The Beginner Shuffle Pattern For Rock, Blues, Country, & Americana!

Hello everyone Welcome to Music Corner I'm your host Jonathan KIU, let's spend 30 minutes here getting better at the guitar, let's improve your skills by adding a new trick to your guitar tool bag, so grab your guitar and have your pick handy because it's I'll need a guitar pick for today's lesson. What we're going to do today has a few different names. You can call it random

pattern

. Blue

shuffle

. uh we'll learn it in the key of E in the key. of A and the key of D and all that will make more sense in a minute as we talk more about it.

What we're going to do today fits into the category of rhythm guitar I'm going to play for you for a minute so you can hear what we're going to do and then we'll talk more about this here's the blue

shuffle

pattern

in the key of E. I'm Using the two thick strings of the guitar, see if this sounds familiar to you. It's because you've heard it in a million songs, especially

blues

-related music. This type of pattern appears in

rock

songs. Appears in

country

music. The Beatles certainly use it. You can find many ways to use the

blues

shuffle pattern.

Beyond just blues music, so let's get into the nitty-gritty of what's really going on here, first of all, like I said before, this is rhythm guitar, what is rhythm guitar, rhythm guitar is the foundation Of any guitar-based music, the rhythm guitar keeps the beat going. You're not just the guitarist when you play rhythm guitar, you play so consistently that in effect you're also the drummer and you're also doing the bassist's job, you can imagine what you could build. a whole song on this nice steady rhythm guitar, so that's a rhythm guitar, that's one way to define rhythm guitar, so when would you use the shuffle pattern?

Well, you probably already know the chords if you're watching this show, you have a guitar. useful, you probably know some basic chords from C major to minor and that's great in future shows we will show you some tricks with those chords and help you play them better, but not all songs need those chords many times the rhythm guitar part doesn't need them needs. trust those chords that you may already know as well as G and E minor. Many times what is appropriate for a song is the shuffle pattern and the shuffle pattern has so many variations and so many possible uses that you will find many opportunities to use this if you are already a little familiar with the shuffle pattern, stay tuned because I might show you some tricks in ones you never thought of or, if you're an experienced guitarist, the way I describe it during today's show might help you teach someone in your family or a friend of yours how to do the shuffle pattern so you can have a good jam session because they're great for jam sessions, as you may already know, so let's get down to the nitty-gritty here.

The key to My Blue Shuffle pattern is great to start with now. Here's why it's called the E key. One of the strings you're going to use is your open E string, your fat open E string, right there, now there's only one of the strings. I'm going to strum with my right hand and that's the neighboring string, the fifth string, the a string, so let's take a look at our left hand for a second. Here your left hand has a pretty easy job starting with one finger on one. string, okay, that's my index finger on the fifth string, the second fret of the a string and notice I'm right on that fret.

I'm not back here all the way to the fret and there are a couple of reasons for that number one to get a good tone, but number two, I'm going to stretch the other fingers up, so you want to have the advantage of being nice and close, so let's leave the left hand here. I leave the sixth string completely open and I tighten the fifth string, second fret, now the six strings that are completely open, that's your E string, that's where the name of this pattern comes from, that's why it's called the E Shuffle pattern, okay, now let's go to the right hand, your right hand has a pretty easy job. to do and I'm going to show you a trick to make it even easier here's the job of the right hand, the right hand is just going to strum the two thick strings just with downstrokes like this, okay, now I'm technically playing the thick strings. the fifth string first and the fifth string second, but I'm doing it so fast that it ends up being a big sound.

Now let's stay here with the right hand for a second. Here's the classic shuffle beat. I describe it to my guitar students. like a kind of feeling or sound of uh riding a horse or even better riding a camel that ch ch ch ch ch Chun kind of feeling now, that's the classic way it has the random pattern, you know, it was developed a long time ago . When, of course, you can also play with a direct feeling. Hear the difference. This is what is known as direct feeling. It works great that way too. Now let's go back to the left hand because we're about to add perhaps the most important thing. the left hand does not remain stationary or static on that note, although you do want to have a good grip on the tip of the finger, we are about to add a second note to the mix, it is the ring finger and believe me, it has to do it. be the ring finger, you'll be tempted to use your pinky, don't do it, stick with the ring finger because we're going to use your pinky for more tricks later, okay, ring finger still reaching for the fifth string.

I'm going to cancel the index finger by pressing hard right there on the fourth fret. Well, now some of you might be having a hard time getting that far. Many people find it difficult at first and there is a trick. Well, stay with me on the left hand. the trick is to look at where my thumb is, my thumb is to the right, almost forming a triangle, see that actually helps my ring finger get there if my thumb is too far back here or somewhere strange, you might my ring finger can't reach it, but having my thumb like this makes a big difference, okay, here's another picture, make your thumb point towards the ceiling, okay again, that's just another way of saying, adjust your thumb to help you to reach for your ring finger, so take a look at your The thumb is currently pointing directly toward the ceiling, which will help you.

Well, here's the pattern. Let's make some music. I'm going to strum twice with just my index finger down. Oops, here we go and then I'm going to strum twice with my ring finger, but notice that I keep my index finger down because I'm going to need it again to get the tip of my finger stuck there with super glue 2 2 4 4 2 2 4 4 2 2 4 4 and when I say 2, two, I'm talking about the second fret and when I say 44, I'm talking about the fourth fret. Note that my hand is pretty stable, the only thing is Chang, sometimes my ring finger is off the guitar and other times it's on.

Let's do this together I'm going to slow down 2 2 4 4 2 2 4 4 2 2 4 and those of you who are newbie guitarists grab your e blue scale and start playing with us here, okay, now give yourself a break. for a minute because chances are if you're doing this for the first time your left hand is feeling a little cramped or a little sore and you want to pay attention to your body. It's okay, if you feel any cramps or pain or like it. I can't do that stretch, your body is sending you a message, you know it, so take a minute, stretch that hand out, shake it a little, okay, this is going to be easier in a second, but right now, yeah, Yeah.

You are doing this for the first time. Your ring fingers may feel a little sore, as I said a minute ago. You will be tempted to use your pinky instead of your ring finger. Don't do it right musically. It will sound good if you use your pinky finger instead of your ring finger musically it will sound good, but there is a reason I'm going to keep you with that ring finger because with practice the pinky can go all the way to the fifth. Worry, listen to this, this will be your first U-type ornament in the random pattern.

I still have my 22, my 44, I'm going to go up to the 55, okay, now you can do this no matter what size your hands are. do this those of you with smaller hands are going to need a little more practice you'll want to stretch your hand a little before playing during this here's how the pinky can add a nice touch okay, I'm going to do it Slow down though so that there is no doubt about what is happening. I'm going to strum twice with my potter finger twice with my ring finger added. Note that I keep my finger pointing down, even though my pointing finger stays right where it is. twice with my pinky remember we talked about where your thumb should be, don't forget about that thumb pointing towards the ceiling, okay, not here or anywhere else you know, and the last two will go back to the ring finger, so numerically I want you to think about this 22 44 55 44 and do it with me slowly 2 2 4 4 5 5 4 4 2 2 4 Now, one thing I found from teaching for over 20 years with my students is that there are a lot of students intellectually. they understand they understand everything they just learned but their hands can't do it as fast as their brain can understand it they get used to that feeling there are a lot of things when you learn to play the guitar and probably any musical instrument that is part of your brain understands the intellectual side of things, you get it, you get it, but for some reason you still can't get your fingers to do something that comes with a territory and hey, if you understand what your job is, but you can't quite get it yet while you're on the go To master the technique, it takes patience, it takes practice, uh, those of you who are still growing.

I hope there are some little kids watching those of you who are still growing. The positive side will be that they will be better at things like this simply by growing and getting longer fingers. Those of you who are done growing up, then it's time for you to stretch out those hands. We could ask his left hand to do something that corresponds to it. I never had to do it before, but anyone can do it. Alright. I'm ready to do a quick review to change things up. I'm going to do this straight feeling just for a little change here, but I'm going to do 2244.

I'm going to leave it. stick your pinky out for now because that's not the most important thing, okay, so let's do the E Shuffle with two thick strings, remember to use your index finger, ring finger, thumb pointing towards the ceiling, here it comes straight, feeling , here we go 2 4 4 2 2 4 4 2 2 4 if you're ready to go a little faster I'm going to increase the speed a little here we go 2 2 4 4 2 2 4 well, the number one thing is does the student and that would it be you, does the student understand what is happening? I bet the second thing to do is whether the student can execute it well.

Many people need a little practice at this and that is quite normal. Okay, understanding, execution and the final step is. can you make it musical? and we all spend a lifetime working to make these skills musical. Okay now, before we move on to the other random patterns, there are two more, but they are totally easy, especially if you understand this one, let me show you a quick one. Trick to Make Life Easier Let's assume you're right-handed for our purposes today your right hand is capable of doing a lot of cool things many times your right hand is limited in what it can do because the left hand is kind of a walk-on. fumble or can't do its homework and can't keep up with the right hand, so let me show you a trick and this will allow your right hand to have a little more freedom and be able to let go. a little bit, here's the trick, let's focus on the left hand for a second.

You already have the idea that your index finger is planted on the fifth string, the second fret, your thumb is basically pointing towards the ceiling, okay, now here's the trick and trust me. This is easy and effective. My index finger relaxes and actually plays the other four thin strings. The first four thin strings, you basically lay back at work and relax right there. Doing so dampens the four thin strings if I really did that. an effort to curl up like that, you know, maybe I would, maybe I could, you know, those thin strings would still be ringing, but I don't want those thin strings ringing, I'm not using them, so I call this relaxing, being lazy , OK? my index finger is very, very light, it has to be light, it is very lightly resting on the four thin strings now, why is that a good deal?

Because then your right hand won't have to stress if you accidentally strum too many strings, okay? now this is what i mean this is a two string pattern let's focus on the right hand for a second this is a two string pattern with a right hand but if i'm damping the four thin strings with the side or the edge of my finger index of the left hand, then my right hand may be a little aggressive and even a little powerful, but the listener will still only hear the two thin strings. You could strum three, four, or five strings, but those are going to sound dead, so check.

This notices how my right hand is going to be nice and aggressive. I'm probably striking some extra chords here, butthe listener can't hear those strings, so what's my point to you here right now. My point is that you can do it. You do yourself a huge favor if you are lazy with your left hand and who doesn't want to hear that from time to time, then let your index finger bow instead of arching your left hand index finger like most of us do when First start with the guitar so that we get clear timbre sounds. Do the opposite.

Still stay on the tip of your index finger, but let it bend over a little and cushion the four thin strings. Now you have to let the skin touch each other very lightly. Don't, don't squeeze with all your might. Okay, don't squeeze as hard as you can into that left hand. instead, use the tip of your finger like you've probably always done and then let it bow well so that the four thin strings sound good, so you've got that up to now. We're about halfway through the show today, so we're going to spend a few minutes here talking about the other two random patterns, random pattern A and random pattern D.

Now this is going to be real quick because if you understand what we just talked about, make in E Shel pattern. Let's take that knowledge and move everything that we just did, everything that we just learned, one rope down, that is, towards the floor, okay, now look at this, okay, look at my left hand, my hand left, this index finger is now on the fourth. string also known as second fret D string, okay and my ring finger is going to cancel it right here when I say cancel it, that's my way of encouraging you to keep that index finger stuck down, don't lift it up, okay, hold it . index finger stuck okay, let's look at the right hand for a second with the right hand my pick now let's talk about the right hand for a second here my pick is now hitting the A string and the D string I'm avoiding the fat string no longer there's a fat string, we're avoiding that one, we have the open A, that's why shuffle and D are called, so my choice is to just hit those two or, like I said, if you're nice and lazy with your left hand, you can play extra strings, but they won't sound like anything.

Okay, the A shuffle is the same as the E Shuffle, the same thing just move down one string, your right hand moves down one string, your left hand moves down one string, there are still two strings left. your guitar look at that now let's stay there on the left hand and learn the D random look my index finger just moved over one more now I'm on the thin third string aka second fret of the G string here we go so stay there on the left hand quick summary if you're playing index E Shuffle right here if you're playing index a shuffle here if you're playing index D shuffle here and guess what a and d and e these three random patterns, you can play a million songs with those three random patterns.

Note that your right hand will also move towards the random E pattern, you will focus on the two thick strings and a random pattern. fifth and fourth strings and the D random pattern the third and fourth strings are fine, a quick example of a song that can be played with these three random patterns, good hound, you're nothing but a hound, there it is e a shuffle crying all the time here comes the D you ate nothing but a D shuffle Dog crying all the time back to me a shuffle Here it comes e you've never caught a rabbit that's my e Shuffle to D you're not my friend , back to now, don't worry, I don't expect you to memorize all that.

I just want to give you a quick illustration of how the simple combinations you learn today, a d and e, can be combined to play a million. songs, especially songs that fit into the category of what they call 12 Bar Blues, okay, shuffle, D shuffle, and E Shuffle with just those three ingredients, you can play a million tunes, so let's back up a minute and talk about what we are doing today and why we are doing it, it is always good to have a reminder. The shuffle pattern is a great example of good rhythm guitar and is an alternative to playing the chords you're probably so familiar with.

In fact, it's okay, if you're jamming with a friend and he's playing an A chord, you can experiment with doing a shuffle while playing the A chord and see if that fits with the song you're playing, you can always try that. at least to replace a chord with a random pattern, it might fit the song even better than the chord, at least it's a good complement to what I would call a standard open position chord, so if you get the chance to play with another musician, I hope you do with another guitarist, especially if they know a song that uses d and e, let them strum the ad& and you strum or play the random a pattern and the random D pattern p and the random E pattern, eh, maybe Give a big compliment right now, what I want to do here for a second is present a new idea because they're great.

The random patterns they make make wonderful music. Any of you who have any type of guitar capo can get my hands on it. Lots of mileage from these three random patterns if you have a Guitar Capo. I have one style here, the Shove brand, but there are many different brands of Guitar Capos. What I want to do here is show you how you learned today. All three Shuffle patterns can be played in other keys thanks to the wonderful guitar device called the Capo, okay, look at this, I'm going to arbitrarily choose the third fret as my new, my new home, and this is what I mean by that.

I'm going to put my capo on, let's look at the left hand for a second. I'm going to put my capo right behind the third fret and clamp it closed, so I've effectively cut this whole part off the guitar, there's no sound coming from there at all, you don't hear anything at this point. I'm going to tell myself this is the new first fret here and this is the new second fret and so on. Okay, now I'm going to continue playing my e Shuffle, but I'm going to try this fret right here, which we all know is the fifth fret.

I'm going to treat it as if it were the second fret because now I have a new frame of reference. Again, I put the hood on. I arbitrarily choose the third fret just to choose a number that is my new zero, this is my new first fret, etc., listen, here's E Shuffle. Now in a new place, the same technique you've been learning today, just a new reference chart, okay, see how it compares to the ability that looks like the second fret and that looks like the fourth fret? You know what I'm saying, so what we're doing now, two thick strings, we called it the E Shuffle when we were.

Down here, believe it or not, now with the capo on the third fret, the name would now be known as the G Shuffle, but you didn't have to learn anything new. Did you just put a capo on it, slap it on, and use your new one? frame of reference, well, now you have a random combination in the key of G and when you drop it on a string, what we used to call a random combination a minute ago, believe it or not, that's combination C. Now a new and review one more. what used to be called D shuffle is now F Shuffle, okay, the names are not the important thing for today's lesson, the important thing is to know that you make an investment in a capo, for 10 or 20 dollars you get a good one. last a long time, the EA and D mixes you just learned can now be played on a million keys.

You heard me sing Hound Dog a minute ago. Well, what if you were playing in a band and the singer said that he was too short? Can't. sings so low could you play the hound dog but get it in a different key instead of relearning the whole song? I'll just put on a capo and find the right place to get the right key to help the singers sing their best when the singer sings his best the whole band sounds great okay now I didn't have to relearn the song. Remember I took my same three shuffles and my capo, maybe the fifth fret, maybe that's where the singer will sound best, okay, so a little add-on here.

Because by investing in a good capo, you'd be surprised how many of your guitar skills can be used in so many ways in different keys by putting on a capo instead of relearning an entire song. Capo can make a big difference, and so can we. I'll talk more about capos in a future show because, um, it can get a little mathematical when you start talking about applying a capo to the guitar, eh, but it's really easy and fun, okay, rhythm guitar, now I've talked a lot. today I want to remind you that I am always happy to answer your questions, so don't forget that if you have any questions about what we have been talking about today send me an email or call me and the phone number. and the email address will appear at the end of the show when we roll the credits and you may have seen the phone number appear earlier in the show as well.

Don't hesitate, if you have any questions, feel free to send us a message. Send an email because I know we covered a lot of information today and I want you to feel like you know what's going on. These patterns here are very useful for many styles of music, especially American popular music, you know, in general. but it can be a little overwhelming if you're playing a guitar for the first time or if you've never tried this type of guitar, it can feel like a lot of information has just been put in front of you and, uh, I wouldn't be surprised if you have some questions, no. feel free to call us or send us an email.

What we've talked about so far is the E Shuffle, the a shuffle and the D shuffle, they are excellent replacements for the EA. and the D chords, they are a great foundation for many songs, since we have a little time here. I'll give you a quick example of another way to use the random material in a way that sounds a little different. but it doesn't require any major new skills. I'm going to use E Shuffle as an example. Listen to one 2 3 4. Does it sound familiar to you? I'm going to do the same thing as part of a shuffle or based on a shuffle doesn't require any new skill, the right doesn't require any new skill, but at least not for the left hand, but for the right hand it's a little different, it's okay, but a clean sound and that could even sound.

You may have even heard something like this, so I'll show you what I'm doing here. The left hand is what we have been doing all along. Based on the two thick strings, in this case the index finger. two ring fingers moving up to four pinkies over five, but instead of strumming it this way, I'm going to show you how to strum it differently with the right hand, so let's go to the right hand for a minute, which I'm doing now. it's the fat string alone its neighbor fifth string the fat string alone fifth string with a four down ring finger down so I'll do it again slowly fat string fifth string second fret what I've been calling two fat strings fifth string four ring finger I'm not using the pinky yet, those of you who might be super perceptive, let's stay on the right hand for a second here, if you're really looking closely, you can notice that I'm doing the phase as an upward movement. and the fifth string as a downstroke up down up down up down up down that creates a nice little pulse, can you feel that the little upward pulses tend to be a little bit softer and sound downward?

The strokes have a little more emphasis just because of gravity, okay, okay. so you get a little bit more uh here's another embellishment or another use for the random pattern, okay, in this case, we won't play both strings simultaneously, thick string, fifth string, you could call it sixth string, the fifth string, okay, Now what I'm doing. I'll do it here while I say goodbye. I'm going to play with you by making this new version of the random pattern again. My name is Jonathan KIU. You've been checking out the music corner. I hope you enjoyed today's show.

Don't forget to call. or send an email and stay tuned for future shows, I'll show you more guitar tricks and thanks for watching, here we go.