Rhythm is the bread and butter of all music.
For instance…
With poor rhythm…
- An orchestra would turn from majestic to messy in the swipe of a conductor’s baton. Imagine 100+ instruments all being out of time.
- A rock band would sound as messy as how a Led Zeppelin hotel room would have looked back in the 70s.
…And on the guitar, you can hear a mile off when a guitarist has poor timing.
They tend to speed up when strumming, slow down when tricky sections come about, and everything has an undercurrent of feeling “disjointed”.
It’s not always obvious why something doesn’t sound right, but you just know it is not right.
It’s like a feeling in your gut that something is “off”.
That’s why it’s key to keep working on your rhythm.
There are lots of ways to do this, of course, but one way is to work on your sub-divisions.
This is my favourite way.
Sub-divisions such as 1/4, 1/8, and 1/16 notes (otherwise called a crotchet, quaver, and semi-quaver)…
…Are key to music.
They are the building blocks that allow you to stack the bricks to create a “musical mansion”, as I think of it.
So, every day, it’s a good idea to run through your sub-divisions and be able to seamlessly move from one to the other and back again.
You can do this in a “heavy” way with a metronome, challenging scales, or intricate exercises.
I prefer the simple way of practising sub-divisions and I’ve created a little “sub-division” game.
Over the years, I’ve played about with variations of this game and I believe this is one of the main reasons why I went from having poor rhythm skills (and not being able to dance in time as a teenager)…
…To transforming my rhythm quickly.
It’s really helped my private students too.
Even now, the more I do of this game, the better my sense of feel and timing are.
Best of all, this game uses just three notes, it can be done in a few minutes and is a lot of fun.
I’m releasing this new lesson on the 1st of November in the Dan Thorpe Acoustic Academy.
Before those lessons are out, you can join today and get started with the “Kickstarter” lesson, which may just be a game-changer for your playing.
You can find out more about the academy below…
The Dan Thorpe Acoustic Academy
Have a great weekend
Dan Thorpe
Guitar Domination
P.S. This post was originally taken from Dan Thorpe’s private email list. To get blog posts like this sent to you which are full of great tips to make fingerpicking, strumming, and learning guitar more enjoyable (especially if you are over 40) join Dan’s list. It’s 100% free, HERE.
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