{"id":154,"date":"2019-04-10T20:25:46","date_gmt":"2019-04-10T20:25:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/?p=154"},"modified":"2019-04-10T20:29:15","modified_gmt":"2019-04-10T20:29:15","slug":"getting-out-of-a-strum-rut-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/2019\/04\/10\/getting-out-of-a-strum-rut-part-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Getting Out Of A Strum Rut Part 2"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In <a href=\"https:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/2019\/04\/03\/getting-out-of-a-strum-rut-part-1\/\">Part 1<\/a> of this article, we discussed how keeping your hand in motion is key to strumming, and learned how to play along with a couple of basic strums. &nbsp;The standard strum that I used as an example, can be played more than one way, however! &nbsp;So let\u2019s review what the first way sounded like:<\/p>\n\n\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/4uLqhtBKBsc\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This time, we\u2019re going to put the emphasis on the DOWN stroke and have a shorter up stroke, and that changes the feel of the strum entirely. &nbsp;Take a listen and play along if you like:<\/p>\n\n\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Q37LwayCdzo\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This gives the same strum a swing or \u201ccountry\u201d feel. Notice that I\u2019ve drawn the up strokes shorter to help you remember to play them more quickly. Play along with it for awhile if you need to, in order to get the feel right. Then go back and play the first one so you can duplicate the difference yourself and get a sense of how to achieve it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">When you\u2019re listening to a song that has an acoustic guitar strum in it, you\u2019ll often notice that the strum doesn\u2019t necessarily stay consistent throughout the song. Sometimes that\u2019s because once a strum pattern has been established, sometimes the guitar player will change it just slightly here and there. That\u2019s a natural way of playing. But often a strum pattern will actually be longer than one measure. &nbsp;Here\u2019s an example from a 70\u2032s song by the band America called \u201cHorse With No Name\u201c. First I\u2019ll just show you the whole strum:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"500\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/Horse-Strum.gif?resize=500%2C150&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-162\"\/><figcaption>Horse With No Name Strum<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Notice now the first measure or bar has our regular pattern with a swing feel, so the up strokes are shorter. &nbsp;The second measure, however, has more up strokes than down strokes\u2026we actually skip two down strokes to complete the pattern. &nbsp;Confused yet? &nbsp;\ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Even if you can\u2019t quite play it yet, have a listen to the strum below:<\/p>\n\n\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/M4A03tn1St4\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">You will probably recognize the<strong>&nbsp;Em<\/strong>&nbsp;chord, but may not know&nbsp;<strong>D 6\/9<\/strong>, so I\u2019m going to diagram it here:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"225\" height=\"303\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/D-69-Chord.gif?resize=225%2C303&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-161\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This chord is easy to achieve from an<strong>\u00a0Em<\/strong> if you use your first and second finger; \u00a0all you have to do is move the first finger up to the 2nd fret of the 6th string and the 2nd finger down to the 2nd fret of  the 3rd string. \u00a0If you\u2019re just trying the strum out on your own, however, I\u2019d suggest you try it with ONLY the <strong>Em<\/strong>\u00a0chord until you are proficient at it. \u00a0Then introduce the <strong>D 6\/9<\/strong> at the second measure. \u00a0You\u2019ll be amazed how many people know what this song is by only hearing that strum! You can find out more about that strum and playing along to it in my video blog <a href=\"https:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/videos\/\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">And there are many other songs out there with distinctive strums\u2026with some songs you can probably tell what the song is by hearing only the first few seconds of it! &nbsp;For instance, the Oasis&nbsp;song \u201c<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/bx1Bh8ZvH84\">Wonderwall<\/a><\/strong>\u201d has a two-measure long strum that also makes it quite recognizable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The strum is most noticeable in the first part of the video. &nbsp;The strum is very quick, employing 1\/16th beats, so you might even think that it\u2019s 4 measures long, but it is actually only two. &nbsp;Listen to it a few times and see if you can figure out what the strum is! &nbsp;I dare you \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">There are a lot of guitar players out there who don\u2019t pay as much attention to strumming as they do the chords or notes and scales. &nbsp;But the fact is that strumming is a crucial part of learning guitar, and learning it well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I hope you\u2019ve learned something out of this article. &nbsp;If you have, please let me know by leaving a note below!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\n<em>IJ<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In Part 1 of this article, we discussed how keeping your hand in motion is key to strumming, and learned how to play along with a couple of basic strums. &nbsp;The standard strum that I used as an example, can be played more than one way, however! &nbsp;So let\u2019s review what the first way sounded [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[7],"class_list":["post-154","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-horse-with-no-name"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=154"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":167,"href":"https:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154\/revisions\/167"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=154"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=154"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irenejackson.com\/guitar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=154"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}