Rhythm Playing
Jam10
Posts: 654
Does anybody know of any good exercises that work on rhythm playing technique? Different strum patterns, and different timings?
Is the best way to learn great rhythm playing to learn all different styles and songs or are there specific practice exercises?
Thanks
Is the best way to learn great rhythm playing to learn all different styles and songs or are there specific practice exercises?
Thanks
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JEFF HARDY AND JEFF AMENT USED TO LOOK THE SAME
"Pearl Jam always eases my mind and fires me up at the same time.”-Jeff Hardy
Learn songs, and learn to read rhythm as it is written, rather than just playing by ear. There is a lot more discipline required.
Lots of GNR songs have intersting arpeggios as the rhythm, Don't Cry, Civil War come to mind.
I play a lot of Metallica, and there are a bunch of different rhythm styles to learn there. Classical arpeggios, as in Fade to Black; dozens of fairly straight rhythm lines like Sandman, MOP etc; syncopated stuff like the verses of One, or the choruses to Sad But True or Unforgiven II. Then you get songs like Harvester of Sorrow, where you start with an arpeggiated intro, slide into a heavy riff, then back to the arpeggio, the syncopated stuff in the verses etc. There is so much variety in the catalogue and just some songs.
Learn stuff like that, and any rhythm part will seem like a pop.
Or tune to open G and dig into some Stones, for a looser feel and a totally different vibe.
The Black Crowes have some great open G songs too, similar to the Stones. The basic rhythm is easy to get down but there's tons of room for little fills and such to let your own style shine through.
Led Zep's "Friends". It's in a weird open tuning, and if you get the puoblished tab, it states that the rhythm is "world folk double swing", or something like that.
Anyway, ther are a couple of different complex rhythms going on, and because of the open tuning, there is very little fretting going on. There is some, and you have to jump in and out of the main rhythm and go to the "chorus" feel and back again.
It's totally a rhythm driven song, and very cool. Even my wife loves it when I play that. YIOu may be able to play it by ear, but if you follow the written rhythm you may find it a great exercise in rhythmic discipline. I know I keep coming back to that idea, but I have found often over the years that plenty of songs I play by ear sound fine, but then they sound even finer when I follow the original score more accurately. It's actualyl a lot harder to do, than just playing by ear too, but that is the point. Making your hands go where and importantly when you want them to go, not where and when they want to go. Good rhythm playing is all about great control. It's OK to play "out", but only once you can play "in".
think of it that way - if you can tap out a rhythm you can play rhythm.
tap out the rhythm you want to play first, then apply it to the guitar.
there's also comping and playing in the pocket - it's just more involved.
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It's actually designated "World Symphonic Folk Rock", double swing, which I thought was piss funny. Great rhythm workout though !!
I finally bought a capo a few weeks ago too, so I was able to tackle Bron-yr-Aur Stomp for the first time ever. That's another great work-out. More of that today.
Depends on how accurate you want to be and what your definition of hard is. Like a lot of Page stuff, it's not too hard to approximate it, but to play it really accurately is another bowl of noodles. Page's talents have been reduced by "teh internets" to an out-of-context quote of "nothing I did was very hard" and an ignorant repetition of "Page is sloppy", but the man had monster chops and copping his stuff accurately takes some doing.
The song is played in open F, low to high, D, A, D, F#, A, D with capo on 3.
(without the capo, it's open D), and is largely hybrid picked.
My hybrid picking is not up to the speed required in this song, so I'm just faking it with pick drags etc for the present.
The song is derived from Celtic folk music, and rather than having verse/chorus/verse/chorus/break/chorus type pop structure, it is more theme/variaton, with the vocal serving the instruments, rather than instruments serving vocal. There are a few timing changes too, and it jumps in out of double time feel, similar to Gallow's Pole.
I have a box set of Zep tabs books which has excellent notes on the structure of the song and how to get yourself into the right stylistic headspace. It's a rambunctious, joyous song, and unbridled enthusiasm will produce a better feel than cautious picking of the right notes.
Anyway, long answer to a simple question. I've never really dug into it, because I didn't have a capo, but I'm doing a lot of esoteric stuff now I've dropped the band thing.
Buckley's Hallelujah copped a hiding yesterday, and all the open tuning and capo songs are on the menu for a while. I don't know if you've done much open tuning or slide stuff, but it is great fun, just a pain to change tunings all the time.
Serriously, if you want to become a rhythm monster, open tunings are really great, cos it's all about the feel, with bugger all fretting. Buy the Led Zep III book and learn all those songs, learn some White Stripes, which will cover a lot of old delta blues stuff, like Death Letter etc. Then learn a bunch of metal songs, and nothing will be hard any more.