GSCC Lesson 08 – Lick By Neck

Revision of Lesson 01-07

We had covered the common chords in key of C Major, and even more of their cousins 😉

And the primary chords in a new key : G Major

We have also looked at some basic strumming patterns: One strum per beat, up-stroke strumming, Strumming lightly on first few strings, 16 beat strum, Campfire Strum

And of course, we had fun learning all these songs !!

Lesson	Song
Lesson 1	Song #1 (English: Because I Love You) Lesson 1
Lesson 1	Song #2 (Chinese/Cantonese: 喜欢你) Lesson 1
Lesson 2	Song #1 (English: Happy Birthday)
Lesson 2	Song #2 (Chinese: 月亮代表我的心)
Lesson 3	Song #1 (English: Let It Be – Beatles)
Lesson 3	Song #2 (English: Perfect – Ed Sheeran)
Lesson 3	Song #3 (Cantonese: 海闊天空)
Lesson 4	S o ng #1 (English: Deperado – Eagles)
Lesson 4	Song #2 (Chinese: “最长的电影” – 周杰伦)
Lesson 5	Song #1 (English:”Creep” – Radiohead)
Lesson 5	Song #2 (Chinese: “你要的愛”)
Lesson 5	Song #3 (English: “Last Christmas” – Wham)
Lesson 6	Song #1 (English: “Reality”)
Lesson 6	Song #2 (English: “刻在我心底的名字”)
Lesson 6	Song #3 (English: “Auld Lang Syne”)
Lesson 7	Song #1 (English: “Country Roads”)
Lesson 7	Song #2 (English: “Time of Your Life”)
Lesson 7	Song #1 (Cantonese: “朋友”)

If you are new to this series, here’s the links to past lessons:

Click here to ask a question …

Ladies and gentlemen … Let Me Introduce You Guitarist’s BEST FRIEND – CAPO !!!!

When we sing karaoke, we use the KEY button to adjust the key of the songs to suit our vocal range. On guitar, we use CAPO:

It works by clapping the strings on guitar neck, making the strings shorter in length, thus, raising the pitch.

Let’s look at some basic music theory:

The distance between each adjacent note is called semi-tone. eg. C – C# ; C# – D ; D – D#

Here’s the notes on guitar neck:

Let’s look at a normal C Major chord:

If we clap the CAPO on 1st fret :

On 2nd fret :

So, the pitch / key has been raised!! Just like the key button on karaoke machine!!!

Let’s look at other chords:

How about G Major chord? Our newly learned key!

If we keep moving up the CAPO, from G->G#->A->A#->B->C !!!! We can play a C chord using G shape chord !!!!

Let’s try to play C, Am ,Dm G7 using their G major counterpart – G, Em , Am , D7, by clapping the CAPO on 5th fret.

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You may ask, the CAPO can only raise the key, but how can we lower the key?

Answer: By using CAPO with chords from other key, we can “lower” the pitch/key.

eg. If key of C is too high for you to sing, and you want to lower say 2 keys(go down to A#), you just need to use key of G with CAPO on 3rd fret. Examine the following table and you will know what i meant 😉

No Capo	Fret#1	Fret#2	Fret#3	Fret#4	Fret#5	Fret#6	Fret#7
C	C#	D	D#	E	F	F#	G
G	G#	A	A#	B	C	C#	D

Other chords in Key of G Major

In Key of C Major, we had explored the siblings of all the primary chords. Let’s look at their counterpart in key of G Major (you already know many of them).

New Chord Shapes (the rest of the chords in G Major, period)

These are the new chords appear in the G Major sibling chords above. Don’t worry, you do not need to memorize them all for now. You can always come back to them in the future.

They may looks alien to you for now. But let us try to play them with CAPO on 5th fret, we can actually use them to play songs from past lessons because these few chords are just the counterparts of C Major siblings.

Click here to ask a question …

Basic Guitar Strumming –

“Chuck” strum

This week, we are going to explore a very interesting strumming technique – The “Chuck” Strum. This technique will create a percussive sound out of your strumming, creating an illusion of a drummer playing along with you. This is one of the reason making guitar such a popular musical instrument.

The trick is to rest your strumming hand’s palm on the string (near the bridge of the guitar), muting the string and then brush the strings with your fingers or guitar pick (Check out the live stream video for the demo).

Practice#1: Try to listen to the counting beat (the Tok-Tok cowbell sound) below and try strumming the chuck strum pattern above:

Press a “C Major” chord and strum the above pattern

Practice them with chords

**Follow the indicated strumming pattern**

Practice #2: Follow the chords changes and strum with the beat count

Practice #3: Using this new strumming pattern (pattern #6 – The Chuck Strum) , listen to the practice songs in lesson 1-7 and strum together with the counting beat

Lesson	Song
Lesson 1	Song #1 (English: Because I Love You) Lesson 1
Lesson 1	Song #2 (Chinese/Cantonese: 喜欢你) Lesson 1
Lesson 2	Song #1 (English: Happy Birthday)
Lesson 2	Song #2 (Chinese: 月亮代表我的心)
Lesson 3	Song #1 (English: Let It Be – Beatles)
Lesson 3	Song #2 (English: Perfect – Ed Sheeran)
Lesson 3	Song #3 (Cantonese: 海闊天空)
Lesson 4	S o ng #1 (English: Deperado – Eagles)
Lesson 4	Song #2 (Chinese: “最长的电影” – 周杰伦)
Lesson 5	Song #1 (English:”Creep” – Radiohead)
Lesson 5	Song #2 (Chinese: “你要的愛”)
Lesson 5	Song #3 (English: “Last Christmas” – Wham)
Lesson 6	Song #1 (English: “Reality”)
Lesson 6	Song #2 (English: “刻在我心底的名字”)
Lesson 6	Song #3 (English: “Auld Lang Syne”)
Lesson 7	Song #1 (English: “Country Roads”)
Lesson 7	Song #2 (English: “Time of Your Life”)
Lesson 7	Song #1 (Cantonese: “朋友”)