I struggled with this a lot at first…search for “pinky lock” in this thread for details.
It took a while, but now I use it all the time…especially when changing to/from C. It’s much more efficient.
I probably still lead a bit with either finger, so it’s not a pure air change, but it works fine for me.
That said, if it’s not holding you back for the songs you want to play now, I wouldn’t worry about it. If you find that limiting in the future, you can revisit, and it will probably be easier because of your increased skills.
I did something similar by holding a C chord, then fretting with my pinky on e, B, G, and D strings…up and down at the 3rd fret. IIRC, I included this in one of my videos upthread.
Really seemed to help, and taught myself some C chord embellishments as well!
It finally clicked for me. After struggling for 2 weeks - finding it considerably harder than the big F - what changed the game for me was focusing more on making the movement as minimal as possible instead of focusing on a big air change like I was trying before.
Tnx for this one. And voor the perfect timing of adding Sweet Sixteen to the app. Love the song and a really nice way to practice transition to F and G and C.
For me this weak G is easy, the C is more difficult. And the F, off course.
Hi Fyona @Sofie75, welcome to the community! If you have a minute, visit over here and tell us a bit about your guitar journey.
It’s always interesting to see what different people find easy and difficult. The stretch on the weak finger G is difficult for me, even after over 6 months of practicing it! But I agree, it’s much easier to transition to C. Like you, F (in all its forms) is still a challenge for me, but I persist!
I have been practicing Casey’s Last Ride - Kris Kristofferson for this G practice. It has all the changes Justin suggests using this G for plus being a beautiful song.
I’m sure this question has been asked somewhere, likely more than once, but I can’t find it so I will re-ask it.
I could play what I think of as the “regular G chord” (320003) before I discovered Justin’s courses and I can switch to it pretty fast - ie I haven’t encountered a song in which getting to G would be an issue while there are several other chord changes that are ore limiting for me. Which makes me wonder, should I still be working on the weak finger G since the course says so, or better to work on the chords that are limiting my song playing (Em to Dm, Em to B7, Am to F)?
(I know B7 and fast changes to a full F chord are not something that was assigned so far, but I am kinda working on them regardless because of the songs I want to play…)
That would be up to you. If you have limited time to practice then I’d suggest skipping the Weak Finger G for now. But and it’s a big But. It’s called the Weak Finger G for a reason. Justin teaches it mainly to help strengthen your pinky and work on it’s independence. The pinky doesn’t get much of a workout in the beginning then all of a sudden there are 7th chords, Barre chords, etc that use the pinky then people have trouble with them.
Hi Maciej, welcome to the community forum. The lesson is very similar with the same chord shape for the G. The “G chord hacked” lesson introduced the 2 3 finger version of the G chord, leaving out the index finger on the 5th string and muting instead. This lesson, uses the 3 4 fingers for the chord. Some people have trouble using the pinky or 4 finger, so this version was introduced later.
Something I’m wondering about, when using my pinky (but it can also happen with other fingers), my finger tends to ‘overstretch’. A picture is more clear, so here you see the pinky in the nice curve at the thinner E-string:
Intuitively I would say that the first one is better, especially when wanting to (later on) play with the chord and put the pinky somewhere else. Overstretching makes it go ‘out of control’ a bit.
Is this indeed a bad habit and should I focus on not letting the finger ‘overstretch’, or is it not a big problem (the chord sounds out alright) and shouldn’t worry about it?
Hi Jonathan,
This is indeed a bad habit.
keep an eye on it and it will go away 'on its own ', it’s what happend me and many people in the beginning,often due to unnecessary force in the beginning, if the G and other chords are changed without thinking, the problem never seen again
Greetings
