Hey, how are you doing? Justin back with you
to explain some F chord cheats
Now, even though I am calling them cheats
these are great chords in their own right
and there are times when you would prefer to use these chords
than a full barre chord F so they're not just cheats
but they will kind of get you out of jail a little bit
The first couple of chords we're going to look at are called F major 7
well, we'll learn Fmaj7,
Fmaj7 /C
which means F major 7 with the C as the bass note
and we're going to look at a mini F chord
which just uses the thinnest 4 strings
The major 7 chords are a good substitute for F
most of the time,
but you have to use at ease cause there are times
where a major 7 type chord just doesn't sound right
There are theory rules that will explain that if you want to get into it
but I don't recommend you go down that route
If you can't play a big F you try Fmaj7 and you see -
if it sounds good - great, use it.
If it doesn't sound good -
then you either have to leave that song
or battle on a little bit more to get your F chord
or use this little F that we're going to talk
which should be achievable for most of you this lesson
within a couple of weeks' practice.
So let's go through them one at a time in a close-up
The first chord that we're going to look at is this chord
which is an Fmaj7
just uses the thinnest 4 strings only
So the thickest two strings aren't going to be used
3rd finger is going on the 3rd fret of the 4th string
the tip of it should try and mute the 5th string
Actually, if the 5th string is left open it doesn't sound too bad
it's called Fmaj7/A meaning that it's got an A bass note
A is a note in the chord anyway that's why it doesn't sound too bad
But I would recommend you practice getting that 3rd finger just to mute,
very lightly touch there the 5th string
so it's muted up
shouldn't have too many problems getting that note right
We then got 2nd finger, 3rd string if that note is muted
it's going to be the fault of the 3rd finger
laying down a little flat,
so just make sure you up enough
on the tip of the 3rd finger
so let that note ring out clearly.
Then we've got the 1st finger, 1st fret of the 2nd string
Again, if it gets muted like that
it's the fault of the 2nd finger laying a bit too flat
So make sure that's right on the tip as well
And then lastly we've got the thinnest string open
Now, again, if that one is being muted
it's most likely going to be 1st finger laying down a little flat like that
So you want to make sure again 1st finger is right on the tip
Some of you might find that it's the underneath of that 1st finger
who might be muting it as well
so have a little experiment
Ideally, you want to leave just a little gap there,
between the neck and the 1st finger, okay?
It doesn't want to be just touching
it can do later on,
especially if you haven't had any problems there
just leave, even a millimeter is enough, just the slightest gap there
Now, the angle of the fingers is important
it's much like the C chord -
so there's C chord
there's Fmaj7
and this is a fantastic change to be working on anyway,
your C to Fmaj7
they're very commonly found together
and you can see there the angle so it's like with the C chord -
you don't want to be doing that, that's really difficult
there's loads of tension now in my arm and in my hand
it's just too stretchy
you want to be looking at making sure
the fingers are kind of touching each other
the 1st 2nd and 3rd finger are all touching each other
to get that major 7 sound
Definitely a good thing to practice is going from the C chord to the F chord
it should help you to keep your fingers nicely locked together
and forming the nice shape, great shape
The next chord we're going to check out is called an Fmaj7/C
Now, the slash means over a different bass note
we're going to explore those a little bit more later in this course
The basic idea here is that we're taking A big F bar chord
and we're moving our 1st finger down
so it's just playing the 1st fret on the 2nd string
the thickest string is muted
so we're going to have 3rd finger, 3rd fret, 5th string
little finger 3rd fret, 4th string
2nd finger or 1st finger where they were for the regular major 7
and still with that open string
okay? Making sure the thickest string is muted here
If you have that -
it's particularly obnoxious having Fmaj7 with an E at the bass
okay? So the 3rd finger just reaching up that little bit
to be at the thickest string
Now this is a really interesting one to go from C chord
1st finger and 3rd finger can stay where they are
2nd finger drops down, little finger goes on
there's major 7
back to C
I'm making this look fairly easy, I know for my left hand who practiced
this is not as easy as that
but that's a really nice way of practicing -
is going from the C to this Fmaj7/C
there's quite a few songs that use this motion
this chord changing C to F
or C to Fmaj7
so it's a really nice way of practicing it
just taking your time and make sure that you get it right
So the last one I want to look at is the mini F chord
and it's possibly the most useful
cause the Fmaj7, like I said, sometimes won't work
when an F chord is written
sometimes it sounds really good sometimes it won't work
so if we have a Fmaj7 chord
but with our 1st finger we cover the thinnest 2 strings
so we're using the pad of the 1st finger to cover the thinnest 2 strings
we can have this mini F
it is just the top 4 strings of the big bar chord F
very, very useful one, this one
tip of the 3rd finger wants to mute the 5th string,
much like the Fmaj7 did
I mean, again, quick hovering over It doesn't sound obnoxious
to have the 5th string, but the thickest string -
There, that's definitely not really what you'll see
you don't want to be playing the thickest string here at all
Again, this looks easy, but many of you are going to find it
a little bit tricky to get here.
Most times I found my 1st finger was sitting too far back
and I wasn't able to get the notes so make sure the 1st finger
is right up touching the fret there,
just behind it.
You're also going to find the roundness of the 2nd and 3rd finger
are likely to be tricky.
But with this one you want to go for the 1st finger first
then reaching over the 2nd finger,
then the 3rd.
Be fine with the laying down thing. Again, you don't want this.
That's akward.
Some of you might find that okay but most of you are going to find
the fingers wanting to lay down
so finding a way of laying them down
where they're not touching the other strings
is the ideal setting
Now, just to explain,
you will often see me playing it like this
with the thumb playing the bass note
I have been trying to have a go at doing the thumb over with neat such
and I'm not able to get it at all
it is far too difficult
so I wouldn't recommend you try to do an F chord like this,
with the thumb reaching over
for, definitely until you 're kind of intermediate level to top player
just in case you see me doing it in other lessons
I think before I'd learned it left handed I kind of assumed
that it might be somewhat possible for beginners
but it just definitely isn't so I wouldn't be going there
With this little mini F,
as I said you want to go through and pick up the notes
just one at a time
take it off, put it down again
1st finger again, 2nd finger, 3rd finger stroke
pick up the notes one at a time
take it off, there we go, put it back, stroke
this is a real common one - from D chord to F chord
so that's a really nice change to get
there's quite a few songs that have D to F in them
and it involves all of the fingers changing,
that's definitely one
that's going to be on your one-minute changes
practice routine
but, the mini F chord is very useful.
I remember trying to learn F years ago, when I was first starting out
and I just couldn't get on with it at all
but the mini F - I got there needs side is there,
I can play the mini F chord.
Most of the times it's a bit of a struggle to jump to it
because it's a new feeling and it's a different shape
it feels awkward,
It's going to feel challenging.
But challenging is good
I'm hoping that you're finding the lessons here challenging
this is not the super easy grade one stuff any more
these lessons should take you a little longer
they should be a little bit more challenging
but that's good. that's how you are going to get better
when it comes to song choices this week make sure that you are choosing
a few songs that are using the mini F or the Fmaj7 chords
to get to work them into your repertoire
because the key thing here is taking the chords that you are learning
and actually using them in songs.
Discovering how difficult they are,
working out which chord changes you need
some of it will be dictated by the songs that you choose
if you are not for choosing a song that goes F to D
I would recommend replacing that in the practice routine
and not practicing F to D
practice F to G, or F to Am
or whatever it is the chord changes are that you need to work on
for the songs that you're doing.
As usual, any questions in the comments bellow
and I'll see you for more very soon. Bye