Hi guys, my name's Andy and in this lesson I'm going to be showing you the easiest three
chords to play on guitar, and then demonstrate TEN SONGS that use only these three chords.
Each one of those songs will have its own video linking from this lesson so you can
see that lessons in its complete form and know exactly how to play those songs.
This follows on from my very successful 'Play 10 songs with 2 easy chords' series
And this series is Level 2, and that series being Level 1
of my beginners course.
The lessons do follow on from here.
On the homepage on my Youtube channel
or on my website you will find Level 3, Level 4 etc if this is something you really enjoy!
The 3 chords I'm going to be demonstraiting for you are E, A & D chords.
And we're gonna have close ups on each one of those chords and the changes between them so we can really nail these songs!
I will be demonstrating one song in it's entirety (in this video)
and that song will be 'Lean On Me' and that will come at the end of this lesson.
So the 2 chords that I covered in the first series of videos 'Play 10 songs with 2 chords'
were the E major
and the A major.
in this fashion with the 1st finger
used as an anchor point
to go between those two chords
The new chord that we're gonna be using along with those 2 chords is the D major, (which is played) like this
So i'm going to start off with the D major because that will be new for a lot of you that have come from that first video
but I'll also go through the other 2 chords as well and how to cha nge between them
So this is the D major chord
and to play this we need our 1st finger
at that 3rd string, 2nd fret
and it needs to be as far to this side of the fret as possible
Be right on the tip of your fingers
so make sure your not pressing the bottom of the guitar (neck)
& have your thumb behind the fretboard
and it wants to be resting (just creeping over) the top of the neck
but certainly not right over like this
we're going to keep it behind.
Your middle finger goes at the 2nd fret on the 1st string, like this
and you can see now I've created this angle so i can fit both of my fingers in here.
If you try and play this with your fingers straight up,
it will probably be more difficult for you.
This angle allows the 3rd finger to reach the 3rd fret of the 2nd string
And thats how we play this D chord
The little finger isn't down at all
So we have 1, 2, 3
with our fingers on an angle
little finger placed near the 3rd finger
just to keep your hand in a more solid shape
And then we strum from string 4
which is the D string.
and our D chord should sound right.
Try not to play either of the thicker 2 strings
and that will be our D chord.
To change to the A chord, which is the most common change
we're going to keep the first finger down
and move the middle finger above, and the 3rd finger below
That [A chord] is played like this
and we strum from string 5 this time
because string 5 is the A string.
So the lowest note of each of these chords has the same letter name (as the name of the chord)
The A chord alone
Will be 1st finger around the middle of the fret
at the 2nd fret of the 3rd string
middle finger directly above it
and 3rd finger directly below it
So 1, 2, 3
Each of those fingers needs to be as far to this side of the fret
without crossing over this fret line here.
To change to the D chord we've just learnt
make sure you slide to this side of the fret
for the D
& then slide back for the A
to ensure we don't get any dead strings ringing out
If I play at this side of the fret
I simply have to press on MUCH harder
And it still doesn't sound as good
So it's really super important
There the D chord.
Thumb just creeping over the top
1st finger stays down
Slide back a little bit
Middle finger above, 3rd finger below
And thats the A chord there.
Very similar technique to get to the E chord
1st finger stays down
Slide it to the 1st fret, same string
Middle finger string 5 fret 2
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