Pick up any old thing and join in!
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VERY Basic Guitar
This is part of the "How To Folk" series of articles. In an effort to "jump start" your enjoyment of Folk music and your ability to join in, no matter what instrument you play, we are providing some very basic notes about guitar chords and how to recognize them, even if you don't play guitar.
Note: - This part of the Folkarama page, which is dedicated to helping beginners "get into" Folk music and join Folk communities as easily as possible, with simple articles and links to resources that provide hands-on instruction in traditional acoustic instruments.
Folkarama, in turn, contains many references to more extensive articles and resources in Paul Race's CreekDontRise.com site, as well as other related pages.
Knowing a Little Bit Can Help a Lot
Even if you never intend to play guitar, in public, or at all, knowing a few common chords can make it far easier to join in. If a guitar player leading a song doesn't tell you what key you're in, or what chords they're using, you can often figure it out just by watching his or her left hand. Don't laugh. Folk musicians do this all the time. There are other ways to predict, or at least guess, which chords a song will use, but this is an invaluable shortcut.Why Guitar?
Guitar is the default for 98% of people playing Folk or Folk-influenced music. Because I play guitar, I can follow along on almost all of that repertoire simply by watching the guitar player's left hand, even if I'm playing mandolin, dulcimer, banjo, autoharp, ukulele, or any other instrument.Again, this isn't about becoming proficient on the guitar, it's about basic knowledge that will help you "get on board" with new songs or new circles of musicians far more quickly.
Not to mention that ability to play some chorded instrument will help you write songs and create harmony parts when you're singing with other folks. Or providing a rudimentary accompaniment when you're out and about, and someone says, "Say, play that song you were telling me about."
Resources
There are plenty of guitar instruction materials, online, of course. But we are working on a few that will help you learn the most basic, but necessary, information quickly.The current resources we have published are:
- Meet Your Guitar - a very basic intro to holding, tuning, and picking the guitar.
- Three Magic Chords - a three-part series to introduce enough easy guitar chords to get you started on playing hundreds of 2- and 3-chord songs. Articles include::
- 3-Chord Songs in D - A list of songs you can easily play in D, using G and A7. (When you get a little farther along, you can also play many of them in E, using E, A, and B7. Or in C, using C, F, and G7. Yes, we will show you all of those chords eventually.)
- What is a Three-Chorder? - Explains "3-chorders," and how understanding them will help you learn or follow along on thousands of songs without sheet music or lead sheets.
- More Useful Chords - "Next steps" to expand your range and enable you to play even more songs, including:
- C and C9 Chords
- It's All Relative - Am and Em
- A Major - the Fiddler's Friend
- E Major, a Cornerstone of Blues and Folk
- F Major - Set your C Chord Free!
- 3-Chord Songs in G - A list of songs you can easily play in G using G, C9 (or C) and D7. (When you get a little farther along, you can also play many of them in A, using A, E7 and D.)
- Barre Chords - The Swiss Army Knife of Guitar - You may not need them much, but you should know how they work at least.
- About Capos - A necessary tool that can become a crutch if you rely on it too much.
Other resources should follow soon.
Conclusion
These suggestions are just a start, of course. But for all of its variations and even contradictions, Folk music is a discipline in itself, and a rewarding one of that. The more you play, sing, practice, and hang, the more you'll get out of it, the faster you'll learn in the future, and the better you'll be at whatever you already do have "under your belt."Other resources will be listed as I get to them.
Sister Sites
Other sites we started to keep this site from getting too big to be useful include:
- CreekDontRise.com is a repository of articles about Folk music and the instruments on which it has been traditionally played.
The "Acoustic" page includes a long list of articles including maintenance and playing tips on all sorts of traditional acoustic instruments.
RiverboatMusic.com is a buyers' guide for acoustic and traditional instrument from a musician's point of view, focusing on the uses, reliability, and practicality of various instruments, and not just the marketing hype about the shape of the fret markers or whatever.
For instruments like dulcimers that have mostly small manufacturers or cheap imports, we try to tell you what to look for, irrespective of brand.
Momma Don't 'Low includes a free e-mail newsletter that discusses all of those topics above and more. We plan to include other features as time permits.
Note - If you wish to sign up for our newsletter and ask a question at the same time, please click on the Momma Don't 'Low newsletter button to learn more and to get a link to our signup form.
PaulRaceMusic.com is the "landing page" for Paul's own musical endeavors, plus many memoirs and blogs about music and the music business.
ClassicTrainSongs.com describes railroad songs that every train lover should know. Or at least know about.
- SchoolOfTheRock.com has articles about Christian music, Christian music careers and performance, Christian living in general, and vintage saxophones, another of Paul's interests. This site has separate newsletters, etc., by the way - there isn't a lot of overlap with the Momma Don't 'Low(tm) newsletters.
For information about other music collections and projects, check the links at the bottom of this page.
Whatever else you get out of our pages, I hope you come away with some great ideas for "sharing the joy."
And please stay in touch!
- Paul Race
All material, illustrations, and content of this web site is copyrighted (c) 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006,
2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 by Paul D. Race. All rights reserved.
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