how to accompany on guitar

The role of the guitar. Acoustic guitar as accompanying instrument. How to accompany singing. Be a singer/songwriter guitar player.

From the Secret Guitar Teacher Site : secretguitarteacher.com/youtube/ssb.php?lp_id=1…

Video script:

I have been asked a few questions recently about the various different roles played by the guitar in modern music.

I decided that by including in my answer, some basic tips on how to approach learning to fulfil each of these roles, this might make a good mini-series of Secret Sound Bites for beginners.

Aged around 7 or 8, I first became aware of the guitar because of the popularity and outright mystique of one musical artist. No one who has followed a few of my lessons will be surprised to learn that this performer was Bob Dylan!

For those of my generation, Dylan remains the gold standard of singer/
songwriter/ guitarists. So this is what prompts me to start with the role of the guitar as an instrument for self-accompaniment.

Looking at several stellar examples of solo performers, it seems to me that there are a whole range of stylistic approaches to using the guitar to accompany yourself singing.

Strongly influenced by their folk music roots, performers like Bob Dylan and Joan Baez used a wide variety of finger picking patterns and relatively simple chords to accompany their vocals.

These artists wanted to keep the guitar playing very much behind the vocals, playing a supportive role. Neil Young, by contrast used a fairly solid, plectrum wielding technique. Creating his own unique style by separating out the bass notes, muting the strings and using a very percussive attack. I would argue that in his case, the guitar is more central to the structure of his overall sound.

Joni Mitchell's playing is another quality example of a highly-developed, very individual guitar playing style based mostly on strumming, rather than finger picking, but using more complex chords.

Meanwhile, another group of solo performers took basic finger picking patterns and developed them melodically as a foil to their strong ballad vocal style. James Taylor, Don McLean, Ralph McTell are examples that spring to mind here.

What I think is valuable to learn by listening to the recordings of all great solo performers, is how each of them developed their individual guitar playing to complement their vocal and song writing style.

As a beginner guitarist, you may feel that all this is of little relevance to you as you struggle to make all four notes of the F chord sound clean or to span a C chord without dislocating your finger joints!

But, as you work through the very physically difficult early stages of playing guitar, I want you to realise that all these great guitar players had first to lay exactly the same foundations as you are working on right now.

Whether supporting your own or someone else's singing, no matter what style you develop, you need first to be able to play chord changes cleanly and with good rhythmic continuity.

Even if, you want to develop the more intricate finger picking styles, I strongly recommend focusing first on developing a strong fretting hand and then on being able to play a variety of natural strumming patterns over a variety of chord changes.

From these foundations, you can go on to develop your own individual style, even if you switch to finger picking. And do this in a way that best supports your natural singing and/or song writing style.

I'll play out in a minute with a brief example of one of the first songs I ever learned on the guitar.