Finger Placement for Better Sounding Guitar Chords
Hey, are you having a hard time getting your chord sounds good? Well if that�s that case,
you are not alone. In this video, Im gonna show you just what you need to know to fix
that.
Hi there, I�m Tomas Michaud from Real Guitar Success. If you are new here, go and subscribe
to my YouTube channel so I can get you more lessons on how to play guitar with confidence,
connect with others and have fun. Its very common when youre first learning chords to
have strings that are buzzing, or strings that are muted or even completely dead notes.
This is something that student after student has somehow been surprised then I have to
admit in the beginning I thought maybe I was just missing something. But you know, a lot
of it just has to do with making small adjustments and learning the little subtleties of hand
position and finger placement. It takes time and practice. But there are some very clear
tips that I can give you that will help you to get it right faster. And more importantly
after giving you a list of tips, Im gonna teach you a system so that you can learn the
habit of getting finger placement just right so these chords will sound beautiful every
time. So lets get started with some basic tips on good finger placement. Now you might
have heard some of this before but please bear with me. Sometimes hearing something
again will be just what we need to get it right and also you might learn something new.
Bad sounding chords are caused by either your fingers or touching another string as you�re
playing the chord and is muting out the note or you are not pressing hard enough to make
the note sound clear. So first off, you wanna make sure this is probably an obvious one
but make sure your nails are short on your left hand. This is something I have had to
tell students to cut their nails because if your fingers cant press all the way down even
if the nail touches a little bit, it will make it difficult to get a good sounding note.
Secondly, make sure when you press the note that your finger is closed to the fret. Now,
on top of the fret that won�t mute the note but up close to the fret just behind the fret.
The father back it gets the harder it is to get a good sounding notes. The harder you
have to press down also so as close to the fret as you can. Sometimes you get closer
than others depending on the form of the chord but just as close as you can.
So the third tip is to make sure when you�re playing the chord that is best you can, your
finger is not touching another string. So that might seem obvious but it is something
you just need to keep in your mind as your playing the chord. Your finger is only pressing
on the note and not accidentally touching the string before or after it.
So now the main issue you might say.. this is by far the biggest issue that people have
with making chords not sound good. And that�s the way they placed their finger is causing
it to either retouch another string or not press the note clearly.
So you want to put your finger on the string in such a way that it goes up and then back
down. First of all, if you take a look at my hand, let�s say this is the neck of the
guitar you want the fingers as much as possible to go straight into the string like this,
not like this. If its like this, its going to touch the string down here and mute the
string. Now just for the record sometimes you actually want that when youre making certain
chords. Ill make a chord in a way that I let the finger touched the string to deaden out
the note, I don�t want. But from the most part, youre gonna want to keep all the strings
open and sounding clear so the fingers need to go like this.
Another way to think about that is your fingers are gonna go up and down, kinda like if you
curl your fingers like this. Youre going up and then back down not so much like this.
Sometimes you have to compromise a little but for the most part, the more your fingers
go like this, the more they�re gonna touch another string. So were looking for a motion
like this or a position like this. You get this position by having a good hand position
on the guitar having your fingers go up and then back down on to the strings. Here�s
I�d like to do, pretend your holding a ball in your hand. Let say about the size of a
soft ball and that�s the hand position. Nice and relaxed, not clenching then take
that position and put it in the guitar neck riding between your thumb and your fingers.
Now thumb position right quick. Some people place their thumb like that. If there is no
absolute right or wrong, I prefer to teach the students from the beginning to put your
thumb behind the neck and then relax that way not kink like this but relax like this
roughly in the middle of the neck. This is what some people call some kind of a classical
positioning. And it seems more difficult in the beginning to have your thumb behind the
neck as opposed to wrapping it around cause you are trying to hold on to the neck of the
guitar but in the long run it is actually easier its just a habit. It is easier to move
around and to make more difficult chords but also a little easier to get your fingers easier
to go up and then down unto the neck.
For the final tip, it has to do with the amount of pressure you put on the string. The string
is buzzing. You might wanna experiment with pressing a little bit harder. I know for a
lot of students it hurts their fingers especially on a steel string acoustic guitar. And there
is really no way out of it just usually hurts your fingers when youre first learning especially
on the steel string guitar and you will get used to it. The thing to do is just keep coming
back a little at a time and your fingers will get both desensitized and just tougher in
general, thicker-skinned.
But the issue also is not just usually about pressing hard enough but correcting your hand
position so as a compromise their keep working on better hand position and you wont have
to press as much at the same time it is easier to develop a little tougher fingers and be
able to press hard enough to get a good clear sound.
Now I realized over the years and you may already realized this that even though this
tips are helpful, you really don�t have time to think this all out as your playing
a chord especially when you start moving from one chord to another. The key here is to develop
a habit of good finger placement every time you go to put your fingers on the guitar.
So with that in mind, I have a couple of exercises that I found very effective to help you learn
this basic habit.
The first one is very simple and keep all these tips in mind as you do this exercises.
Were gonna put the first finger on the second string, first fret. Now take a look that your
finger is angling up and then down that is making a good curve. You are using more tip
of your fingers than the flat part of your fingers, that�s another way of saying that
and of course at the same time you are not flattening out your finger that there is good
angles in both of the knuckles especially this top knuckle. Now you should have a little
space between the neck and your hand as well. If your hands are closed it gets harder and
harder to actually angle your fingers without touching another string so you need a little
space there and you should try to aim for something that�s barely relaxed not too
much tension. Now were gonna play the first three notes one at a time and then go back
to the second string. The third string, the second string and first string and then back.
So that�s the first part of the exercise. If at first it sounds like this � dead first
string, that would be fairly normal. So you get a chance to kinda adjust a little bit
now right there I was touching the third string as well. Im pushing my finger up a little
too much so I re adjust now its clear, second string and first string. So now, put your
second finger down unto the second fret, second string, and then make a few adjustments so
you can get a nice sound then the third finger down the third fret and then go backwards.
Third finger and then first finger. Now by doing this, you are practicing all the basic
movements so that your fingers are in the right place and if the first string sounds
clear and the third string. The string before and after the finger sounds clear.
Now you wanna apply the same idea to playing chords but if you practice this separately
and focus on what you just need to do, little by little that will translate as you play
chords. So you wanna practice this a little bit each day, don�t spend half an hour on
it. Im talking 3 to 5 minutes a little bit each day and over time you will see improvement,
that�s the first exercise.
For the second exercise, were gonna expand on that a little bit and use a fairly easy
chord. We will call this an F major 7. To form the chord, you put your first finger
on the second string first fret then your second finger goes down like next to it on
the third string second fret, and finally the third finger goes down from the fourth
string third fret. So here what the chord should sound like. Were gonna start with the
fourth string, now all the notes are sounding and for common students sound like this, okay.
Because my fingers are touching some of the other strings, this is a chance again to practice
three notes together and making good finger angle. My hand is going up and the fingers
are going down. More so on the first finger is more exaggerated and the third finger is
a little more arched. I have some space between my hand. My thumb is in the back of the neck,
relaxed. If I let go of my hand, it just kinda fall. I�m not putting a lot of tension.
I�m not putting a lot of strength here in my arm. What Im doing is Im holding on to
the guitar my thumb and the fingers and because of the angle it doesn�t take a lot of strength
from me to press down. Now my fingers are closed to the fret, not on top but close to
each of the fret, and I don�t have my arm like this. That really helps the arm closed
into your body because it gets your hand up and down as opposed to the angle. The angle
makes it harder to form the chord without touching other strings. So form the chord
and start with the fourth string and go down nice and slow. Im on the dead note string
now Im gonna make adjustments. Okay now try again. So better but often for students that�s
been few minutes kinda trying to get the sound. Again, practice a little bit each day and
then little by little your body will just start learning what to do to get the sound.
There�s a connection between your ear and your fingers and by doing this over and over,
little by little your earlobe will tell your fingers where to adjust to get the right sound
and then that will become a habit. I want you to start getting the hang of getting good
clean notes in your chord. You want to practice and be better at changing from one chord to
the other and getting the fingers in the right place right away.
Ive created a whole lesson on this for you and I�ll put a link in the description below
this video for you.
Thanks for joining me today. Its been a pleasure as always and I hope to see you again in another
video. Hey, I do have a quick question, Im wondering what chord do you have the most
problem to it. I really like to know. If you could leave me an answer on the comment section
below, I�ll appreciate it. And of course, don�t forget to subscribe to my YouTube
channel. Take care. Ill see you again soon.