Hi guys. My name is Andy
and in this guitar lesson I'm going to be showing you
how to play the E major chord.
Now this is the first chord that I would teach
any absolute beginner if they were to have a private lesson with me.
So if you're an absolute beginner, (maybe) you've never even held a guitar before
this is the ideal chord to first start with.
So this is the E major chord and this is what it sounds like
Now seen as is generally absolute beginners watching this lesson
I'm just going to cover a couple of the basics for you.
So these metal strips going down the neck here are our frets.
But we'd consider this area here fret one,
this area fret two
and this area fret three
and for each of our fingers
we have a coordination between the fret number and the string itself.
We're going to number the strings 1 to 6 so 123
456
For this E major chord,
We need our first finger
on the 1st fret
of the 3rd string
So 1- 2 - 3
There is my 1st finger.
Its right on the tip
and its (positioned) over to this side of the fret not over this side
Not over this side
So the side closest to you.
but it doesn't want to be on top of that metal fret.
we want to be in this area here.
Your middle finger
is on the 5th string, at the second fret
and again it's as far over this side of the fret
as is comfortable for you
and it's on the tip
Our third finger
should be again on the 2nd fret just underneath
on the 4th string
So 1
2
3
And we want this 3rd finger
as far underneith
finger that middle finger
as possible
while staying on the tips of our fingers and then if we strong all
And then if we strum
all six strings
it sounds like that.
Now you may be strumming this just with your thumb (fingers)
I'd really recommend getting yourself a pick also known as a plectrum and if you
click in the description below they'll be help on how to choose a pick and what
pick I'd recommend you use.
but it will sound a lot sweeter rather than using your thumb
where it can sound a bit
quiet
I definitely recommend for absolute beginners to try and get used
to holding a pic. It just gives you more options.
The main problem when people first start learning any guitar chords is that
some of the strings don't ring out.
That is generally because their fingers are too flat
or they're touching the bottom of the guitar like this
and that thinnest E string has no chance of ringing out
so we want to give this area here
underneath the guitar
around these thinner two strings that
that look like cheese wire
as much room as possible
so they ring out
and don't sound like this
As you try and get those strings to ring out you may actually be pressing on to hard
It is way more common for people to be pressing on too hard than the not hard enough
And in my opinion if we put it on a scale of one to 10-
1 being not pressing down at all
and 10 being pressing down at all and 10 being like the pressure of making a fist (really hard)
(We want to) press down around a '4'
but if you need more help with that
there is help in a later lesson about exactly how hard to press down
But, this is the E chord
we just want to press down hard enough to get these strings ringing out
We can test whether the ringing out
by picking each individual string from six to one
We can tell that's ringing out and if at any point
one of them isn't
you can see which string that's (is)
in this case string 5
Because i lifted it off a little bit
or i'm not pressing down hard enough
Press it down harder
and there it is
and you can still see I've left plenty of room here
by just keeping the thumb
a little bit lower
than I would be for was just gripping the neck
just a little bit lower
And that is our first chord - E major
Now when we look at the chord diagram for that E chord
it does seem a little bit upside down to some people but the idea is from
your angle looking down, it is the right way up.
so we can see that we have
a thinker a line on the bottom and the thinnest line on the top
These horizontal lines are your strings.
All those horizontal lines are the strings we have
We have the fret lines going down
and we have a double line at one side
and that's the 'nut' of your guitar
where the strings are held in place
So that's how to play the E major Chord
The next chord I would recommend you go for (learn)
is the 'A major chord'
There are a couple of variations of that one that one
But that A major is shown in the next lesson
so if you want to stick with me and follow this beginner's course
I will see you in that next lesson where we show you how to play the A major chord!
you can download this video and the eBook that goes with this entire course
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