Yeah, that’s what I was doing after Notter’s reply. I keep my guitar by my desk and when I’m fidgety or watching a youtube video, I’ll play around on the guitar. I wasn’t practicing so much as I was just playing around so I wasn’t timing myself. I was just trying to switch between chords as cleanly but as quickly as I could while also keeping it as fluent as I could. If i had to estimate it was around 40 per minute.
As far as songs, I can usually get through most, on level, songs on his app. The strumming is what is throwing me off right now. The songs I know on that app dont strum the way the way the app has it and it throws me off. I understand why it is that way but it confuses me terribly lol. Im also not skilled enough with strumming to do the songs as I know them anyways. Im at a part in the course now where I think that’s about to change :).
Sounds good. With around 40 changes per minute you can start playing rhythm; that’s what I did at least. Can’t really say anything on the app, cause I never used it. At first I just looked up song tutorials on youtube or other sites and tried as best as I could to sound just like the person doing them; now, I’m just trying out different strumming patterns for songs without looking-up how one plays them to see what sticks.
Justin also says you don’t count the bad chords so if only 25% of your changes are clean then your count is 15. So slow down to where 90% of your changes are clean.
If you are practicing mistakes you are learning mistakes. Best to fix the problen now before it becomes ingrained into your playing.
It’s my first week of practicing, and I’ve been doing the chord change exercise for 4 days, my current chord changes per minute are 47, but there’s this problem that sometimes the notes don’t sound correctly as I can’t press much harder, what should I do?
Here’s a simple PDF file that will allow you to keep track of your “One Minute Chord Changes” progress. You may have to login to the forum to download the file. You can download it at PDF - One Minute Chord Changes (PDF File) | The Guitar Forum
You need to go back to earlier lessons. Are you making sure to read all of the Learn More information that supplement the video content. Go here: How To Play The D Chord | JustinGuitar.com
under the video is essential information on Chord Perfect Practice. It applies to all new chords also.
Hi. Is the metric # of changes (A to D would be 1) or number of chords (A to D would be 2). Justin says the 1st in the video and text following, but then counts the chords he plays.
@Richard_close2u My max so far is 43. I’m able to switch chords fast with my left hand but between the switch lot of time is wasted staring at my strumming hand to make sure I’m hitting the correct strings. I’m essentially looking left and right and I believe this is where the time loss occurs. How can I fix this?? Should I practice not looking at my strumming hand?
@Richard_close2u Update: I practiced not looking at my strumming hand. I’m able to hit the correct strings 80% of the time. It was a bit sloppy but I was able to hit 61. Justin doesn’t mention anything about getting used to not looking at the strumming hand but in my opinion this is the only way to chord change over 60 times in a minute. I’m curious how else does everyone else achieve this?
That sounds like a good move and progress has come.
Ideally, you want good muscle memory and not to have to always be looking at your hands. It is a long term aim of course - making chord changes by feel and without a reliance on your eyes, strumming by feel without a reliance on your eyes are both playing without relying on your eyes. What can help your strumming be more accurate (in terms of number of strings hit) is shallower arcs as you swing your forearm, wrist, hand.
I’ve been doing the chord changes non stop and I finally hit 70 chord changes in a minute, although it is a bit sloppy. Not looking at the strumming hand helps big time. I’ll definitely incorporate shallower arcs, this needs more practicing. Thanks for the tip!
I’m switching back and forth between a classical guitar and an electric to keep my brain on its toes, and i guess it was nice while it lasted to be able to have put the classic log in a to d and the electric log in d to a.
I have a question - in the practice routine for changes from A to D, do I count A to D and then back to A as 1 change or as 2 changes? Justin counts them as 2 IIRC in the video but if that’s the case then I guess there’s no need to split it into two items - A to D and D to A. Really confused about this…
Welcome to the Forum Saket
Every time you move from one chord to another is a change so A to D to A is two. No need to play the chords twice just A-D-A-D-A-D-A-D. The easiest way is to fret the A chord have your timer close by and them start the timer then start you changes. This way you’re not fumbling to fing the first chord after you start the timer. Your finger are already in place.
The amount of times I’ve got nearly to the end and then “um, how many was that” and started again I’ve lost count, exude the pun. But if you think about it it’s all good practise so if you lose count start from scratch.
