Description
In this week’s lesson, you’ll learn how to create a solo Bluegrass-style arrangement using just strings 4, 3, and 2 with a simple strum pattern and minimal fretting. Great for improving rhythm, melody, timing, and musical feel all at once.
Part 1 - Free Guitar Lesson
Part 2 - For Premium Members
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Slow Walkthrough
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Video Tablature Breakdown
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I love to keep it simple. Thanks Brian
Bar 17 and on…brilliant imho.
Love it! That reminds me of a song we sang as a kid in Sunday school. Do Lord, oh do Lord, oh do remember me!
My first thought when I heard it!
So cool Brian! This opens up lots of room for jamming with the not so secret anymore G chord. Great way to get a bit more bluegrass under the fingers. This will be fun. 😁🎸
Another very good one very helpful!
Very nice ! Thank You!
I found it interesting and will have a lot of fun playing this rhythm while using these chord ideas. Like the way it builds upon the strumming lesson from a week or so ago.
This is “This little light of mine”, correct?
it could be if you wanted it to be … you’d have to change the structure slightly but you could use those notes to create that melody
That’s the one I was trying to think of! Reminds me of when Brian was teaching us to use any simple tune you know and use it as a melody to come up with something else that’s
Simple, but a very effective technique that produces a full pleasing sound.
No matter if you like that bluegrassy sound or not, this is an excellent way to work on your rhythm and sound great while doing it. I think there is an older lesson that this would go with nicely as well. I’ll have to dig it up out of the archives.
lots of fun thanks always look forward to Friday for lesson
Nice touch with staying within the 4,3,and,2 strings on the guitar and getting so much out of it. Loved the concept and had never thought of it the way you explained it.
Great lesson, I just seem to get a lot out of these simple ideas. Easy to understand and follow, the Bluegrass tunes just seem to have an easy melody and rhythm to follow.
Much appreciated Brian
Truly an Active Melody, and keeping the rhythm section going makes it very musical!
What a great lesson! Fun to play, even though I can’t play it full speed yet.
Cool! This one is great!
I’ve always enjoyed utilizing open strings in my song renditions but this lesson really increased my appreciation for the sound and inspired some ideas. Perhaps a remake of ripple?
Thank you Brian! I am so grateful for your ideas and guidance… I talk about you with my musical colleagues as if I sit down with your every week for a one-on-one lesson. The fact that your lessons make me feel as if you are teaching me one-on-one is one the wonderful gifts that you have developed as a teacher.
Check out Eric Blackmon’s explanation of standard tuning and how other triads are also found in open tuning https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hc7OJqQYaA&t=21s after 1:53. You might find it interesting. Great lesson as usual by the way.
Cool stuff. Thanks for sharing… But you got to hand it to Brian for just putting the “rubber on the road”!
Great link, thanks, I see what he is saying and how it connects and expands on Brian’s point.
Thanks. I enjoyed that!
Brian, that was a blast! Simple and fun. Thank you.
My dad was in a country band when I was a kid. This song was a staple, they would play it every night . Later years I would play guitar and harmonica with my dad . What I wouldn’t give for just one more night . Thanks for the memories Brian.
Jesus Is On The Mainline, tell him what you want…
Thank you, I’ve just spent half an hour singing snippets of that, trying to recall the song title. 🤣🙈
This is a very cool approach, I agree with y’all. I used to play (or try to) Ry Cooder’s Jesus Is On The Mainline in open G. Brian’s approach here works great. And no need to retune!
I hear Cooder playing the root G’s relative E minor as a passing chord (which is also easy to find here), before landing on the last IV – V – I of the turnaround.
Very interesting lesson packed with good ideas, many thanks Brian.
Thanks for showing us how to take a simple concept that can be used in so many ways. Very cool.
This my kinda jam. Love the rhyme and the ringing open strings. I think using only three strings will make it eas8er to improvise. Great lesson!
Great lesson Brian!! Even in the details!
The moral of the story:
Never underestimate the importance of repeating key ideas over and over in new ways.
You caused me to think differently about the CAGED A Shape as a result of your comment that the open D-G-B strings were an open triad for the G chord.
Now that you said it that way… I have an easy way of remembering that an A shaped chord is made up of 5-1-3… so I can more easily remember where the 5 (or 3) is located in that shape.
I had never noticed that tuning nuance even though I’ve played up and down many times.
There’s magic in that repetition my man! Thanks again!!
Gotta Travel On is the song I hear.
Wonderfull lesson Brian. Full of things to learn and very fun. It opens a new chapter of guitar playing for me. I love the strum pattens you’re teaching in the last weeks.
Can you please tell me the microphone you use to record the acustic guitar ?
Thanks
here’s a link to the mic I used: https://www.eartrumpetlabs.com/products/microphones/edwina
Hi, thanks for all great lessons, Im a new member and I find your videos so inspirational!
I have a technical question about this kind of songs with a lot of open B and in other cases open high E strings.
For me they tend to drown, in this case, the melody on the fourth string. I try to be light on the up stroke, but I cant seem to get it right. Any ideas? Any videos on this topic?
I understand its hard when you cant hear me play…
I also have the same “problem” when I jam old times style with long parts playing one chord, especially D. Does my question make any sense?
It’s not just avoiding the high E, it’s also not striking the 5th string either. To avoid that, it is possible to mute the 5th string with the tip of your left forefinger as you play the 4th string melody. Developing your touch and feel for targeting sets of strings is just something you have to work on and loop over and over making small adjustments if necessary. Even picking a single string cleanly is very challenging at first. Brian did a great job going over the strumming patter in this lesson. You just have to work on strumming all three strings as if they were the only strings on your instrument in a tight enough pattern not to contact the other surrounding strings. I know it seems difficult at first, but you can always slow it way down and do many repetitions at slow tempo to get the mechanics down first. Do not do many wrong repetitions,
The rhythm strumming pattern for the three string triad is first: down, down, down, up, down, up. It would be counted 1 2 3 & 4 &
But let’s break it down into components:
The first part is all down strokes: open D, then all three strings of the triad. (loop this part over and over in rhythm counting 1 2 3 4)
Then next part is alternate down/up strokes: open D, open B, open D, open B (again, loop this part on it’s own over and over in rhythm counting 1 & 2 & 3 & 4&)
Now try combining the two together using the count of 1 2 3 & 4 &
Once you get that down, it’s time to start playing the melody line. If you have anymore questions, just let me know. I just sent a friend request to you.
Thanks. I’l just have to keep working on my struming psttern then.
“I heard there was a secret chord”
That low D string is basically playing G mixolydian vertically, could do same on the high E or detune to D for extn effect.
Great stuff Brian. Easy on the fingers on the fret board yet very rewarding fast. So much fun!
Great lesson Brian. I’d like to see more like this.
Good lesson… I love Bluegrass!!! “This little Light of Mine… Do Lord and Somebody touched me” All good songs for this lesson. Thank you so much… And such a different sound and a easy way to do it. Wow!!
This is so fun to play. Great lesson!
The more you play this the more fun it gets; seems an intro to bluegrass flatpicking. More of this would be fun! Thanks for your great lessons😀
As with a lot of players, I struggle with timing and memorizing the material. With this lesson using only quarter and eighth notes, and very little syncopation. And simple melody. I am able to get the timing and play the melody fairly quickly. It’s satisfying not to struggle all the time. Thanks for a lesson that fits my little pea brain.
Thanks Brian. I have learned so much from you.
I sometimes use the 4.3.2 open G when changing chords or getting to another section of the fretboard.
Relative newcomer here. Question about the pdf tab notation. Do the stems have anything to do with strumming pattern or are they merely another marker for note duration (e.g. quarter or eighth note)?