you can move on to Module 4. You will work more on strumming in Module 4 and in later modules.
