# Guitar/Rhythm

Good rhythm is almost essential to good guitar, and probably the
simplest to understand. Let\'s start with some terms:

Beat\
Bars\
Time signature

All bars (measures) consist of a number of beats. A very easy way to
grasp the idea of bars is to learn a 12 bar blues. The time signature
shows the number of beats in a bar and the note that will be used for
counting. For example, 4/4 - the top of the fraction shows the number of
beats and the bottom of the fraction shows the note unit used for
counting; which in this case is a quarter note. 4/4 is usually referred
to as common time. It may appear on the stave of printed music as either
4/4 or as a \"C\" as shown below. Whichever way the same information is
given - the piece of music has four beats to a bar and the counting note
is the quarter note.

!4/4, or common time

All the notes in Western music have a fractional relationship. We know
that in 4/4 time we will be using the quarter note as the reference for
counting. Play an open string note slowly and repeatedly while counting
in fours. Now play the open string note only when you count 1 and 3. You
have just played a half note. To play eighth notes count
\"1-and-2-and-3-and-4-and\" in the same time you would normally count
\"1-2-3-4\". For sixteenth notes the count is
\"1-e-and-a-2-e-and-a-3-e-and-a-4-e-and-a\". Here is a list of note
values used in Western music:

whole note\
half note\
quarter note\
eighth note\
sixteenth note

In common time a whole note consists of four quarter notes or four
beats. Each half note is two beats and quarter note is one beat.

There are other possible signatures, 3/4, 2/4, 6/8, 7/4 are some.
However it must be noted that over 90 percent of the music ever written
has been in common time. Triple time or 3/4 is the second most used time
signature. Once again the bottom of the fraction tells us that the
counting note is to be a quarter note but this time each bar is to only
have a count of 3. This is easily felt by playing and counting
\"1-2-3\". Triple time may also be called \"Waltz time\". Since time
signatures are fractional the question will arise as to what is the
difference between 3/4 timing and 6/8 timing. If you come across a 6/8
time signature it is best to take this as an indication to play the
piece of music \"briskly\" with even emphasis. It must be remembered at
all times that 4/4 timing is the most widely used time signature
especially so in rock and pop music.

To further apply the concept of beats, bars and time-signatures; let\'s
play a simple chord progression. Play G and D over two bars with a 4/4
time signature.

It will look like this (each measure separated by a pipe and each beat
denoted with a dash):

`G         D`\
`|- - - - |- - - -|`\
` v v v v  v v v v `

The \"v\" from now on denotes a downstroke and a \"\^\" denotes an
upstroke. Here. you are playing a downstroke on each beat (each tick of
the metronome) and nothing in between. Some people find it easier to
practice this without playing any chord, and muting all the strings. Try
that too.

Let\'s do some upstrokes now.

`G         D`\
`|- - - - |- - - - |`\
` v^v^v^v^ v^v^v^v^`

Here, you are downstroking on the tick (intuitively called the
\'downbeat\') and upstroking in between the ticks ( the upbeat. A good
way to do this is to count your beats, \"one-and two and three and
four\" going down on the numbers and up on the ands. Most strumming
patterns you can here this going on, but slightly more complicated. Make
sure you are going down on downbeats and up on upbeats. A lot of people
who start playing tend to not follow this, and it mixes up your rhythm
badly. If you keep to this pattern, even with more complicated patterns,
you will not lose track of the beat.

If you listen to the above pattern, it will start to sound boring. But
it is the basis of all other patterns. When you hear a more complicated
pattern, most likely the player is missing some strums. Like this:

`G         D`\
`|- - - - |- - - - |`\
` v^v^v^v^ v^v^v^v^`

