GUITARINTERMEDIATENOTES

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CONTENTS
Lesson 1 Introduction To The Intermediate Guitar Course Technique: Muting Strumming: 16 Beat Lesson 2 Short Worship Session Family chords Transposing Lesson 3 Worship Session How To Worship? Lesson 4 Short Worship Session Technique: Anticipation Technique: Half-time and Full-time Lesson 5 Dynamics I Strumming: Swing & shuffle Lesson 6 Dynamics II Strumming: 3/4 Beat Lesson 7 Worship Session How To Flow With The Holy Spirit Preparation For Test Any Other Questions Lesson 8 TEST

All lessons will include previous lesson review, new songs, and practice exercises.

LESSON 1
I. Introduction To The Intermediate Guitar Course:

Welcome back! I hope youve enjoyed the Guitar Beginner Course. In this course, we will learn many deeper aspects of guitar playing, new strumming methods and techniques, and of course, new songs and chords. You will notice as we go along that well focus more on the spiritual aspect of guitar playing, thus there will be more practical worship sessions in our lessons. This is to equip you for your role as a guitarist in the cellgroup. You cant learn how to swim on dry land, right? But, theres nothing to get worried or pressured about. Just make sure you practice and enjoy yourself!

II.

Technique: Muting

Muting is a technique used to enhance the feel of the song by stopping the sound (remember the mute function on your TV remote? Its the same principle). Basically, there are two kinds of muting: left-hand muting (also called vamping) and right-hand muting (sometimes called chopping). Lets see how theyre done.

Left-Hand Muting (Vamping)

Left-hand muting, as you may have guessed, is done with the left hand. The way to do it is to release your grip on the strings just slightly, so that your fingers are still touching the strings, but not pressed down. This will produce a clunking sound when you strum. Note: make sure no notes can be heard when you strum. You may have to touch the open strings with your fingers to mute them.

Right-Hand Muting (Chopping)

Right-hand muting is done with the right hand, of course. To mute, use the lower part of the palm (as shown below) to touch the strings as you are strumming. This produces a chopping sound, which explains why sometimes this is called chopping.

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When To Mute?
Okay, heres the question most people ask about muting: Now that I know how to mute, when do I mute? Well, theres no easy answer to this question. Its all a matter of what kind of feel you want to create. But for starters, mostly we mute at the 3rd beat for normal praise songs. Heres an example: X X 3

beat:

1
2

Note: X denotes the place where you mute.

III. New Strumming: 16-beat

16-beat (Worship)
Now were going to start learning a new strumming. This is called the 16-beat strumming. This strumming is very important, as this will be the strumming that is most commonly used in the songs youre going to sing in cellgroup. Heres how to do it:

Note: Just remember that 16 = 6 + 6 + 4. So, play the strumming in 3 segments (6 beats, 6 beats, then 4 beats)

16-beat (Praise)
So how do you play 16-beat praise strumming? Simple. Just play the 16-beat worship strumming (much) faster. Now youre playing praise!

Too difficult?
16-beat strumming is not as hard as it seems to be. The trick is to take your focus off the up and down strokes and focus on the general feel and beat of the strumming. For example, instead of counting all 6 + 6 + 4 beats in the strumming, focus on the 3 emphatic down strokes (shown in the figure as the arrows in bold) in the strumming, and let the rest of the strokes follow naturally. The key is: be natural. Dont worry if you cant catch up. Well continue practicing the 16-beat strummings throughout the next few lessons.

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IV. New Songs

Today were going to learn one new 16-beat praise song and one new 16-beat worship song. (Refer to Appendix II.1)

V.

Practice

Once again, I want to remind you that to achieve best results, it is important to practice everyday instead of just practicing many hours once a week. Since this is an intermediate course, we will extend the practice time by 5 minutes. Your assignment at home is to practice everyday for at least 20 minutes or more.

This Weeks Practice Exercises:

Remember: practice at least 20 minutes everyday. 10 min strumming with 16-beat praise song 10 min strumming with 16-beat worship song Try using left-hand muting and/or right-hand muting. Take a longer time to practice the 16-beat strummings if you can.

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LESSON 2
I. Worship Session

Today before we start the lesson proper, we are going to have a short time of worship. Please feel free to kneel or adopt a proper position for worship. You should feel free to minister in the gifts by giving a word of wisdom or singing a new song to the Lord if the Lord leads you to do so. As we have mentioned in the first lesson, we will be having more of these worship sessions in this course. The goal is to let you experience the presence of God in a practical setting so that you can reproduce it in your cellgroup. Remember that you can never bring others to a place youve never been before.

II.

Transposing

Introduction: The Musical Notes

We learnt briefly in the beginner course about the open notes on the guitar. Lets take this one step forward and take a simplified theory lesson about the notes themselves. There are basically seven (7) notes in the universe. These are:

A B C D E F G
However, in between these notes sometimes there are half-notes, as shown below:

A# Bb

B C

C# Db

D# Eb

E F

F# Gb

G# Ab

Note: The # denotes a sharp note and a b denotes a flat note. Note: There are no half-notes between B and C, and between E and F. Each jump (e.g. A to A#, or B to C) along this line is called a half-step. Two half-steps make a full-step. Therefore, the distance from A to B is one full-step and the distance from E to F is one half-step. Note: one half-step is equivalent to 1 fret on the guitar and one full-step is equivalent to two frets on the guitar.

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Diatonic Chords
What are diatonic chords? Well, in simple terms, the diatonic chords of a key are chords that are usually played within that key. For example, lets look at the chords that belong to the family of C. The whole family notes of C doesnt have any sharp or flat notes, which makes it slightly easier to understand. Lets adjust the diagram we had before, putting C in front and numbering the notes using roman numerals.

II
C# Db

III IV
D# Eb

V
F# Gb

VI
G# Ab

VII VIII
A# Bb

E F

B C

Note: The distance between III & IV, and VII & VIII is one half-step(1 fret apart), while the distance for the rest is one full-step(2 fret apart). This rules apply for all different keys. Note: There isnt really such a thing as an eighth (VIII) note. Its just the first (I) note repeated in the next higher octave. So given that the chords of the family are determined like so:

ii7

iii

IV V7

vi

vii

Note: Capital letter denotes a major (normal) chord, small letters denotes a minor chord, and small letters followed by a denotes a diminished chord. Note: This is a very important principle/rule, and it applies for all major keys. Therefore, putting the pieces of the puzzle together, the chords in the C family should look like this:

Dm7

Em

G7

Am

Now for another example on D major key. Instead of starting with C as I, we start with D as I. For the simple reason, we want to find the family chords of D major. Remember the distance between III & IV, 7 & 8 is one half-step. The rest are full steps.

II
D# Eb

III IV
F# Gb

V
G# Ab

VI
A# Bb

VII VIII
C# Db

E F

B C

Note: The positions of the numbers didnt change. Only the positions of the notes.

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Applying the same principle, we get the D diatonic chords:

Em7

F#m

A7

Bm

C#

This may seem rather complicated, but once you understand the principle, you should have no problem working out the diatonic chords for all the different keys. Here we have an exercise for you. Complete the table below.

I C D E F G A

ii7 Dm7 Em7

iii Em F#m

IV F G

V7 G7 A7

vi Am Bm

vii B C#

VIII C D

After learning the theory behind all this, it would seem appropriate to memorize this like you would memorize the fingering for a chord. It is important to memorize this as there will be times when you need to do fast transposition for any given song, especially when the song leader wants to sing a key or a few keys higher. We will have an exercise to practice transposing with a simple song in the next lesson to revise what weve learnt.

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III. New Songs

Today were going to learn one new 16-beat praise song and one 16-beat worship song. (Refer to Appendix II.2)

IV. Practice
This Weeks Practice Exercises:
Remember: practice at least 20 minutes everyday. 10 min strumming with 16-beat praise song 10 min strumming with 16-beat worship song Try using left-hand muting and/or right-hand muting.

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LESSON 3
I. Worship Session

Today for the lesson, we are going to have a short time of praise and worship instead of the usual practices. Be excited during the praise clap your hands and sing loud. Prepare your hearts to praise and worship the Lord. Be free to minister in the gifts if the Lord leads you to do so.

II.

How To Worship

Preparing For Praise And Worship

A. Pray Worship is an attitude of the heart rather than a set of skills or techniques. Therefore, it is of utmost importance that we prepare our hearts before praise and worship starts by praying. Ask God to cleanse you from all your sins, give you clean hands and a pure heart, and to anoint your hands and your voice. Remember that no matter how good your skills are, if God doesnt come, the praise and worship will be a flop. B. Memorize Your Chords Even if God comes, if you have not prepared yourself enough, then the Holy Spirit may be quenched simply because you failed to do your part. God does His part, we do ours. Thats the way we were supposed to work. Its a partnership. If you fail to prepare, then prepare to fail. Memorizing your chords helps you take your mind off the playing so that you can focus on the more important thing worshipping. C. Practice Of course, who could forget our golden rule practice, practice, practice. The degree you practice in private is the degree you can perform in public

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Singing
Yes, this is a guitar class, but singing is very important if you are the guitarist or the song leader. Learn to develop your voice so that you can sound clear and strong during worship. If you can sing well, you can help cue the song leader when the song starts, and also build a stronger presence.

Worshipping At Home
When you worship at home with your guitar, try switching off or dimming the lights. This forces you not to look at your hands when youre playing so that you can focus on worshipping God.

III. New Songs

Today were going to learn one new praise song. (Refer to Appendix II.3)

IV. Practice
This Weeks Practice Exercises:
Remember: practice at least 20 minutes everyday. 10 min strumming with 16-beat praise song 10 min strumming with 16-beat worship song You should be using left-hand muting and/or right-hand muting by now.

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LESSON 4
I. Worship Session

Today before we start the lesson proper, we are going to have a short time of worship. Be sensitive to the Holy Spirit and be free to minister in the gifts if the Lord leads you to do so.

II.

New Techniques

Today, we are going to learn two new techniques that are essential for you to be able to handle the songs you are going to encounter in the future. Here they are:

Anticipation
Anticipation is when you change chords one half beat before the next bar, instead of changing on the next bar itself. For example, in this normal 8-beat praise strumming, Normal (No Anticipation)

beat:

change here

Anticipation

beat:

change here on the upstroke

Note: As you can see, the strumming changes a bit when you anticipate, so as to accommodate the anticipated beat.

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Half-time and Full-time

Sometimes, in certain songs, the tempo of the song seems to suddenly drop; i.e. the song seems slower. We call that change dropping to half-time. Half-time means that the tempo of the beat dropped to half the speed. Therefore two bars in full-time is played as one bar in half-time. Confused? Heres an example of a praise strumming dropping to half-time:

beat:

3 4

1
2 3

drop to half-time Note: The strumming becomes more spaced out when you drop to half-time.

Dynamics
We briefly talked about dynamics in the beginner course because when youre starting off, more emphasis should be placed in your strokes and techniques. In this intermediate course, and especially when learning the 16-beat strumming, dynamics play a very important role. Youll notice that many times we do not play all the strokes, because if you play all the strokes, the strumming becomes monotonous, and we dont want that. Learn through observing your teacher, taking extra notice in the feel of the strumming. Remember: focus on feel and not strokes.

III. New Songs

Today were going to learn two new praise songs, one with anticipation, and one with halftime to full-time. (Refer to Appendix II.4)

IV. Practice
This Weeks Practice Exercises:
Remember: practice at least 20 minutes everyday. 10 min strumming with song with anticipation 10 min strumming with song with half-time to full-time You should be using left-hand muting and/or right-hand muting by now.

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LESSON 5
I. Worship Session

Today before we start the lesson proper, we are going to have a short time of worship. Be sensitive to the Holy Spirit and be free to minister in the gifts if the Lord leads you to do so.

II.

Dynamics

All right, weve talked about dynamics quite a bit now, but there are just too many aspects of dynamics that it cant be covered in just one lesson. Here well discuss a few more techniques for improving dynamics.

Building Up
One of the most important aspects of dynamics is learning how to build up the atmosphere. Learn to distinguish between the different moods or atmospheres that the Holy Spirit works through. Sometimes certain parts of a worship song might be more majestic, some parts might be quiet and soft, or it can be light and easy, or strong and forceful. Some might require more bass notes, some might need more treble notes. Some might require vamping (left-hand muting), others need you to chop (right-hand muting). Most parts of praise songs are happy, or they can be majestic too. Some songs have parts that are exciting, some forceful, some with a skip, etc. Most songs now are in the more complex 16-beat rhythm, but some are still in regular 8beat. There are many ways to create a stronger atmosphere. You can strum louder, using more defined strokes and muting to make it more powerful, or you can even move up a key. Short pauses immediately following powerful strumming often creates anticipation. The most important thing is to listen. Listen to your teacher play, the way he/she plays it, and the feel that is created by such and such a type of strumming. Be observant. And most importantly, be sensitive to the Holy Spirit. Remember that God is the Chief Musician. He is able to teach you if you want it bad enough. Dynamics creates depth in music -how close the music is to the listener.

Less Is Best
Dont be afraid of silence. Many guitarists make the mistake of thinking that if they stop playing, the people will stop singing. This is not true, especially during worship. In fact, sometimes short periods of silences help to build up anticipation in the atmosphere. Dont strum every single beat. This makes your playing monotonous and noisy. Experiment with this at home and listen to how they play in the CDs.

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Dynamics is often associated with a respect for silence

Pauses
Some songs require a short pause in the middle to create anticipation. It is also a good way of building up the excitement level of a praise song and making it fun to sing and fun to play. Listen! I cannot emphasize this enough. How well you can play is dependant on how much you can pick up from listening to others.

III. New Strumming

The Swing And Shuffle
Another kind of strumming you will often find is the swing and shuffle. This type of strumming is called swing and shuffle because it makes you want to swing and shuffle (Im joking of course). But indeed, this can be a very fun strumming to play and to sing with. Most times, if done correctly, a song played in swing and shuffle can inject a tremendous amount of life into the praise session. Heres how it works: Normal (Straight 8-beat) Sounds like: One and two and three and four and Strokes: beat: Swing and Shuffle Sounds like: One Strokes: beat:

a two

a three

a four

a one

emphasis on the a

Note: when playing swing and shuffle, the down strokes come immediately after the up strokes. If this is still too difficult, try imagining a horses hoof beats.

IV. New Songs

Today were going to learn a new praise song. (Refer to Appendix II.5) Remember to put into practice your swing and shuffle strumming and your dynamics!

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V.

Practice
Remember: practice at least 20 minutes everyday. 10 min swing and shuffle strumming 10 min strumming with the 16-beat praise song You should be using left-hand muting and/or right-hand muting by now.

This Weeks Practice Exercises:

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LESSON 6
I. Worship Session

Today before we start the lesson proper, we are going to have a short time of worship. Be sensitive to the Holy Spirit and be free to minister in the gifts if the Lord leads you to do so.

II.

Revision

Continue to work on your dynamics with your teacher as he/she will be able to help you pick out certain aspects of your play that needs to be improved or changed. Be eager to learn and keep an open mind and heart. A lot in dynamics has to do with the heart and spirit of a person. It helps to create the feel while playing. Remember: music is an expression of how you feel. Make good use of the instrument in your hands to express how you feel about God, pretty much the same way you use your mouth to express how you feel by speaking. Music is a powerful form of communication

III. New Strumming: 3/4 beat

The 3/4 beat is used in some worship songs. Its called a 3/4 beat because there are only three beats in a bar instead of the usual four. Songs that are in 3/4 beat are usually very flowy and smooth. Imagine a cha-cha kind of beat (incidentally, the cha-cha is in 3/4 beat). Heres how it goes. Strokes: beat:

change here Note: This is a pretty simple strumming to master. The trick is to remember that you change chords after three beats, not four.

IV. New Songs

Today were going to learn a new 3/4 beat song (Refer to Appendix II.6) Remember to put into practice your dynamics!

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V.

Practice
Remember: practice at least 20 minutes everyday. 10 min swing and shuffle strumming 10 min strumming with the 3/4 beat worship song You should be using left-hand muting and/or right-hand muting by now.

This Weeks Practice Exercises:

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LESSON 7
I. Worship Session

For the final lesson, we are going to have one last time of praise and worship. Be excited during the praise clap your hands and sing loud. Prepare your hearts to praise and worship the Lord. Be free to minister in the gifts if the Lord leads you to do so. Take this opportunity to learn how to flow with the Holy Spirit.

II.

How To Flow With The Holy Spirit.

There is no easy lesson or explanation on how we can flow with the Holy Spirit. More things are caught rather than taught. Spend time with the Holy Spirit. Be still and listen to Him speak to you the mysteries only He can reveal to you. The key is in your relationship with God. At the same time, you need to practice worshipping with your song leader. As you begin to progress, you will be able to flow with him/her and the Holy Spirit.

III. Preparation For Test

Revise again what was taught in the previous lessons, and remember the golden rule: practice, practice, practice!

IV. Any Other Questions

Feel free to ask your teacher any questions you may have regarding your play. Remember: ask, and you will learn something. If youre afraid to ask, you will end up not learning or receiving anything (John 16:24)

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LESSON 8 : TEST
I. Test

We will simulate a actual praise and worship environment during the test, so it will just be like a cell group worship session.

II.

Test Material
The test will consist of: One 16-beat praise song One swing and shuffle praise song One 16-beat worship song One 3-beat worship song

III. Test Criteria

Dynamics Life Flow Singing Ability to follow worship leader

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