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Hi Everyone,

This series has been in the back of my mind for a long time. In my weird brain, I've been scheming and planning and trying to map out a course about "what is my job when I play with others?" I've tried to start this series numerous times and it kept getting bigger and more detailed. I finally decided to just go for it.

In this first lesson, I lay out the goal of this series and dig right into the essence of rhythm guitar, which is difficult to tack down.

I have landed on these three fundamental elements of rhythm guitar:
1. To contribute to the dynamic intensity of the song
2. To clarify and hold down the tonality of the song (aka the chord progression)
3. To be the drums and/or accentuate the drums

Your homework for this lesson is:
1. Make your own dynamic maps for "This Song is for Practice"  (links and PDF below) Be sure to write in the specific ways you'll be achieving your dynamic changes
2. Try out the variety of dynamic options for increasing or diminishing intensity
3. Have fun exploring options while you get familiar with "This Song is for Practice"

Post your homework on the community forum. 

Here is the dynamic chart I was tinkering with for this lesson, for example. Now it's your turn.


Links:
This Song is for Practice (Full Version)
This Song is for Practice (without Rhythm guitar) 

Other lessons in this series:
Roles 01 | Rhythm Guitar | Introduction (current lesson)
Roles 02 | Rhythm Guitar | Effects and Tonality (coming soon)
More coming soon!


Also, if you're curious about this song - what does it mean? What is it about? I don't know! I wanted to use this song for future lessons on lyric writing, so I just left my rough draft B.S. lyrics. We'll probably continue pulling this song apart in future lessons, not just this roles series.


Happy Practicing

Files

Roles 01- Rhythm Guitar- Introductio_v02.mov

This is "Roles 01- Rhythm Guitar- Introductio_v02.mov" by Scott Paul Johnson on Vimeo, the home for high quality videos and the people who love them.

Comments

Dude77

Rhythm guitar series awesome exactly what i need ! Please make a lot of practice stuff in this series to learn rhythm guitar. My rhythm is terrible thats why i still cant play songs after many years !

Scott Paul Johnson

I have a whole series on the mechanics of strumming and how to make your own patterns called “strumming patterns.” Look it up on the lesson archive!

Ken Keffer

You've got a great voice, Scott. Your song is more proof, in my humble opinion, that practice is really performance. I really like the chord progression in the pre-chorus, too, especially the G to Bm.