So this video is going to be broken up into three sections. One, what is a power chord. Two,
you know what are the different shapes. And Three, at the very end, I'll show you some
cool things that we can do when we play and use power chords on the guitar. So first let's talk
about what a power chord is and I want to start with using just a regular G chord. Now a G chord
is a very open chord has a lot of sound to it. Now power chords. I call them abbreviated chords
because they sound very abrupt in comparison. So this is a G5 power chord. okay you can hear that
has a little bit more of an abrupt rocking feel to it power chords are very common in rock music so
here's the open g chord very open very bright sound hear that compared to the power chord
now a power chord is just made up of two notes and you can either play this over two strings or three
strings i'm going to show you the shapes in a second here but i just want you to understand
just a little bit of the music theory behind this so usually when you see a power chord
it has the number five after it so if you see a g that's an open chord but if you see a g5
that indicates that it's a power chord and what it is is it's two notes called the root and the fifth
all right the root gives the name to a chord so this is a g5 power chord so the root note is g
the note that gives the name to the chord and the other note on the fifth fret of this fifth string
that's our fifth it is the fifth note up from g in the scale we're not going to go into all
that music theory mumbo jumbo but i just wanted to understand just for basics here that a power
chord is made up of two notes they're called the root and the fifth and that's it so now let's
get into the different shapes that we can use for power chords so the first shape i'm going
to show you are some open power chords now an open power chord just uses one finger the first
finger and the first example i'm going to show you i'm going to show you three chords here
is an e5 power chord it's just the open e string and the first finger on the second fret
okay and you don't want to hit all these other strings so i'm kind of muting them
with my first finger but it's the open e string and the fifth is this note right here it's the
second fret on that fifth string so that is an e power chord if you move your finger down
one we have an open a string and our fifth note is going to be the first finger on the second string
of the four or four fourth string second fret that is an a5 power chord and if you move down one more
open d okay and first finger on the second fret of the third string
that is a d power chord now this stuff is pretty common you can use it in blues
so sometimes you will hear some of that stuff in blues music most of the time people are not going
to be using open power chords but i wanted you to be aware that they do exist the most common
form that you're going to see in songs is the next shape i'm going to show you here hey guys hope you
are enjoying this lesson so far don't forget to subscribe to the channel turn on the notifications
this way you know when i release new videos just like this one now the next way i'm going to show
you how to play power chord is probably the most common way it's going to involve two strings i'm
going to show you two versions here all right so let's go back to that g5 power chord now this is a
shape that can be slid all over the guitar okay once you learn this shape once you can use it in
lots of spots that's the great thing about power chords and they don't matter there's no third so
it doesn't third it's a music theory term don't worry power chords are not major or minor that's
why they have that five after them it's not major it's not minor it's just a power chord all right
so let's start with this g5 power chord so we have our first finger is going to play the root note
here this was the g and how do i know because one two third fret top string
this is the g note and that's very important because it's going to tell us that this is
the name of the chord g now i gotta take my third finger and i'm gonna go down one string and up two
frets so i have the third fret on the top string and the fifth fret on the fifth string so three
five three five that is root fifth root fifth and we would play these two strings at the same time
now with my third finger just so you guys know i am laying that down over the other strings
so that i don't let them ring out because if you're playing a power chord and we hit the
other strings it might not sound so good so you may just want to practice late practice
lightly putting that third finger down okay so that's your power chord okay very common song or
very popular song with power chords think of iron man you know black sabbath a great song
all right so you can hear that that's kind of that intro it's all power chords and some of this stuff
sometimes is easier to do on an electric like there's a little slide part that comes after that
that's definitely easier to do an electric than an acoustic but you may have noticed when i played
that example all i did was slide this shape okay so so i played an open e5 okay that was the open
power cord then i played a g power chord i played the g again and then i slid that up two frets to
an a power chord how do i know it's an a chiral chord because my first finger is touching this a
so it was open e5 to g g a a all right so what's this telling us we can slide this shape if i slit
it up two more frets my first finger would be on the seventh fret of the top string that's a b five
power chord all right and this same shape works on the fifth string okay so if i'm on the third fret
of the fifth string this is a c note okay this is where learning your fretboard becomes
important to know where these notes are and then i'm going to move up two frets down
one string that's a c power chord if i move it up two to the fifth and seventh
d power chord move it up two more e power chord so you have an open e power chord here and then you
have an e power chord up here at seven and nine so you can see these chords can move anywhere
so that's the amazing thing about power chords is it really opens up the entire
neck of the guitar for you guys here now one more addition i want to show you there
is a way to get a fuller sound out of your power cord and that would be if we go back
to that g5 power chord we'd be doing root fifth and you could add a pinky below that
and that would be another root note some people like to bar this as the third finger playing
both notes whichever is more comfortable for you but it gives you a little bit more of a fuller
sound instead of just the two strings so here's two strings g5 all right here's three strings
you get that extra root note in there just fills it out a little bit more
okay there's iron man again so you can hear it just provides a little bit of a fuller sound so
whatever you want whatever you're more comfortable with whether you want to do the two string power
chords or the three string power chords that shape is able to be slid all over the guitar hey guys if
you're enjoying this so far make sure to check out my stage two mini courses i do have a power in bar
chord mini course if you guys are interested in learning about that you can go check it out in the
description below alright so i want to show you some cool things that you can do with power cords
that are fun rhythm so a lot of times for rhythm with power chords we're always going to be doing
eighth notes one n two and three m four m one and two n three m four m one and two n three
and four m one and two n three m four and so that is a very common thing you'll hear with power
chords particularly in rock music now something else that's pretty common with rock music and i
have a whole nother lesson on paw muting that i'll put up here you guys can go check that out is that
we can do some really cool accented rhythms so for example i'll give you one example here which
would be just accenting the first rhythm of the power chord okay sound sounds pretty cool right
another thing would be to accent the second and fourth beat so it'd be something like this
the other thing that's really cool with power chords is we can do something that i like to
call the chika chika um you think of a song like smells like teen spirit
by nirvana that is a good song so here's the chicka chicka sound on smells like teen spirit
do you hear that i caught like a chicka chicka it's where we actually mute the strings so because
we're doing these power chords we're able to mute our strings with our fretting hand so in this song
we're going from an f power chord okay first fret to an um a b flat or an a sharp power chord okay
so that would be the first fret first fret okay first fret on the sixth string first fret on the
fifth string then we're jumping up to an a flat here on the fourth fret and then coming down to a
d flat power chord on the fourth fret of the fifth string all right and you can hear and k
i'm strumming i'm gonna call it chicka chicka so what am i doing i'm actually releasing the cord
and there's no sound coming through on my string so i call it the chicka
chicken it's basically quick down up down up chicka chicka so down up down down down
that's that song down up down chicka chicka down down down up down down down up
kind of a really really super cool thing that you can do with power cords that is very very common
in rock music i call it the chika chika strumming hey guys make sure to like this video if you
enjoyed it this way youtube shows it to more users just like you guys i'm going to throw up that palm
muting video up here if you guys want to go check that out and learn about palm muting go check that
out youtube will throw another video up over there i hope to see you guys in another lesson real soon