Guitar Mastery Simplified: How Anyone Can Quickly Become a Strumming, Chords, and Lead Guitar Ninja (16 page)

E Chord Form

D Chord Form

All Forms Together

Practicing With
The
CAGED
System

So now that you understand how the CAGED system works, just
how can we practice it to make us better players?  Before we go any
further, I’d like to dissect this study into 2 parts:  Concept and
Fingering

Understanding the CAGED concept without picking up your
guitar is Part 1 of this equation.  That is to say, you should be able to
understand the concept “on paper” before attempting to actually play the
chords.  Playing these chords fully or partially is yet a whole other
story, but is our Part 2.  That part will take a bit longer, but don’t get
discouraged!  Remember, these are “open” chords that we will be attempting
to assemble like bar chords.  We don’t have to play every note in the
chord, but it’s nice to know that we can if we should want or need to. 

Firstly
, you MUST know/memorize how to play the open
chords of C, A, G, E and D.  If you don’t know how to do this already, you
REALLY need to brush up on those chords before going any further.  If you
get any deeper without that knowledge, it will only confuse you.  Knowing
how the forms fall on the guitar neck is crucial to understanding and mapping
the fret board.  I use this knowledge dozens of times a day so rest
assured that learning this new concept will revolutionize how you view the fret
board.

Complete this and you will understand the fret board better
than a lot of other players out there today! 
Once the
concept makes sense (see the previous page and supplemental video in the
directory), we can then tackle the fingering.
  I must emphasize
that, although I show the entire chord, we don’t have to play it in it’s
entirely; in some cases it may be VERY inconvenient to do so.

So here is the method that I use myself to master these
chords.

Play the open C chord.  With all these chords make sure
that each note that should be
heard,
IS heard. 
This will, of course, be easier for those that have had more time on the
guitar.  Now, for the “A” form of the C chord, lay your 1
^st
finger across strings 5-1 (A through high E) at the 3
^rd
fret.
 Make sure that your 1
^st
finger is totally straight.  For
most people this means dropping the thumb down behind the neck so that the tip
of your thumb is touching the bottom half of the neck.  Unless you have
Martian fingers, or are Jimi Hendrix, you most likely will not be able to hang
your thumb over the top of the neck AND play a bar chord. 

Trust me, learn it the right way and then “cheat” later if
you master this technique.  Okay, back to that “A” form.  The 1st
finger should be pressing down those 5 strings that I just mentioned.  The
rest of the bar can be played a couple of different ways; depending on the
application, I use both.  The first way you will play the 5
^th
fret of strings 4, 3, and 2 with fingers 2, 3 and 4 (in that order).  The
other way is to play strings 4, 3 and 2 with finger 3 barred.  The only
way to get that high E to sound with this method is to hyper-extend the 3rd
finger at the last knuckle (meaning bend it backwards a bit).

The G form is very tricky and difficult at first to play
fully.  First bar strings 4, 3 and 2 at the 5
^th
fret with the 1
^st
finger.  Then, play string
5,
fret 7 with the 2
^nd
finger.  Then string 6, fret 8 with the 3
^rd
finger and finally
the high E, fret 8 with the pinky.  Getting cramps in your hand yet? 
You’ll get it.  The other way to play this chord is to play it partially –
as I show in this video.  Hang in there?  Don’t give up!  This
stuff takes time.  NO ONE just gets it right away.  Myth and ego say
that one person do this and not the other.  Don’t buy into it!  You
will be just as much a player as Hendrix or Stevie Ray IF you practice like
they did.

Okay, so the “E” form is much easier.  In fact, if you
know how to play a full F chord (at the 1
^st
fret), then you know how
to play this chord already.  Just scotch it up to the 8
^th
fret!  If you don’t know the F, then place your 1
^st
finger at
the 8
^th
fret and lay it across
all
6 strings (just like on
the “A” form, you must drop that thumb and get your hand out in front of the
fret board a bit).  Then place your 3
^rd
finger on the A string
at the 10
^th
fret. 
Followed by the pinky on
the D string at the 10
^th
fret and the middle finger on the G string
at the 9
^th
fret.
  I’m purposely changing from string
numbers to names (letters) because it’s important that you know both.

Lastly
, the “D” form is a little tricky.  Place
your 1st finger on the 10th fret of the D string.  Then place the 2nd
finger on the 12th fret of the G. Then place the 3rd finger on the 12th fret of
the high E. Finally, place the pinky on the 13th fret of the B string. 
Now you are playing the “D” form of the C chord.  Now let’s do one more
form because you are going to need it for keys other than C.

Since the “C” form is C is played open, we need to see what
it would look like as a bar chord.  So, for this example we are going to
play a “C” form of the D chord.  Place your pinky at the 5
^th
fret of the A string.  Then place the 3
^rd
finger on the 4
^th
fret of the D string.  Place the 2
^nd
finger on the 3
^rd
fret of the B string. 
Finally, bar strings 1, 2 and 3
with the 1
^st
finger at the 2
^nd
fret.
  Now you
have a movable C form.  Get it?

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Previously in this book we
learned the basics of tablature.  Now that we understand that and have
some other skills sets under our fingers and in our minds, let’s further
investigate this language of tablature.

Remember how I said tablature provides a lot of detail?
 The following are tablature symbols that represent various techniques.
 Since new techniques are being discovered all the time, this is not an
exhaustive list.

A “
hammer-on
” is a technique performed by sharply
bringing a fretting-hand finger down on the fingerboard behind a fret causing a
note to sound.  For our example here, you would pick the fifth fret and
hammer the seventh or eighth fret as indicated.  Hammer-
ons
might feel awkward at first, but they are easily
mastered with practice.

As the name indicates, hammer your finger in a quick
snapping motion so that the string does not have time to fade out.  A
snappy hammer-on will vibrate the string almost as much as a strong picking.

By the way, this is the A minor pentatonic or C major
pentatonic scale that you are about to play.

A “
pull-off
” is the opposite of a hammer-on.  A
pull-off is a technique performed by plucking a string by “pulling” the string
off the fingerboard with one of the fingers being used to fret the note.
 For our example here, you would pick the seventh or eighth fret as
indicated and pull-off to the fifth fret.  Pull-off s can also be a little
awkward at first but with practice can be mastered.  As its name
indicates, pulling your finger off the fingerboard in a snapping motion causes
the string to vibrate as if picked.