Learning to play bar chords on guitar is not an easy task. Your fingers are forced to contort into positions that they would never normally be in. You need to hold them in that position for the duration of the chord. And it takes a lot of hand strength to do it.

Here’s a video I made that will hopefully help you play bar chords a little more cleanly.

Brian

This video demonstrates how to do right-hand (left-hand for lefties) percussive muting while playing rhythm guitar. This is a great technique to help drive the rhythm and add interest to your playing.

The video is a supplement to the Beginning Guitar Podcast

This is a song I wrote for my first son when he was just a few days old. It was the first song on guitar he ever heard.

Copyright 2003

I came across some free software that some of you might find useful. It’s called Fretboard Warrior.

It’s a simple little game that shows you a note on the fretboard and then you need to identify it. When you are done, it gives you a score so you can see how well you did and so you can track your progress over time. It has a nice-looking user interface too.

I think this could be pretty helpful as you are trying to learn all of the note names on the guitar. Plus you can’t beat the price!

You can download it here.

How to play pentatonic scale pattern 5. The last of the five pentatonic scales.